


We Can Change

by eventualprocrastination



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Despair, Drama, Eventual Romance, F/M, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Love, Non-Canonical Character Death, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-05-19 04:49:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 67
Words: 677,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5954233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eventualprocrastination/pseuds/eventualprocrastination
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Sophia was never bit and turned into a walker and, as a result, it set into effect a series of changes for the group. Not everything happens the same way anymore. Not everyone who originally died, does. Not everyone who lived, does either. New paths are forged, and a new face emerge and take up residence in the lives of the survivors. [Rick/OC]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sophia

 

 _"Just because everything is different doesn't mean anything has changed."_ — Irene Peter

* * *

  
The woods were not the most ideal place to be at night, but Joanna Moore needed the cover to get away from a large herd of deadies that she had accidentally stumbled upon coming out of Atlanta. Her car had broken down the day before and she didn't have the tools or know-how for syphoning gas out of the abandoned cars on the side of the road, so she had to throw her backpack on and continue by foot. That was when the deadies seemed to come out of nowhere. Or maybe they had been behind her the entire time but she had been too lost in her daydreams to notice them approaching.

When their gasps and snarls grabbed her attention, she had thrown a terrified look over her shoulder and jumped over the guardrail along the side of the road and tried running down the embankment. She caught her foot in a clump of soil and lost her balance. She rolled somersaulted and rolled the rest of the way down, landing on her backpack like an overturned turtle. A few of the deadies had begun to follow after her, so she had to get back up to her feet as quickly as possible.

Once she was upright again, she hobbled into the woods, wondering if she had sprained her ankle or not. It didn't hurt that bad but it wasn't exactly feeling wonderful either. She couldn't focus on that, though. She had to focus on getting away and finding someplace to hide.

Joanna, or Jo, as she preferred being called, did have a gun until recently when she ran out of bullets. Also she had anymore to protect herself was a pocket knife, which would require getting up close and personal to the deadies; something she'd rather not do if it could be helped.

Pushing branches and leaves out of her face as she ran, Jo found a pretty gnarly tree, literally and figuratively. It was perfect for climbing; something her father would've built a treehouse in for her when she was a child. Reaching up, she grabbed onto the branches with her hands and then lifted her legs, hooking her feet here and there to climb up high enough that the deadies couldn't reach her when they finally came that way.

Balancing in-between the trunk and a limb, she held on tight and waited with bated breath when two of the deadies began to amble on by, none the wiser as to where she'd gone and she smiled with success. But she wasn't about to count her chickens before they hatched. She watched them for a good while, just wandering around the vicinity, not really going anywhere and she wondered if they could still smell her close by. All she could do was stand there and wait, for however long she had to.

After an hour, they seemed to finally get distracted by a small animal in the brush and amble away, but Jo wasn't convinced it was safe to climb down just yet. Instead she merely bent her knees and sat down on the branch to give her tired legs a rest from standing in the same position for so long. She turned her body slightly, so that she could sit on the limb with a leg dangling down over either side and she could lean back upon the trunk.

Sighing to herself, she just sat there and let her mind wander for a while.

However, a while turned into something longer than that because at some point she must've dozed off. When she woke, it wasn't as dark anymore. In fact it was pretty damn bright out beyond the canopy of trees. Reaching carefully behind her, she pulled her backpack off and sat it on the limb in front of her. Quietly unzipping the front pouch she pulled out a pocket watch that used to belong to her father. Opening it up, she checked the time to see that it was nearly one in the afternoon.

Jo couldn't believe how long she'd slept but she figured her body must've needed it.

Just as she was preparing to climb down out of the tree, she heard the rustling of leaves underfoot and someone panting.

Peering through the trees, Jo spotted a young girl running along by herself and holding a doll in her hands. Her natural instinct took over and she leaned forward to make herself more known.

"Hey. Girl," she called out, spooking the poor thing.

She was thin with chin length blonde hair and her doll looked considerably soiled. When the girl looked around and spotted Jo in the tree, she seemed less scared.

"Hey," Jo said again. "It's all right. Is something chasing you?"

The girl hesitated, which was understandable; stranger danger and whatnot. "Not anymore," she finally replied, hugging her rag doll to her chest. "I was supposed to wait for Rick to come back for me but, if he didn't, he showed me which direction to go; to keep the sun on my left shoulder."

"Is Rick your father?"

The girl shook her head. "No. My dad's dead. Rick's a cop. He's, like, the leader of the group I'm with," she said, looking around. "Walkers were chasing me into the woods and Rick came after me to help."

Jo figured that walkers are what the girl referred to as deadies. She liked the sound of the word walkers. It seemed more befitting. "Walkers chased me into the woods last night. That's why I'm in this tree." Climbing down, Jo landed on her feet with a soft thud and threw her backpack over her left shoulder. "Do you want me to help you find your group? You shouldn't be alone."

The girl tensed as Jo approached. "I don't know you."

"My name's Jo. It's short for Joanna. I used to teach first grade." She held her hand out to the girl to shake as a sort of peace offering.

The girl considered and then relented, reaching out and shaking Jo's hand. "I'm Sophia."

"Hello, Sophia," Jo smiled. "Is your mom with that group?" Sophia nodded. "She's probably worried sick about you."

"Are _you_ with a group?"

"No, I'm by myself."

"Were you ever with a group?"

Jo shook her head. "No, not really. I mean, I've been around people after everything happened, but I haven't traveled or lived with them." Jo offered her hand again to Sophia. "Here, take my hand so we don't get separated."

Once more, Sophia hesitated, but she really had no options. She was clearly lost, on top of being alone. Placing her hand in Jo's she smiled appreciatively. "Do you have any kids?"

"Just the ones I used to teach," Jo replied as she began to walk along with the girl. "Do you have brothers or sisters?"

Sophia shook her head. "No, it's just me." She looked at Jo's hand she was holding and became curious. "You're married?"

Jo nodded. "Yes."

"What happened to your husband? You said you're alone."

"He got sick when the outbreak first happened. I locked him in our bedroom when he died and came back. I was scared and didn't know what to do. All my neighbors had either left or died. I couldn't call for help and there was nothing I could do for him anymore, so I just packed some things and I left as well."

"You didn't kill him? After he turned, I mean."

"I couldn't," Jo regretted. "I wasn't strong enough then."

"Are you strong enough now?"

Jo smirked. "I'd like to think so. None of us really have a choice anymore, do we? If we want to survive in this world now, we have to do things that are really scary, but very necessary."

After several minutes of walking hand in hand in silence, they both stopped dead in their tracks when they spotted a few walkers coming near.

"Do you have a gun?" Sophia asked nervously, tightening her grip on Jo's hand.

"Only a pocket knife," she replied. "But I try not to use it because I would have to be real up close to those things and I'd rather not if I don't have to." Gesturing a different way, as she spotted two more walkers not far behind within the trees, she pulled Sophia's arm. "C'mon, let's go this way."

The pair hurried through the trees, but the walkers were on their trail. As they came upon a creek, Jo believed they had had lost the walkers. She breathed a sigh of relief as they stopped. Looking around, everything seemed quiet and peaceful, with the exception of their breathing and the babbling of the water.

"Where do we go now? How do we find my mom?" Sophia asked.

"If you got chased into the woods, you were probably on that main road, right?" Off Sophia's nod, Jo bit her lip and tried to figure out their next step. "I don't think we can go back the way we came without running into those deadies."

"Can you call them walkers? Deadies sounds sad."

Jo leaned down and smiled at Sophia. "Sure. Walkers, it is." Straightening back up, she looked around and then pointed upstream. "I think we might be able to continue this way and then circle back at some point. You're gonna have to bear with me though. I don't know these woods."

"It's okay. Thank you for helping."

"You're welcome. And thank you. I was starting to get really lonely on my own."

Sophia reached for Jo's hand again as the pair walked into the water. "You can be with my group when we find them. We lost some people a couple days ago. It'll be nice to have someone new."

"I'd be honored."

Jo and Sophia walked along the edges of the creek, staying away from the trees for the time being when they came upon a small tree trunk lying across the shallow water. While stepping over it, Sophia lost her balance and slipped. As she fell to her knees, she let go of Jo's hand and her hold on her rag doll, which got lodged under the trunk. Jo was quick to grab the girl and check to see if she was physically all right. When Sophia looked down at her doll, she went to pick it back up, but stopped and jumped back when something caught her attention coming from the trees on the side of the creek.

Jo noticed it, too.

It was one of the walkers from earlier.

"Let's give it the slip," Jo advised.

She led Sophia out of the creek and back up into the trees just as the walker stumbled down into the water, knowing its footing wouldn't be as nimble as theirs. As they ran a little ways, parallel to the creek, they cut down into the creek once more, before climbing back up into the trees again; zig-zagging to throw the walker off.

When they were in the clear again, they continued to walk in silence for quite a while.

"I'm hungry," Sophia mumbled.

Jo looked down at her and stopped. Removing her backpack, she held it in front of her and unzipped the larger pouch. She pulled out a can of sardines and offered it to Sophia. "It's not the greatest thing to eat — in fact, it smells horrible — but it's better than nothing."

Sophia took the can and stuck her finger into the tab, pulling the lid back. As she brought it closer to her face and got a whiff, she made a face that looked as if she would vomit. "You weren't lying. It smells like a sewer."

Jo laughed. "I know. It's gross," she agreed. "Try holding your nose while you eat them. That way you'll only taste them, not smell them."

Wincing, Sophia sat down on a rock and set the can on her lap. Plugging her nose with her left hand, she picked one sardine up with her right and hesitantly put it in her mouth. Jo's suggestion seemed to work and Sophia was able to eat the remainder of the can without any urge to throw up. Jo took a seat beside her on a smaller, neighboring rock and pulled out a can for herself. It was best to eat while they could.

Afterward, she pulled a water bottle out of her backpack for them to share before suggesting they start walking again.

Soon enough they had made their way upstream enough where they could cross over to the other side where it wasn't too steep. They scaled the slight incline together and then continued through the trees, but in the direction they had originally come from, just on the opposite side of the water; with hopes of making it all the way back to the road before sundown.

Running away from the walkers had put them slightly off track and Jo didn't want to admit, but she was considerably turned about.

The tree coverage overhead was so thick, she could barely tell which direction the sun was heading. All she had was her father's pocket watch which told her it was now after four in the afternoon. In a few more hours it would be getting dark again and if they hadn't made it to the road by then, they would need some place safe to take cover in for the night. But that was considering they could find anything at all.

"Did you and your husband want kids?" Sophia asked after a while when the silence became tiresome.

"Yeah, we did eventually."

"What was his name?"

"Oscar."

Sophia giggled. "Like the Grouch."

"Oh, he was anything but," Jo assured with a smile. "He was a wonderful man; very loving and very funny. He always made me laugh."

"What did he do? What was his job?"

"He was a guidance counselor at the high school, the same one we went to when we were teenagers."

"Were you, like, childhood sweethearts?"

"We were," Jo nodded. "We first met in second grade. We were in the same class. We didn't become friends, though, until middle school, and then we didn't start to date until the end of junior year. Neither of us had dates to prom, so we went together and we just kinda realized we really liked each other. We've been together since."

Sophia smiled. "How long were you married?"

"Five years this past April."

"I'm sorry your husband died."

Jo sighed, looking straight ahead. "Me, too." Thinking back to the girl's earlier comment, she added, "I'm sorry your dad died."

Sophia shrugged. "He was mean and he hurt my mom a lot," she admitted. "Is it wrong that I'm not sad he's dead?"

"I don't think it's wrong. We all feel differently when people die. I think it's perfectly all right if you're not sad or don't miss him. If he was mean and hurt your mom, it's probably for the best he didn't make it."

"Walkers got him," Sophia continued. "My mom destroyed his head with an ax so he wouldn't come back, but she was crying while she did it. I don't think she knew I saw her, but I did."

Jo couldn't think of anything else to say to that and decided to just let the silence fall between them again.

Despite the growing lateness of the hour, the heat was still just strong. Releasing her hand from Sophia's, Jo pulled a hair tie off her wrist and pulled her long blonde hair up into a ponytail. She also pulled tightened the long sleeve shirt she'd had wrapped around her waist that felt like it was slipping.

Looking up at the trees, she knew she would have to make a decision about what they would do about when night fell.

"Sophia?"

"Yeah?"

"It's gonna be dark soon enough and trying to find our way back to the road at night is gonna be very difficult and not safe. We're gonna need to find some place to sleep for the night," she said. "We'll start out again first thing in the morning."

"But my mom—"

"—won't go anywhere without you. No mother would," she assured, crouching down to Sophia's level. "Your group is probably out looking for you right now, but even they won't be able to do much tonight."

"Where do we go then?"

Jo shrugged, looking through the trees. "The woods gotta come to an end somewhere. Maybe we can find a house or a barn to sleep in. Does that sound okay?"

Sophia nodded.

Standing back up, Jo took the girl by the hand again and veered slightly to their left. As they walked along, Jo could sense that Sophia was occasionally looking up at her. She smirked slightly at the attention, assuming the girl wanted to ask her something or just talking in general.

"What is it?"

"What—oh. Nothing."

Jo smiled knowingly. "Go on. What's on your mind?"

"What happens if we don't find my mom or my group? What happens to me then?"

"Well, I won't leave you. We'll stick together," Jo insisted, giving Sophia's hand a reassuring squeeze. "We won't give up hope of finding your mom."

"But what if we never do? What if she's been eaten by walkers? What if my whole group is dead?"

Jo stopped walking again and looked down at Sophia. "Like I said, I won't leave," she repeated. "But let's not think about the negative possibilities. We need to focus on the positive. It's what'll keep us going."

Sophia nodded.

After another half hour of walking, the girl tugged firmly on Jo's hand and pointed at something through the trees. Initially, Jo thought it was another walker or two, but then she saw there was a clearing up ahead, and some sort of building.

"Good eye, Sophia."

Leading the girl toward the clearing, she hesitated at the edge, looking out for any walkers. Pursing her lips, Jo whistled. She waited a few more moments until she was content there was nothing around in the immediate area.

The building was an old, rundown Victorian farmhouse that had been abandoned long before the outbreak occurred. Walking up to it with Sophia, they approached the front door. Jo let go of Sophia's hand and pulled her pocket knife out of her pocket and then took her backpack off, handing it to Sophia. Gesturing for the girl to stay right there and not make a sound, Jo pushed open the front door and stepped inside. But, before going any further, she banged her fist on the wall and whistled.

Then she waited.

Nothing came out from the other rooms, so Jo leaned her head back outside and beckoned for Sophia, letting her know the coast seemed clear. Jo then had Sophia remain in the kitchen while she checked the upstairs, which was also clear.

She figured that if this place had been abandoned for years, there would be no real reason why any walker would have a reason to be drawn to this place. There were no animals or other signs of life. Even though the walkers could hear sounds, smell human life and see movement, those senses were limited and seemed triggered by instinct rather than cognitive thought. It was like muscle memory. The brain functioned enough to keep them going but they were nothing more than mindless creatures now; albeit dangerous mindless creatures.

"I think this place will do for tonight," Jo deduced. "What do you think?"

Sophia nodded. "Yeah."

"We'll sleep downstairs, in case we need to get out quick. I'll bring down some blankets."

"I'll sleep in the pantry. I'll put the blankets on the floor."

"You can have the couch," Jo insisted.

Sophia shook her head adamantly. "If something comes into the house while we're sleeping, I can hide in there."

Considering this, Jo nodded. "All right; if that'll make you feel safe."

"It will."

"Alright."

After settling in for the evening, Jo and Sophia sat around the kitchen table, eating more of the sardines. There was a small trash bin that they used for discarding the empty cans, something Jo insisted they use.

Just because the world fell apart didn't mean etiquette had to.

While Sophia busied herself with making the pantry floor comfortable for sleeping with a pillow and blanket, Jo sat on the back stoop to the house with her hands folded between her legs. She was watching the sun setting below the horizon and thinking about how she had survived another day in this changed world.

"Jo?" came Sophia's voice.

Jo turned her head and peered back inside the house. "Yeah?"

"I found some cards. Will you play Go Fish with me?"

Jo looked back toward the sunset and smiled. "Sure thing."

Standing up, Jo pulled the back door shut and headed into the kitchen.

"We won't be able to play long, though. It's getting too dark," Sophia frowned, holding a pack of playing cards in her hands.

"Never fear," Jo quipped. "I have a few candles and matches in my backpack. See if you can find a short jar or an empty food can."

Heading out to the front door, Jo walked down from the porch and crouched down to scoop a big handful of dirt into her hands. Walking back inside the house, back to the kitchen, she found Sophie holding an old tin can with a label on it for pear halves.

"What's the dirt for?" Sophia wondered.

"To keep the candle from tipping over," Jo replied, emptying the dirt out of her hands and into the can. Wiping her hands on her pants she gestured to her backpack. "Middle pouch, there are three tall candles. Grab only one. We need to make them last. There's a matchbook in the same pouch."

Sophia obliged and unzipped the middle pouch, digging around and successfully pulling out one tall, red candle and a small matchbook. She handed it over to Jo and then took a seat at the table with the pack of cards. Jo stuck the candle in the middle of the can, surrounded by the dirt which kept it upright. Ripping a match out of book, she struck match head along the coarse strip and a little flame erupted. Lighting the candle, Jo sat down at the table across from Sophia and blew out the match.

"Alright, Sophia, show me what you're made of," she teased.

 

* * *

 

The following morning, Jo awoke on the lumpy, old sofa and sat up, taking a moment to remember where she was. Eventually she stood up and made her way back to the kitchen and then knocked lightly on the pantry door before pulling it open to find Sophia curled up in a tight ball. The girl was waking up, stifling a yawn, as she sat up and stretched her legs outside of the pantry.

"Morning, sleepyhead," Jo greeted.

Sophia smiled up at her before she got to her feet. "Good morning."

"I have some crackers we can eat before we head out. We ate the last of the sardines last night."

"That's okay."

After sitting at the table, eating packages of saltine crackers Jo had swiped days earlier from an abandoned diner, Jo made sure her backpack was had everything in it they would need. She'd placed the candle back into the middle pouch and also shoved the pack of playing cards inside as well. Pulling out her water bottle, she attempted to see if faucet worked at the sink. Turning the knobs, the pipes groaned and sputtered but nothing came out of the tap.

Frowning, Jo looked over at Sophia, who looked back naively. "We're gonna have to head back to the creek and fill the bottle up with some water," she explained. "It looks like it's gonna be another really hot day and we need to keep hydrated."

Upon leaving the house, Sophia reached for Jo's hand again and they both walked back toward the edge of the woods they had come out of the evening before. And, as they walked along, to keep themselves occupied, they played word games or just chatted about themselves to each other in an attempt to get to know each other better.

By early afternoon, they found the creek again but it was just a matter of getting down because it was the steeper side.

Grabbing onto a random branch, Jo tried to manage down the incline but she lost her footing and slipped the rest of the way down. She landed on her side with a sharp sensation of pain in her right arm. Sophia cried after her and climbed down as carefully as she could, running up to Jo when she managed her way over.

Jo was lying in the water and lifted herself up to see that a rock had cut into her arm and she was bleeding pretty badly.

"Shit," she groaned.

"Oh no, you're bleeding."

Looking around, Jo noticed Sophia's ragdoll a little ways downstream, lodged under the log from the day before. "Help me up."

Sophia grabbed onto Jo's opposite arm and let the blonde woman use her as balance for standing. She hobbled downstream, mad at herself. The fall down the incline had aggravated her foot which had originally hurt slightly two nights ago when she took that tumble down from the road. The two females walked along with Sophia placing her hands upon Jo's wound in an attempt to stop the bleeding.

"Your doll. I'm gonna need it."

Sophia frowned, but agreed. The girl hurried over to the doll and knelt down and dislodged it. Bringing it over to Jo, Jo took it and pressed it against her arm and sighed. She walked the rest of the way to the trunk and sat down and Sophia sat down next to her.

"Are you gonna be okay?" Sophia asked with worry in her voice.

Jo nodded. "Yeah," she assured. "It's not a big cut. It just needs to clot." Leaning down, she stuck the doll into the water and gave it a quick rinse before placing upon her cut again, which made her wince from the sting of cold water upon the open wound. Looking down at Sophia, she smirked. "It's okay, I promise," she continued, when the girl still seemed unnerved. "It makes for an eventful day. At least we aren't bored."

Jo winked at Sophia and gave the girl a playful nudge to the shoulder. She didn't want Sophia getting too upset. She was still just a child and deserved to not have so much to worry and fear about in this life; or at least as little as possible.

"Sorry about your doll," Jo apologized after a while.

"A friend gave it to me before her family left our group."

"Maybe I can rinse it off real good and it will—"

Sophia shook her head. "It's all right. I don't need it anymore," she insisted. "I'm twelve years old. I probably shouldn't be playing with dolls anymore anyway."

"Pfft," Jo muttered. "I played with Barbie dolls until I was thirteen." Removing the rag doll from her arm, the bleeding seemed to have stopped considerably. "I'll find you a new one as soon as I can."

Sophia smiled appreciatively and took her doll away from Jo and dropped it down into the water beside the trunk. She then leaned down and scooped up a palm full of water which she splashed onto Jo's arm to rinse away the rest of the blood for her. She then reached into Jo's backpack and grabbed the empty water bottle and filled it up for them with the creek water.

It wasn't very clean, but it had to suffice.

"Thank you," Jo nodded. Turning around to look over their shoulders, she gestured further downstream. "We should keep moving."

"Yeah," Sophia agreed.

 

* * *

 

Jo and Sophia came upon the same walkers from the day before after a while, and Jo had managed to put one down but the others were too much for them to manage with only one pocket knife; not that Sophia would've been much help anyway. She was too scared and cowered behind Jo the entire time. They had to run off in a different direction, going further into the woods than they wanted, and eventually seemed to shake the walkers off their scent.

Because of this, however, they were now lost and hungry again. They sat down within some overgrowth and ate the rest of the saltine crackers and drank some of the dirty creek water, which both spat out. When they got back up to continue walking, Jo tried peering up at the sun to figure out which direction they might be head, but once again the canopy of trees made it hard to tell which was east and which was west by the arch of the sun.

After walking aimlessly around for a few more hours and taking a few breaks to sit here and there, Jo made the tough decision that they find some thick bush coverage to use for sleeping in for the night, which would fall in couple more hours.

Sophia looked saddened and Jo apologized that they had not been able to make it to the road just yet. She claimed, however, to be very hopeful the next day would prove fruitful.

Burrowing down for the night, Sophia curled closely against Jo and they both laid there within a large grouping of bushes, tight like a ball, so no limbs stuck out in case a walker or two ambled by. Because of that fear, Jo barely slept a wink that night.

At first light, she was completely awake and woke Sophia up as well.

Pulling themselves up and out of the bushes, they continued walking and this time it really was a fruitful venture.

By earlier afternoon, they had made their way to the edge of the woods and found the main road. Climbing up the embankment, and then over the guardrail with each other's help, Jo and Sophia stepped onto the pavement and looked around at all the abandoned vehicles.

"Do you see your mom's car?"

Sophia shook her head. "Me and my mom were in the same car as Rick and his family. There was an RV the others were in, but I don't either of them."

"Are you sure we're in the right spot? Maybe the car and the RV are up further that way," Jo suggested, pointing to their left.

"No," Sophia shook her head again. "I remember that yellow car right there." Sophia was gesturing to a beige 1967 Ford Mustang. "They left. They left without me."

Jo placed a sympathetic hand on the girl's shoulders. "Maybe they just took their vehicles and backtracked down the road. They couldn't have gone forward. There are too many abandoned cars in the way."

Sophie shook her head. "They probably think I'm dead, that those walkers that were chasing me bit me and now I'm a walker, too."

"You can't think like that."

"They didn't even leave a note in case I came back this way," Sophia commented, feeling dejected. Looking up at Jo, she pouted. "You said if we didn't find my mom and my group that I could stay with you, right?"

Jo nodded. "Of course. But I still think—"

"Then I wanna stay with you."

Frowning, Jo placed her hands on either side of the girl's face. "Are you sure you don't want to wait here? They might double back. We can wait in one of these cars."

Sophia shook her head. "My mom would've left a note. There is no note," she repeated. "They gave up."

"I doubt that's true."

"I should've stayed where Rick left me. I shouldn't have gotten scared and ran off. I should've waited longer for him to come back. It's all my fault they couldn't find me. It's all my fault they gave up."

"Sophia, you need to stop that," Jo spoke adamantly. "Whatever happened, wherever they went, I don't believe they gave up. But it's up to you want you want to do now. Do you want to wait here in case they come back or do you want to keep walking and hope we find them along the way?"

Sophia scratched at her head and looked around. "I want to keep walking."

"All right, then that's what we'll do." Offering her hand to the girl, she smiled. "Onward?"

Sophia nodded, taking Jo's hand again. "Yeah."

Together the woman and child walked in the direction of road, heading away from Atlanta, weaving around the abandoned vehicles and keeping a wary eye out for walkers. Up above, the unrelenting sun beat down upon their heads, but they had each other which made the journey ahead of them easier to bear.

 

* * *

 

A few hours later, Carol was standing on the road beside the beige 1967 Ford Mustang with a message written on the windshield. 

 _**SOPHIA STAY HERE** _  
_**WE WILL COME EVERY DAY** _

Carol was staring at the message as Andrea walked up behind her, placing a hand sympathetically to her back.

"We'll come again tomorrow," Andrea assured. "You know there's always the chance—"

"Don't," Carol cut her off. "I really don't need to hear it anymore, Andrea. Save the thoughts and prayers."

"You never know, Carol," Shane commented.

Carol simply held her hand up to shush him. "I'm serious. I'm not the one who needs thoughts and prayers right now," she insisted. "Rick and Lori do. Their son just died last night."

Shane bowed his head and lowered the shotgun he had brought with him for their protection. As he limped away, he sighed. "Don't remind me," he replied sadly.


	2. Carl

_"Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live."_  — Norman Cousins

* * *

  
The screen door to Hershel's farmhouse slammed open and out came Rick Grimes, completely and utterly beside himself. He couldn't even make it off the porch. His legs gave out from underneath him from the mix of blood loss, exhaustion and the death of his only child, his son Carl. He had enough strength to grab onto one of the balusters of the stair railing so he didn't fall all the way down like a sack of potatoes. Gripping it tight with both hands, he leaned into it and let the sobs expel from his lips while tears stung his eyes and roll down his pallid face.

It was ugly crying at its best and he gave zero shits about how he looked.

Hershel came out of the door, gently letting it close behind him as he approached behind the grieving father, placing a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. "I can't say it enough how sorry I am for the loss of your son, Rick, but I truly am," Hershel expressed. "I wish there was more I could've done."

Hunching forward, Rick let go of the railing and covered his face with his hands. "It's not your fault," he managed to mumble. "It's mine. He shouldn't have been with Shane and me in the woods. He'd never have been shot. This is on _me_."

"You can't think like that, Rick. It was an unfortunate accident. It could've been you or Shane that had been shot instead. We can't know what's going to happen. We aren't _meant_ to know."

"It would've been better if it had been Shane or me that got shot, because then my son would be alive."

"I know Shane and Otis are beating themselves up over this, too, what with not getting back in time," Hershel commented. "Otis is inside blaming himself as well. He's the one that pulled the trigger. But no good will come of blaming anyone. It'll just make the pain harder."

Rick wasn't saying anything; he was just burrowing his head away from the older man beside him. He wanted to be strong and resolute but how did he come back from something like this?

"What I don't understand is what happened after your son died," Hershel continued. "It doesn't make sense."

Rick lifted his head and stared out at the sun cresting higher and higher into the sky; a bright sunny day contrasting with how he felt on the inside.

"Your son turned, Rick, without having been bit. How—how does that happen? I've never seen that."

"I don't want to talk about it right now," Rick announced, pulling himself up to his feet and storming off slowly away from the house.

"Don't go too far, Rick," Hershel called out. "You gave too much blood yesterday. You'll pass out before you even get to the barn in this heat."

"I don't care," Rick spat.

Sauntering away from both the house and his group's encampment, Rick headed toward the windmill, feeling lightheaded and overheated. Sure as shit, before he could reach the barn or the windmill, his head felt like it was spinning and his vision darkened.

Dropping to his knees, Rick fell face first into the tall grass.

Before losing complete consciousness, he could hear shouts and the voices getting closer to him, but then there was nothing.

 

* * *

 

That night, Rick awoke in a bed in the house, feeling disoriented. He looked to his right and saw Andrea sitting beside him in a chair. She smiled at him when he realized it was her and as he tried sitting up.

"Hey, take it easy there," she advised.

"How'd I get here?" he rasped.

"You went down like the Hindenburg. Hershel, Shane and Glenn brought you in out of the sun. Hershel set up an IV to get some fluids in you."

Rick craned his head to look up at the medical equipment attached to him, reminding him briefly of when he woke up alone in the hospital. "This was supposed to be for Carl. All of this," he remarked, pulling the IV out of his arm and shoving the thin tube away.

"Well, now it's for you," Andrea replied, matter of factly.

Sitting up slowly, he looked at her and asked, "How long was I out?"

"Half the day."

"What—what about Carl? His body…"

"Lori wanted to bury him. She didn't want to wait and none of us knew how long you'd be out cold."

Rick knitted his brow together and rolled onto side as he began to cry again. Andrea got out of her chair and sat down on the edge of the bed, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"I missed my boy's funeral…"

"No, we didn't have one yet. We only buried him, nothing else. Carol was the one that insisted we wait at least for that."

Placing a hand to his forehead, he ran it down his face, wiping his tears along the way. "I had to shoot my son in the head, Andrea."

She looked back at him with a pained expression of sympathy as she gave his shoulder a squeeze. "I know. I'm sorry you had to do that."

"He died, and he came back," Rick remarked. "He came back without having been bit and I shot him. And the way Lori looked at me this morning…like I was a monster."

"She was just upset and confused, I'm sure. We all are. We don't understand how something like this could've happened."

Rick sighed. "Jenner," he muttered. "Back at the CDC, Jenner told me. Whatever it is, we all carry it. Seeing Carl die and then turn, it makes sense now. It don't matter how we die, we all come back. We're all gonna change into one of those things."

As he sat up, Andrea helped him and placed an arm around his shoulders.

"How's the patient feeling?" Hershel asked, appearing in the doorway.

Rick looked over his shoulder and nodded. "I'm better now. Thank you."

"It's the least I could do, all things considered."

Staring down at his hands, all he could see was his gun in his hands and pointing the barrel of his gun at Carl's forehead as his corpse surprisingly reanimated hours after his death. Thinking back on it and the fact that his son was already buried in the ground made his hands shake and the moment he took a step to get out of bed, his legs buckled. Rick fell to his knees with his hands on the floor and shouted a long, painful wail. Andrea dropped down to her knees as well and threw her arms around Rick's neck, pulling him upright and holding him tight in his arms. Tears stung her eyes as well. It had been heartbreaking for everyone when Carl died and to see what had happened to him afterward.

Hershel ran over and help Andrea pull Rick up to his feet just as Maggie and Jimmy ran into the room to see what had happened. Hershel turned toward them and shooed them away. "It's alright. He's just grieving."

"My boy," Rick muttered. He looked up at Hershel. "What do I do now? Everything I've done has been for him and now he's gone. I fought to survive for him and Lori, but Carl's gone and Lori blames me."

"It was an accident, Rick," Andrea commented. "And Lori is just grieving, too. She'll come around soon enough and see that there was no way you could've stopped what happened from happening."

Rick just shook his head. "But I—"

"Shh."

Sighing, he looked from Andrea to Hershel and then down to his hands again. "I want to see where he's buried."

"Of course," Andrea nodded. "First thing tomorrow morning, we'll—"

"No, _now_ ," Rick growled. "I want to see it now."

Andrea leaned back. "Alright. We'll go now."

Looking over at Hershel for assistance, Andrea helped Rick up and led him out of the room. He was still weak, both physically and emotionally, and he barely seemed capable of keeping himself upright. They led him to his boots for him to put on and then as they left the bedroom, he shook them both off.

"I'm not a damned invalid," he grumbled.

"You're in a weakened state right now," Hershel tried to explain.

"I ain't weak," Rick insisted. "I'm fine."

He paid no attention to the eyes of Hershel's daughters, Patricia, Otis or Jimmy staring at him as he came down the stairs and headed for the front door. Stepping out onto the porch, the lights were all on and he looked around, wondering where his son was buried. Andrea stepped out behind him and placed a hand to his elbow to lead him down the porch steps and take him right.

In an instant, Shane was hurrying over to him. "Hey, brother, how you holdin' up?"

Rick just glared at him. He knew it wasn't Shane's fault Carl was dead. Shane had done everything he could to go get those medical supplies with Otis, but had just been unable to get back in time. That was no fault of his own; just fate being a heartless bitch. Still, it didn't stop Rick from placing some of the blame on his best friend. If he couldn't blame himself all the way, or even on Otis, who pulled the trigger, albeit accidentally, in the first place, then Rick was going to blame Shane as well.

Shane took a step back and looked at Andrea who just shrugged empathetically at him.

"He wants to see Carl's grave," Andrea informed.

"Oh, okay, yeah," Shane nodded. He looked back at the porch, seeing Hershel remain there, knowing Rick's people had a handle on him right now. "It's right over this way."

Shane and Andrea walked in tandem with Rick, leading him to a large oak tree near just beyond the property limits. Since it dark out, Shane pulled his gun out in case of walkers and nodded over at a watchful T-Dog to follow for extra protection.

The four walked in since to the property's edge, stepping through a break in the barbed wire fence and continued to the oak tree where a fresh grave obviously lie with a mound of dirt surrounded by rocks and flowers strewn across. There was even a makeshift cross that someone had made with two small pieces of plywood and twine.

Seeing the grave brought Rick back down to his knees.

He crawled over to it and then sat back on the heels of his boots, covering his face with his hands as he cried. Shane, Andrea and T-Dog just let him while they kept a vigilant lookout for walkers.

"Rick, I know this is a terrible thing that happened, but you gotta be strong now, for Lori," Shane spoke quietly. He reached down a hand to Rick's shoulder and gave it a squeeze, but Rick swatted it away. "C'mon, Rick."

"Don't—don't patronize me at my son's _grave_ , you sonofabitch," Rick snapped, pulling himself up to his feet.

"Rick, I'm not—"

"You took too long. You and Otis," Rick accused, cutting himself off to keep a sob from escaping. "You took too long getting back. Why'd you take so long? Carl could still be here."

"I told you, Rick. We were getting overrun at the high school. Walkers were everywhere. We barely got out alive." Shane furrowed his brow, trying to get through to his friend. "I loved Carl, too, like he was my own, and I'm gonna miss him just the same, but you got a wife that's going through this with you. You should go to her."

"She doesn't want to see me. She blames me for Carl getting shot and dying."

"Those things she said were out of grief. She's had a day to come to terms and now she needs you."

"I can't," Rick shook his head.

"You _can_ ," Andrea insisted.

Rick looked between the pair, and then over to T-Dog who just looked sympathetic and said nothing. Nodding slowly, Rick caved. "Alright, alright. Where is she?"

"She's been in the RV most of the day with Carol," T-Dog offered.

Rick looked at him and then back at his son's grave with a heavy sigh, feeling utterly defeated with this life. How did he go on when his son no longer could? Reaching for a clump of dirt by his knees, he grabbed it in his hands and tossed it onto Carl's grave and then placed his hand on one of those rocks encircling it.

Pulling himself wearily to his feet, Rick turned to look back at the encampment on Hershel's property and began to stagger away. Shane, Andrea and T-Dog followed grimly behind him. When Rick reached the RV, he hesitated before pulling open the door and stepping up inside of it. Carol and Dale were sitting at the table with Lori; all three looking up at Rick.

"Lori," was all he managed to say before Carol and Dale stood up to leave in order to give the couple some privacy. Once they were alone, Rick sat down across from his wife and looked at her. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry doesn't bring our son back."

"I know it doesn't. I wish I could. I wish I could trade places with him," he expressed. "I wish I was the one buried in a shallow grave under an oak tree, not him."

"I can't accept he's gone yet," Lori admitted. "I keep thinking I'm gonna see him walking around outside, smiling at me." Tears began streaming down Lori's face. "I'm never gonna see our son smile again."

Rick reached his hands across the table but Lori jerked hers away before he could touch her. Rick immediately retracted from the gesture and leaned back against the seat. He just stared at her as she looked down at the tabletop. Tears brimmed his own eyes again and his chin quivered as he pursed his lips in an attempt to be strong for them both.

"What do I say—what do I _do_ to make this right?"

"There's nothing you can do, Rick. Our son is dead and buried."

Rick frowned and looked at his hands. "Has anyone continued to look for Sophia?"

"Daryl has," Lori replied, zoning out a bit. "He, uh, found a house where someone small enough slept in some sort of closet. Maybe it was Sophia, maybe not. We don't know."

"I'll help look tomorrow," he remarked. "I can't—I can't sit around this place and not have Carl's death be in vain. I didn't have him out in those woods with me for nothing. I need to find Sophia. We don't need to have two dead children in our group."

"You do what you gotta do," Lori said as she stood up and walked out of the RV.

Rick just sat there, staring at the empty spot his wife had just been sitting, before turning his gaze out the window to watch her walk toward their tent.

 

* * *

 

That night Rick had slept outside. He couldn't bring himself to sleep inside the tent. The following morning, he got up and walked over to the well beside Hershel's house and washed his face before heading up to the front porch and knocking on Hershel's door.

"Come on in."

Rick walked inside and found Hershel eating breakfast at the dining room table. "I need to talk to you about a few things if you got the time," he spoke vaguely.

Hershel looked up at him and wiped his mouth on a cloth napkin. "Have a seat," the white haired man gestured to a chair.

"I'd rather stand."

"Very well." Hershel leaned back in his chair, resting his hands in his lap.

"I need to know if you want us to move our camp back further away from the house, maybe close to the barn to give your family some privacy."

"That won't be necessary. It'll be safer closer to the house."

"Alright, well, I think, since your man Otis shot my son, he should be out there with us, helping to look for Sophia. I think he owes us that much."

"I'll talk to him." Off Rick's nod, Hershel continued, "But once you find this girl I expect you'll move on. We need to be clear on that."

Rick patted the back of a chair and just nodded. "We're crystal."

Clenching his jaw, Rick stalked out of the house and was met by an approaching Shane, who suggested they gather the group soon for Carl's funeral, but Rick merely scoffed at the notion. He claimed since his son was already buried, there was no point now. Shane insisted the group needed it and Rick snapped back that the group could go ahead, but he was going to focus on finding Sophia. He didn't want Carol to go through what he and Lori were going through if it could be helped.

Over the course of the day, Rick and Lori seemed to avoid each other while Rick worked at mapping out areas surrounding Hershel's farm to look for Sophia with Daryl, Shane, Otis, Andrea, and T-Dog. Glenn and Maggie had gone off into town for supplies while Dale kept watch on top of his RV. Dale was also the only one allowed to have a gun on the property while on watch. Hershel disapproved of weapons being carried on his property and Rick relented, agreeing that the group was Hershel's guests. Shane didn't take to kindly to having to turn over his weapon and neither did Andrea, but everyone had no choice but relent.

"Are we gonna talk about the possibility that Sophia might be dead?" Shane questioned. "If she's been bit or fell and broke her neck, because apparently it don't matter how you die anymore—what do we do if she's a walker?"

Rick frowned and looked among them as they stood around the hood of Hershel's truck. "Then we do what we gotta do."

The group began pairing off, except for Daryl who chose to go looking for Sophia by himself, which meant Otis either tagged along with the other two pairs — Rick and Shane, or Andrea and T-Dog — or he went off alone, too. Otis chose the latter, which was fine with the others. Rick didn't particularly want the man who shot and subsequently killed his son, even if it was an accident, walking around at his side.

In the woods, walking around with their guns, Shane tried to make light of the situation by talking about their past, specifically their high school days. Rick joined in on the discussion, as it veered off in the direction of Shane's sexual conquests, something Shane jokingly claiming Rick lived for the details back then. Rick admitted, he was impressionable then, and may have lived vicariously through Shane.

"It's like we're old folk. All the people in our stories are all dead," Shane commented.

"We can't just forget them."

Shane stopped. "Says the man who refused to attend a funeral for his son."

"Listen, it's hard enough accepting what's happened without digging up the past."

Agreeing with Rick's statement, Shane nodded. "I'll tell you what it is. It's nostalgia. It's like a drug. Keeps you from seeing things the way they are. That's a danger. We got people depending on us."

"You think I don't know that?" Rick questioned, turning to face Shane.

"Rick, I get it—this, all of it, searching for Sophia. You feel guilty about not being able to save Carl, and I do, too, brother. So, you're trying to make up for it. You got every able body at your disposal out scourging these woods for a little girl we both know is likely dead."

"You think we should abandon the search?"

Shane threw his hands up defensively. "It's not my call, is it?"

"I'm asking."

"Survival, Rick. It means making hard decisions. But you've got this knack. You spread us thinner and thinner. I'm trying to save lives here and you're out saving cats from trees."

"Is that what you think Sophia is—a cat in a tree?"

"Don't do that, man. Don't twist my words. How many times we get called up to look for a missing child, man? You got 72 hours. You're looking for a body. And that was before. I mean you honestly think we're just gonna find Sophia alive?"

"Are you that sure we won't?"

"We being completely honest?"

Rick grit his teeth. "I'm counting on you to be."

"It's math, man. Love or not, Sophia, she only matters to the degree in which she don't drag the rest of us down." Rick scowled and began walking on, but Shane followed right after him. "I thought you wanted honest? If we'd just moved on right after we lost her that first day, we'd be halfway to Fort Benning right now and Carl wouldn't have gotten shot. You said so yourself. But we're out here, we're risking lives. Your own son died and the man who shot him is walking around these woods on this pointless search the same as us. What the _hell_ are we still doing this for?"

Rick turned and got right in Shane's face. "I had her in my hand, Shane. She looked in my eyes and trusted me. I _failed_ her. If I hadn't, she wouldn't be out here and, yes, my son wouldn't have been shot either," he spoke adamantly, nostrils flaring. "I think she's still alive and I'm not I'm not gonna write her off."

Shane stepped past and pointed at a towel stuck on some bark of a tree trunk. "It's blue. It's Andrea and T-Dog. Looks like we wandered into their grid," he commented."

Both men continued on in silence for the rest of the search.

 

* * *

 

Later in the evening, Daryl returned and was accidentally shot at by Andrea when she thought he was a walker. He was dirty and limping and from a distance, with the glare of the sun in her eyes, she mistakenly assumed. Luckily though, the bullet only grazed the side of his head. When Daryl regained consciousness, he pointed out Sophia's doll he had found in a creek.

The others took note how it was covered in blood and that was anything but a good sign. Carol saw the doll and the blood and became understandably upset. She ran off with Lori following after her, two mothers' grieving, as hopes for finding Sophia alive were becoming increasingly dashed.

Carol, however, refused to believe her daughter was dead until she saw a body, and that, more or less, was the consensus.

The group wasn't looking for a girl anymore, but her corpse, if only for the sake of closure.

The following day, Lori confronted Rick about Hershel's desire for them to leave and why he hadn't told anyone else in the group. Rick simply explained to her that they had to give Hershel space if he was going to change their mind. His otherwise general aloofness on the subject didn't sit well with Lori and she stormed off, but Rick didn't seem bothered, one way or the other.

That evening, though, he wandered into his and Lori's tent and found a few packages of morning after pills and the pills were all missing. His head reeling in different thoughts all at once, Rick grabbed the empty packages up and went off looking for Lori who he found standing at Carl's grave with her hands in her pockets.

"Is there something you need to tell me?" he asked.

Lori turned her head, looking at Rick. "You can yell if you want. You can scream if you have to, but talk to me," was her response. She couldn't even admit she had just chosen to abort a child without discussing it with him first.

Getting in her face, he whispered, "How long have you known?"

"Does it matter?"

"Days? Weeks? And you weren't going to say anything? I deserved to know. It should have been a joint decision."

"I'm telling you now."

Rick scoffed. "No. I found these," he said, shaking the packages in his hand. "So—so Glenn knows, right? Instead of coming to me, you sent him to get _pills_?"

"You tell me we have no roof and no walls—"

"Do _not_ put this on me!" he shouted. "You tear into me for keeping secrets when you're holding onto _this_?"

"You want me to bring a _baby_ into _this_? To live a short, _cruel_ life?" she demanded.

Rick tilted his head slightly and just stared back at her. "How can you _think_ like that?"

"You couldn't even protect the son we already had," Lori spat.

He looked as if she had just physically slapped him. It was like their argument after Carl died all over again. "So _this_ is the solution?" Rick threw the packages at her feet. "You blame me for Carl's death. Sure, okay, _fine_. I blame myself as well. But _you_ caused this one. This is on _you_ , not _me_."

Lori looked down at the ground, touching a foot to one of the rocks encircling Carl's grave. "Rick, I screwed up," she admitted. "I don't know how we do this."

"We could've made it work."

"How? Tell me how."

"I would've figured it out," Rick replied. "Sh-shouldn't we have _tried_ to figure it out? Didn't you even want this baby?"

"Not like this," Lori shook her head. "Not giving birth in a ditch. Not when its life will hang by a thread from the second it's born. Not when every cry will put it, and everyone we care about, in danger. That's not right."

"Not even giving it a chance isn't right either."

"Maybe this is why I didn't want to tell you," Lori remarked, placing a hand to her forehead.

"I still don't understand _why_. You _really_ think I'd make you have a baby you don't _want_?"

"No, so that it would be on _my_ conscience and not _yours_."

"Maybe that's true, but I can't live like this anymore, Lori. We can't live like this," he commented. "Is there _anything_ else I should know about?"

Lori just looked at him, a little lost and hesitant. "Shane and I."

Nodding, Rick looked away. "I know. Of course I know." He was trying to find reason in her admission. "You thought I was dead. The world went to shit and you thought I was dead. Right?"

Tears forming in her eyes and starting to roll down her face, Lori nodded. "Yeah."

Rick kicked at the ground and looked over at Carl's grave. "But I wasn't dead."

"I didn't know that, though."

"So, this baby could've been either Shane's or mine." Without looking to see if she responded either way, Rick sighed heavily and placed his hands on his hips. "You might want to tell Shane about this then." Turning, he finally looked back at her. "He deserves to know he might've been a father, too."

Without another word, Rick stormed off back toward the encampment.

Lori watched him leave, wiping the tears from her face as she turned away and looked back at Carl's grave.


	3. Survive

_"_ _I'm a survivor – a living example of what people can go through and survive."_ — Elizabeth Taylor

* * *

  
A sickening slicing sound echoed off the bare walls of an old pharmacy that had been looted beyond reason since the outbreak first occurred. The top half of a walker's head slid off and fell to the floor at the same time the rest of the body crumpled back upon a shelf and then slid down to the floor as well. Spinning with a short sword in her hands, Jo looked around and spotted a second, offending walker advancing on Sofia who was trying to duck behind the pharmacy counter.

Whistling, Jo got the walker's attention and as it came toward her, she brought her right leg up and kicked it in the chest. As the walkers stumbled back into the wall, Jo drove her sword forward into its skull and pulled the blade back out without a second thought.

"Sophia, you alright?" she called out.

"Yeah." The girl popped back up from behind the counter and turned in time to see a third walker approaching her, but the girl had enough time and was nimble enough to jump onto the counter and stab Jo's pocket knife into the walker's forehead. Spinning around to face Jo, Sophia grinned brightly. "I did it!"

Jo grinned right back. "Yeah you did. That was kinda badass," she remarked. "I wish I could jump up onto a counter like that, but I'm an old fart."

Sophia giggled, as she sat down on the counter and then slid off to stand on the floor once more. "No, you're not."

"My knees and my back would suggest otherwise most nights. I'm not the spring chicken I used to be."

"How old are you anyway?"

"Thirty-two."

"That's not old."

Jo nodded and smirked. "Well, as long as _you_ don't think so." Sheathing her short sword behind her back, she led Sophia around the pharmacy now that the threats were eliminated so they could gather up as much supplies as possible.

It had been one month that they'd been together and recently Sophia had become a woman, something her own mother should have been there for, but that responsibility of guiding the girl through this new life path fell on Jo's shoulders. They scavenged what was left of the feminine hygiene section and grabbed a few bottles and packages of pain relievers.

"Why don't we take it all?" Sophia wondered.

"Because there might be other people like us out there that may need this kind of stuff, too. A little gesture like this can go a long way." Jo stuffed the products into her backpack and then gestured to a shelf along the opposite wall from where she killed the second walker. "Grab some of that shampoo and a bar of soap from over there."

As Sophia got up and went where she was directed, Jo stood up as well and panned the mess of what was left before smirking at a display she spotted near the counter. Grabbing the items which amused her, she shoved them in her jacket pocket before Sophia returned over to her.

"Do we need anything else?" the girl asked.

Jo shrugged. "There's gotta be a bathroom in here that employees used to use. Let's go in there and clean up and then you can do what I explained."

Closing the bathroom door behind them as a safety precaution in case any bad folk or more walkers showed up, Jo set her backpack down and pulled out some soiled clothes she had stuffed in a plastic bag.

"Sorry there were no tampons, hon, but pads will work just fine. I won't look, just go ahead and use the toilet."

Turning her back to Sophia, Jo looked down into the sink and pulled out Sophia's clothes that had been recently stained and the bar of soap, and turned on the faucet, grateful that there was still running water here.

"There's no toilet paper."

Jo sighed. Ringing her hands as dry as possible, she leaned down and grabbed the small roll of toilet paper they had left in her backpack and handed it over to Sophia without looking at her. "I guess there _is_ something else we need," she commented as she went back to cleaning out Sophia's clothes.

Once Sophia was finished, she walked over to the sink and asked for the soap and began to wash her hands. There was no sense in not trying to keep extra clean.

"How are we gonna dry the clothes?" she wondered, looking up at Jo.

"There's an apartment upstairs of this pharmacy. We can clear it out and stay there for the night, or for longer if need be," Jo replied. "I can hang the clothes up to dry there."

Sophia nodded. "Okay." Then she said, "I can finish cleaning the clothes if you wanna take care of the apartment."

Jo straightened up and looked at Sophia's reflection in the mirror. "You got my pocket knife still on you?"

"Yeah."

"Alright." Jo backed away from the sink and allowed Sophia to take over. Wiping her hands on her pants, she opened the bathroom door and looked out into the pharmacy, and then out toward the storefront windows. "Alright, lock this door from the inside. Don't come out until I come back and tell you to."

"What if you don't come back?" Sophia asked, stopping what she was doing as she looked over at Jo.

"I'm coming back. You just need to stay put." Closing the door, Jo knocked on the door. "Lock it."

Once she heard the click of the lock, Jo turned and headed toward the pharmacy's front door and opened it slowly and quietly, looking up and down the street for any walkers. Fortunately, the coast was clear for now so she made a quick run for the side of the building to the flight of stairs that led to the upstairs apartment. The door was locked from the inside, however, which was a rightful pain in Jo's ass, because it meant trying to figure a way to get it open and then how to deal with whatever was inside that locked itself in since this appeared to be the only entrance.

Pursing her lips in thought, Jo winced as she chose to suddenly ram the door with her body to see if it would give. And it didn't. So, her next thought was that maybe she could use her sword and pry it open, but when the sword began to bend a little too much for her liking, she gave that up in case the sword broke. Lastly, she looked at the nearest window.

The only way to get to it was to precariously balance on the stair railings and break the glass somehow and then try to climb inside.

Biting her bottom lip while praying no nearby walkers heard her, Jo shrugged and withdrew her sword. Reaching forward, she stabbed at the window with the point of the blade, but didn't use enough force to break it. Stepping a little closer to the edge of the top stair, Jo did it again and this time the window broke. Glass shattered down, but not all of it. Knocking away as many of the remaining shards as she could, Jo then paused and held her breath as she listened carefully for the familiar snarl sounds of walkers. There was one, up the street, coming around the corner of a building and it made Jo wonder if it was the only one or if more would be coming, but she couldn't stand around and wait.

Removing her back scabbard and then her jacket, Jo tossed her jacket over the bottom of the window frame, over the tiny shards of remaining glass and then grabbed on as she hoisted herself up onto the railing. She made the choice to look down and see how high up she was and mentally kicked herself for doing so. Shaking it off her latent fear of heights, Jo struggled slightly with pulling her body up onto the windowsill and then further inside.

Slipping, she lost her balance and rolled forward onto a kitchen counter top and then fell gracelessly onto floor.

"Ungh," she groaned, rolling onto her back in time to find herself being approached by a walker. "Fuck." Lifting her arm up, she sliced into the walker's chest and its intestines came spilling out onto her abdomen. "Oh, god, you've _got_ to be kidding me."

Kicking a leg up into one of the walker's knees, it fell down as its knee broke, which allowed Jo to get back up and stab the walker in the head. While wiping the blade on a nearby dishcloth, she kept herself armed as she looked around the different rooms for more walkers, but only found one more body, that of a woman seated on a couch who took the easy way out. At some point the woman stuck a shotgun in her mouth and blew the back of her head off, painting the wall behind her with blood and brain matter.

The apartment reeked, so Jo went around and opened a few windows to air it out. Despite the colder air filtering in, it was refreshing. She even found an aerosol can of air freshener that was, as the label called it, Spring Mountain Mist. Making a face, she proceeded in spraying the can all over the rooms to help neutralize the odor as much as possible. Afterward, she grabbed a few blankets and covered the corpses before going to the door and unlocking it.

Once she had the door open, she left it that way while she hurried back down the stairs and stopped at the bottom as the walker from before came walking near. She held still, with her sword in hand just in case, but after a few sniffs in her direction, the walker turned away from her and continued on down the road.

Confused for a moment, Jo looked down at herself and then remembered she was covered in walker guts and blood and that particular scent had masked her own.

Letting out a sigh, Jo slipped quietly back into the pharmacy and went straight to the bathroom door. She knocked gently and pressed her forehead upon it. "Sophia, it's me. You can unlock the door."

Hearing the click again, Jo stood back as the door opened and Sophia stood there looking at her with surprise.

"Did you get bit?" the girl asked worriedly.

"No," Jo replied, stepping inside the bathroom and closing the door behind them. "There was a walker in the kitchen upstairs. Things got a bit messy. We'll clean it up once we get up there." Gesturing to the clothes in the sink, she added, "We should be able to finish this upstairs. There's a walker on the street and I don't know how much longer until his friends might show up."

Gathering up their belongings, Jo led the way out of the pharmacy and up the stairs to the apartment. She opened the door for them and as soon as they stepped inside, Sophia cringed upon seeing the walker dead on the kitchen floor. There were still some intestines visible and the blood had soaked through the sheet covering it.

"Don't think about it," Jo insisted. She placed their stuff down on the kitchen table and then locked the door behind them. "I'll need your help getting them out of here," she added, gesturing down at the corpse. "I have all the windows open, so if we can lift these bodies up, we can throw them out the back bedroom window."

"Just toss 'em out like trash?" Sophia asked sadly.

"They're not people anymore, Sophia; just bodies. Plus, they smell."

"Can't we bury them?"

"That'll take time, effort and resources we don't have right now." Jo placed her hands on her hips. "I dunno, maybe you wanna sleep near some rotting bodies. If that's your thing—"

"Ew, no."

"Well then," Jo smirked. "We toss 'em."

They went for the woman in the living room first. Wrapping her more completely in the bedsheet Jo had draped over her, Jo lifted the woman's body up by the arms while Sophia grabbed the feet. The dead weight was tough, but the woman was small enough that they didn't struggle too much. They carried her body into the back bedroom and then Jo resituated her grasp and hoisted the body up, shoving it through the empty window. Both she and Sophia stuck their heads out at the same time to watch the body fall onto the small bit of pavement in the alley behind the building and then splatter to the ground.

Both Jo and Sophia groaned in disgust as they pulled their heads back inside.

"That was gross," Sophia commentated.

"Wait till we deal with the other guy."

Sophia groaned and slouched her shoulders. "Euch."

"Yeah, pretty much," Jo agreed.

The corpse of the male walker was trickier because bits of him kept slipping out as they walked. The eventually made it to the back bedroom and, to avoid anything else falling out of the walker's body, Jo had to have Sophia lifted the legs up a little more level with where she was holding up the top half of the body. With more of a struggle than with the woman, they shoved the walker out of the window and it flopped down upon a garbage can that rattled considerably while the body practically exploded once it finally hit pavement.

"Now _that_ was gross," Jo remarked.

After that was all said and done, Jo removed her shirt and just walked around in her bra until she had a clean or dry shirt to wear. The pair of them grabbed towels from the bathroom and used them to sop up the blood and guts on the kitchen floor and along the path they took with the second body to the back bedroom. They then just decided to chuck those towels out the window to. There was no sense in keeping them inside once they were beyond ruined. Checking to see if the water worked, Jo cried out with a happy cry of victory as water sputtered from the tap. It was brown at first, but after a few minutes, it was clear. It never heated up though, and was strictly all cold water, but it was better than nothing. They used the water and some remaining towels to wash the floor and the wall behind the couch, and then tossed those towels as well. They left two towels out, unused, so they could dry themselves off later after some cold showers that were in their near future.

Since there were only two bedrooms in the apartment and one had been used to disposing of the bodies, and leaving a trail of blood and guts through it, and not to mention the couch was still quite disgusting, they opted for sharing the front bedroom, which was perfect. Sophia didn't want to sleep alone and it had a decent view of the street.

After Jo draped their damp clothes over the backs of the kitchen chairs, they took turns taking their cold showers and changing into the last pair of clean clothes they had in Jo's backpack. They then decided to scavenge through the apartment for things like food, more toilet paper and medical supplies, all of which they found, along with an extra backpack that Sophia would wear from now on.

That night they ate cold, canned ravioli and then pulled the curtains closed on the bedroom windows before lighting candles around the room for light. They found the board game of Monopoly in a closet and played that on the floor, occasionally giggling, and for a little while they were able to forget the world outside was a desolate hellhole filled with the undead.

Tired from a long day, they never finished the board game. Instead they packed it up and put it on the floor before curling into the bed with the blankets pulled tight around them after also blowing out all the candles.

It felt so wonderful to sleep in an actual bed again, even though the stench from the apartment hadn't actually gone anywhere.

 

* * *

 

The morning after Rick had confronted Lori about the morning after pills, Glenn had announced to the group that the barn contained a dozen or more walkers. The group became anxious, due to having slept in mere tents not far from imminent danger. Shane, who had just learned that morning that Lori had terminated her pregnancy which could've resulted in a child that might've been his, was already upset. Being a little more hotheaded than his best friend Rick, Shane took the lead in inspecting the barn while Otis went off to collect a few stray walkers of people he and Hershel used to know to place in the barn with the others; that of Hershel's dead wife and stepson, and other friends and townspeople from Hershel and Otis' lives before the outbreak that had since turned. Rick had gone off, following after Otis and Jimmy, wondering where they were going while Shane steamed and ranted to the group, to anyone who would listen, that letting those walkers "live" was a big mistake.

When Rick realized what Otis and Jimmy were up to, he confronted them, catching them both off guard, which resulted in Otis getting distracted and losing his grip on the male walker. The male walker grabbed onto Otis' neck and tore into the flesh with its teeth, causing Otis to scream out in sheer pain and drop to his knees. Rick pulled his gun out of his holster and shot the walker point blank and then stood over Otis' dying body. Muttering a quick apology, he put Otis out of his misery. Jimmy had been understandably freaked out and Rick grumbled something inaudible and then shooting the female walker in the head as well before telling Jimmy to get back to the farm.

When both men had come out of the woods, Rick found the group standing in front of the barn with Shane approaching him, asking about the gun shots they all heard while Hershel was yelling at Shane that he needed to leave his property.

It was chaos as Rick said Otis was dead; that'd he'd been bit by one of the walkers he was trying to corral and bring back to the barn. Jimmy confirmed everything Rick said, Patricia dropped to her knees in tears and Shane became even more pumped about taking out the barn walkers.

"Walkers aren't people anymore, Hershel; no matter how many times you tell yourself," Rick spoke, still holding his gun out of its holster. "You're putting the lives of my people at risk and I can't have that. You need to face facts and you need to face them now. We were at the CDC. We were shown footage of how a person changes, and stops being who they were. There's no coming back from that. There's no cure. There's just this: us and them, and us surviving." Gesturing to the barn with his gun, Rick looked at Shane. "Open 'er up."

"Now we're talking," Shane nodded, shooting the lock off the barn.

Everyone had backed up as the doors were pushed open just enough by the walkers for them to escape the barn. Shane and Rick stood side by side, taking the initial headshots as Andrea and T-Dog flanked them. Glenn looked apologetically at Maggie who just nodded at him while she began to cry as her father dropped to his knees to watch the carnage take place. Daryl joined in as well, getting in a headshot or two with his arrows while everyone else merely watched.

Once it was all over, Beth ran over to her mother's corpse, but woman hadn't received a headshot when she went down and tried to reach for her daughter and bite her. Beth had screamed and was pulled away by Daryl as Rick shot the woman in the head.

Afterward, Hershel and his family went back to the house to grieve while Rick and his group were left with the aftermath. It was decided they would take care of the bodies. They would bury Hershel's wife and stepson, and go back into the woods to get Otis and bury him as well, but the rest they would burn. Rick understood Hershel had a hard time giving up hope that there was a cure and that seeing his wife and stepson again as they were was clearly a wake-up call. Rick understood Hershel had just taken an emotional beating and burying his family was the least Rick's group could do.

The bodies were buried on either side of Carl's grave that evening, and only Maggie and Patricia attended the small funeral. Hershel was nowhere to be found and Beth was crying herself to sleep in her bedroom.

Maggie was upset when she couldn't find her father and Rick, feeling guilt over what he'd helped do fall upon his shoulders, offered to go into town to the bar Maggie figured her father had gone to. Glenn offered to go as well, and while the two younger men were trying to convince the older one to come back, two new men wandered into the bar and began to cause trouble. The interaction between Rick, Glenn and the two other men, Dave and Tony, didn't end well. As soon as Dave drew his gun on Rick, Rick did a quick-draw and shot Dave in the head and then whipped around and shot Tony in the chest before taking a second shot in the head.

Rick, Hershel and Glenn didn't waste any time getting out of there. It was almost dark and they didn't know if the sound of Rick's gun had drawn walkers. Ducking out of the bar, they went for the station wagon and climbed in. Just as they were pulling away, they passed a truck on the road, but they paid no mind to it, even when Rick could see in the rearview mirror that the driver of the truck had turned and looked after them. Not getting the best vibe from that driver, Rick was determined to get off the main road and back to Hershel's farm without the possibility of being followed by anyone — alive or dead.

When they returned, Hershel was given the terrible news that, in his absence, Beth had taken her own life by slitting both her wrists with a knife and bled out on the kitchen floor, and that Maggie had taken it upon herself to put her sister down before she reanimated. Hearing all this, Hershel ran to Maggie, apologizing for leaving. Both father and daughter, along with Patricia and Jimmy, were then given privacy from Rick's group in order to grieve some more for their latest loss.

As Rick went outside to his and Lori's tent, he discovered Lori wasn't there but that was fine. He needed to process the day alone for a while, so he removed his shirt and lay down on the cot, staring up at the tent's ceiling and, at some point, fell asleep.

The next morning, Rick had awoke and found himself staring across at the cot that had initially been set up in case Carl had survived his gunshot wound. It was empty and there were also no signs that Lori had ever returned to the tent at all during the night.

Getting up to his feet, Rick grabbed his shirt and carried it with him out of the tent as he looked around the encampment. Several of his group were already up and moving around; cooking breakfast over a low fire, talking among themselves.

Carol looked over at Rick and offered a sad smile and he reciprocated it before moving on toward Shane's tent to ask him if he'd seen Lori. But just as he approached, he heard Lori's voice inside and Rick stopped in his tracks and listened carefully.

"It's okay," Shane was saying. "I'm sorry I got angry at you yesterday about it."

"You don't hate me?"

"I could never hate you. After everything that's happened and how the world is, I know this isn't the time or place for raising another kid. You did what you had to do and I respect that."

"I think Rick hates me for getting rid of it," Lori commented.

"Well, between you and me, sometimes I think Rick can't see the forest for the trees."

Rick clenched his jaw and turned his head away. He caught Carol looking back at him and finally realized what the sad smile was for. He had thought it was for everything going on in general, but she knew something was going on between Rick, Lori and Shane and she was being sympathetic in her quiet way.

His nostrils flaring and tears stinging his eyes, he forced himself to remain levelheaded as he nodded at Carol stepped away from Shane's tent.

Putting on his shirt, Rick had headed back to Hershel's house to knock on the door. Jimmy answered it and let him in, leading him to where Hershel, Maggie and Patricia were holding vigil beside Beth's body which was laid out on the sofa in the living room and covered with a bedsheet.

"Hershel," Rick spoke, announcing himself to the mourners. "I want to say again how sorry I am for everything that's happened and had to happen recently. I'm sorry about Otis," he said, looking over at Patricia, briefly, "and especially about Beth. She was a sweet girl from what I've come to know."

There was no response right away, so Rick made a move to leave the house, but was stopped when Hershel spoke up.

"I appreciate the kind words, Rick, but I want you to know—"

"You want us gone," Rick assumed.

Hershel turned around and stood up to face Rick. "No, on the contrary," he said, catching Rick by surprise. "I don't blame you or your people for anything that's happened. I was a fool to believe my family and I could continue as we did before, and I'm not talking before you came running across my field with your son in your arms. I'm talking before the world fell apart. I wasn't just a fool or naïve. I was an idiot."

"No," Rick insisted. "You had hope and that's more than a lot of us have these days. We're all just trying to navigate this new world the best we can. It's difficult, but we can do it, if we do it together."

Hershel nodded. "Which is why I want your people to stay."

Rick tilted his head, a little confused by the sudden extended hospitality. "You do?" he questioned. "As much as I hate to say it, Sophia's likely dead and that was the only reason we were still allowed to stay on."

"Winter will be here soon enough and I can't sit idly by while your people wander around from place to place, looking for food and safety. I'd be condemning you all to death. I see that now and I can't, in good conscience, allow another poor soul to meet so sudden an end," Hershel remarked. "When the weather starts to get too cold for camping outside, you and yours can move into the house. We'll all make do."

"Are you sure this is what you want?"

"Keep questioning me and I'll change my mind," Hershel quipped, all things considered.

"It was a joint decision," Maggie offered up.

Rick looked over at her and knew part of her decision was because of how she felt about Glenn, and if Glenn was brought into the house, then it would be unfair to the others.

"Thank you," Rick expressed with a nod of his head.

"When the time comes to move in here, you and Lori can have my bed. I'll take the couch. My first wife used to lock me out of the bedroom on the nights I would come home drunk, so the couch and I became old friends," Hershel looked over at the couch, which was where his youngest daughter's body currently lay.

Rick waved his hand. "That won't be necessary," he insisted. "The sleeping arrangements between my wife and I don't seem to be what they once were, but I appreciate the offer nonetheless." Turning slightly, he added, "I'll tell the others about your decision."

"Rick, one more thing."

Rick looked back at Hershel. "Sure."

"It's a favor, really."

"Name it."

"Would you help bury my daughter today?"

Rick stared Hershel in the eye.

Both men had lost children and, in a sense, their wives. They were in the same boat and it went unspoken now that they needed to rely on each other.

"Yeah," Rick nodded. "Of course."

 

* * *

 

After Beth's funeral, Rick and Lori had had it out. He had asked her to take a walk with him so no one had to overhear their conversation, but their voices eventually carried on the wind. Even though the group couldn't hear what exactly was being said, they could tell the couple was arguing. He asked her if she'd stayed the night in Shane's tent and if anything other than sleeping had taken place. When she hesitated in responding, Rick had his answer. He threw it in her face that their son hadn't been dead a week, and that her pregnancy hadn't been over a day. Not to mention they didn't even know if the pills worked yet. They might've been ineffective and she could still be pregnant. Lori then claimed Rick had pulled away from her and Shane was the only one who seemed to give a shit how she felt, which only enraged Rick, spitting as he yelled, saying none of that was true. He had merely been mourning their son the best way he knew how.

"You don't see me _fucking_ Andrea or Carol because you and I are distant from each other, Lori," he had spat. "I can forgive you and Shane together when you thought I was dead, but I'm _not_ dead. I'm _here_ —"

" _Are you_?! Are you _really_ , Rick, because it sure as _hell_ don't feel like it!"

The argument went on for a while longer before Rick stormed off and Lori shouted after him that walking away from a fight was what he did best. He threw his hands up as if to wash his hands of her, and stormed back to the camp where he went right up to Shane and punched him square in the face.

The two friends began to tussle on the ground but were soon enough pulled apart by T-Dog and Glenn.

"You want her so bad, you can have her!" Rick growled at Shane. "Clearly all that kept us together was Carl and now that he's gone, she's free to take her leave of me."

Rick threw Lori's clothes and other belongings out of their tent and then zipped up the tent doors and windows, closing himself in to wallow for the rest of the night.

The week that followed, Rick avoided Shane and Lori as if they were walkers, and conversed only with the rest of the group. Andrea was the only one who seemed to make the most effort to distract Rick from his personal problems, but not in a sexual way or anything. Sure, both Rick and Andrea could appreciate each other as very attractive people, but the chemistry between them was strictly platonic. They were merely friends and Rick was grateful of the friendship Andrea offered.

The end of the week was when things changed again.

Jimmy had wandered into the woods to find those Cherokee roses Daryl had mentioned and brought to Carol when he happened upon a walker and was bit. He bled out in the woods with no one on the farm any the wiser as to what happened until that night when Dale was patrol, keeping a lookout of the property.

He saw Jimmy walking out of the woods and waved, but when Jimmy didn't wave back and just staggered toward him, Dale called over his shoulder to Rick.

To Rick's displeasure, he was able to deduce that Jimmy had been bitten and died at some point while he was away and turned. Walking up to the teen with his gun drawn, Rick hesitated as he looked into those dead eyes and frowned. After a moment, he pulled the trigger. The sound bounced off the trees and echoed across the property as Jimmy's body fell backward upon the tall grass. Others came running from the house and the encampment to discover this new loss and no one had even known why Jimmy had wandered off. What was worse is that no one had seemed to have even realized the teen had wandered off to begin with and guilt was evident in all their moonlit eyes as they looked from one to the other.

"At least Beth isn't here anymore to see him like this," Hershel remarked sadly. "As much as I pretended to disapprove of Jimmy and her making moon eyes at each other, he was a good kid and he loved her. He was _my_ responsibility and I let him down."

Rick turned and looked at Hershel, shaking his head. "No, this was _all_ our responsibility. We _all_ let him down." He let his blue eyes move from one person to the next, falling lastly upon Lori and Shane who were standing close together. "No matter what, we need to look after each other and protect each other, because we're all we have. We're _all_ family now. We've been through way too much together not to be family."

Shane and Rick shared a look that seemed to express some sort of truce and that tension between them lessened enough that the rest of the group seemed to feel the tension dissipate as well. As they made the move to lift Jimmy up to carry him back to the farm so they could bury him, familiar noises of snarling and shuffling could be heard coming from the direction of both the woods and the field.

As their warm breaths billowed from their mouths into the cool night air, they looked at each other with unease in their eyes as they turned to see hordes of walkers appear.

Within minutes, the group was running back to the house, attempting to grab guns and any other form of weapon to defend themselves as the hordes began to approach the barn and grow closer to the house. There just wasn't enough time or ammo to protect themselves. There were just too many walkers. That amount would've easily torn into the house if they tried to take shelter in it.

After firing round after round into the walkers, Rick made the call for them to leave the farm; to grab what they could, get in their vehicles and leave.

Dale started the RV, but it died on him. There wasn't enough time to fix it, so he was pulled into Shane's car with Shane and Lori. Glenn, Maggie, Hershel and Patricia went off together while Daryl grabbed up Carol onto his bike and tore off down the road away from the farm. Rick looked around frantically to make sure everyone was getting out when he saw Andrea go down. He shot the walker trying to bite her in the head and then pulled her up to her feet while shouting over to T-Dog. Rick hopped into Hershel's truck, Andrea took the passenger seat and T-Dog climbed into the back bed, holding on tight as Rick pulled away like a bat out of hell, hoping everyone escaped in time.

 

* * *

 

Ten miles east of the apartment above the pharmacy where Jo and Sophia were holed up for the night, Rick and the group had brought their caravan of vehicles to a stop outside an abandoned gas station. They had been on the road about a week but hadn't gone too far from Hershel's farm. Rick and T-Dog had gone back a couple of days before to check the property to see how bad it was, and if there was anything they could manage to get from what they'd left behind, but they couldn't get close enough to the house and had to turn back.

Rick was holding his gun out before him as he and Shane went into the gas station first to secure it before letting the rest of the group in so they had a place to rest their heads for at least a few days. There were a few abandoned cars they hoped to syphon gas from and also hoped there might be some food or water for them to eat and drink. Anything would help.

Once they had successfully claimed the gas station for themselves, Rick had gone back outside to sit in Hershel's truck by himself and just think when there was a knock on the window.

He jumped slightly and grabbed for his gun out of instinct, but then he saw it was only Carol, smiling a little at him. When Rick rolled the window down for her, she poked her head in a bit.

"Do you mind some company?" she asked.

Rick shrugged. "Be my guest."

With another smile, Carol backed up and walked around the front of the truck where she pulled open the passenger door and hopped in beside him. Rick rolled his window back up as she closed her door and looked over at him.

"I need to ask you a question and I want you to answer it honestly," she proposed.

Rick looked back at her for a brief moment before turning his focus to the dashboard and nodded. "Alright," he commented tentatively.

"Sophia," she said. "Do you think she's still alive?"

"I hope she is."

"I didn't ask if you hope she is. I need to know what you really think."

Rick sighed and glanced back at Carol. "I think that if we didn't find her by now, the chances are extremely low we ever will," he admitted. "She was out there alone, Daryl found her doll covered in blood…" Rick looked down at his hands in his lap. "I'm sorry, Carol. I'm sorry I couldn't find her and that we all, more or less, gave up hope of finding her."

Carol nodded appreciatively and stared out the windshield. "I know you are. I'm sorry I blamed you for her getting lost. I'm her mother and I just sat around waiting, letting everyone else look while you were grieving the actual loss of your own child. That wasn't right of me."

"No, it's alright. I _needed_ to look for her. I felt responsible and I _still_ do, plus it gave me something to focus on aside from my own loss."

"You're welcome?" Carol smirked, looking back at him.

Rick smiled a little in response and placed a hand on Carol's shoulder. "I don't know what we do now," he confessed as his hand dropped back down. "I know the others are looking at me for what happens next but I'm just as clueless as they are."

Carol shrugged. "We just keep moving. We keep surviving," she commented. "It's all we _can_ do."

 

* * *

  
Two days later, Jo and Sophia had left the apartment above the pharmacy. On a supply run up the road to find more food, Jo had found an abandoned car that was clean and had more than half a tank of gas. She brought the car around to the front of the pharmacy so she and Sophia could load the car up with what supplies they had swiped from the apartment. They'd even taken some of the clothes left behind by the woman whose corpse they'd disposed of out the window, along with some feminine products they would both need.

They hit the road by noon and drove off singing along to a Dixie Chicks CD that Sophia had found in the center console and popped into the car's CD player.

"Cowboy take me away…fly this girl as high as you can into the wild blue," they sang at the top of their lungs, occasionally smiling at each other. "Set me free, oh, I pray. Closer to heaven above and closer to you…closer to yooouuu…"

As they drove along a deserted Georgia road, they came upon a four-way intersection and Jo slowed down to determine which way they should go.

"Left, right or forward?" she asked Sophia as the music played on inside the car.

Sophia played 'eeny, meeny, miny, moe' and eventually pointed left. "Left," she decided.

Jo nodded. "Left it is."

 

* * *

 

A mere ten minutes after Jo and Sophia turned left at the intersection, Rick and his group's caravan came upon the same intersection, but they never slowed down.

Rick cast a glance at Carol who sat between him and Andrea in Hershel's truck, and then back to the road in front of him as they continued driving forward.


	4. Woodbury

_"Any change, even a change for the better, is always accompanied by drawbacks and discomforts."_  — Arnold Bennett

* * *

  
Cold, autumn rain was falling down, pelting the windshield of the car Jo and Sophia were traveling in when a light on the dashboard lit up with a little gas pump icon. Jo looked at it, gripping the steering wheel tighter out of frustration as she wondered just how much more distance she could get out of the car before it died from lack of gas.

The answer would be 1.3 miles.

As the car sputtered and began to shut down, Jo pulled over to the side of the road and put the car in park before turning off the ignition. Leaning back in her seat, she looked over at Sophia and offered a "what are ya gonna do?" kind of smile and shrugged.

"Well, we got a lot farther than I thought we actually would," Jo remarked. "Not that there was actually any sort of destination in mind."

"Do we walk now?" Sophia asked.

"We still have a few more hours of daylight left, so we might be able to start walking and find another car, or we can just sleep in here for the night and start out fresh in the morning and see where the day takes us from there." Jo tapped her fingers on the wheel, considering a few options they had. "Actually, I think we should walk a little and see what might be out there. If nothing's close enough, we can come back to the car and still sleep in here for the night."

Opening her door, Jo climbed out and headed to the back passenger door on her side and pulled it open while Sophia merely remained seat in the front. Jo leaned in and grabbed her short sword in its scabbard and threw it around her back.

"C'mon, kid," she said to the girl. "Let's grab our things and head out. Remember, we can always come back here if need be."

"What if we come back and there's a bunch of walkers surrounding the car?" Sophia inquired, unbuckling her seatbelt.

"Well, then we drop this car like a bad habit, don't we?" Jo threw a smirk at Sophia as the girl out of the car and went to the other back passenger door.

The two of them began pulling their backpacks out and tossed them onto their shoulders and backs. Shutting the doors, Jo didn't even bother with grabbing the keys. The doors were unlocked if they came back to it, and if they did, it's not like she could use them to start the car back up. There was no more fuel in the tank.

Walking along the road in the cold rain, they shivered a little, so Jo pulled Sophia close; throwing an arm around the girl's shoulders and rubbing her opposite arm to give her some warmth.

"You okay?" Jo asked.

Sophia nodded as rain fell down her face. "Yeah," she replied quietly.

They hadn't walked more than a half mile when, in the distance, Jo spotted a white truck. At first she couldn't tell if it was moving or not so, for a fraction of a second, she thought maybe the truck would be viable for them to travel in. But that's when Jo realized it was getting closer to them, and not just because they were moving toward it. It was also moving toward them, which meant Jo became instinctively defensive and equally protective of Sophia. She didn't know who was approaching and, if they stopped, what kind of person or people would be inside the vehicle.

Sticking her arm out across Sophia's chest, she forced the girl to move behind her before reaching the same arm behind her to grab for the handle of her short sword in case she needed to use.

Sure enough, the truck slowed to a stop and Jo stared at the driver's side window, peering through the rain in her eyes. The window rolled down and there sat a decently handsome man, clean and well groomed, which was very strange for an apocalyptic world.

The man, with brown hair and a pleasant face, smiled charmingly down at Jo and Sophia. "Well, hello there," he greeted. "Have you been traveling in this rain long?"

Jo said nothing. She just maintained her reservations.

"I mean no harm to either of you," the man continued, holding his hands up in a sort of surrender. As he reached down and opened his door, Jo pulled her sword out of its scabbard a little and the man hesitated. "I'm just coming out of my truck. I won't hurt you."

Just to be safe, Jo pushed Sophia back a little farther as the man hopped out and took a couple of steps forward. He was dressed nicely enough to match his clean and well-groomed hair and face. He wore a dress shirt, rolled up to his elbows, a black leather vest that was zipped up to mid-chest and black jeans. He also still wore his consistent charming smile and Jo couldn't deny it was certainly a nice one or that he was very handsome.

"How long have you been on the road?" he asked some more.

"Long enough," Jo admitted, finally speaking up.

Lowering his hands as the cold rain pelted down upon his head, the same as Jo and Sophia, the man nodded and looked around. "The weather's only going to get worse," he remarked. "Do you have some place safe to rest your head or call home?"

"Do you?"

The man nodded again. "I do."

It was obvious. A man on the road like they were didn't look as clean and put together as he was.

"We had an apartment for a few days, but ran out of food," Jo replied. "We had a car until a few minutes ago. I ran out gas just up the road. If worse came to worse we were going to go back to it to sleep for the night until we could figure something out in the morning."

The man shook his head; dissatisfied with what Jo was saying. "That's not right. That can't do." He looked her square in the eye and placed his hands on his hips; cold rain drenching him be damned. "I have a community. A town. It has walls and it's safely guarded against from the biters. We're always looking for good people to make it whole." He looked at Jo and Sophia with a twinkle in his eyes. "Are you and…your daughter good people?"

Jo looked back at Sophia who was poking her face out from behind her. Casting her glance over at the man, she nodded. "We are good people. And we've managed so far."

"Winter is around the corner. If you think this cold rain is bad, alone on the road, with biters rearing their ugly heads, wait until the rain freezes and it snows; when you have no shelter, no warmth and no food." He took another step forward, so Jo and Sophia took another step back. He held his hands out at his sides, once more to show he meant no harm. "My town has shelter, food, hot water. We have community and a sense of the world that was. We have the chance to get back what we lost; our lives. Is that something that you and your daughter would want to be part of?"

Sighing, Jo knew she couldn't continue on like this, not with Sophia. Before Sophia, she could probably survive the winter but now she had to put this girl's needs above her own because she had claimed the girl as her responsibility. "It is," Jo nodded.

The man smiled; pleased. "The name's Philip Blake, though my people call me The Governor." He shrugged sheepishly. "Their nickname for me, not mine." Holding up his right hand, he extended it to Jo and waited.

She looked down at his hand and then up at him with a raised eyebrow before shaking it briefly. "Joanna Moore. I prefer Jo."

The Governor nodded. "Jo, it is." He focused his attention to Sophia. "And your daughter's name?"

Jo hesitated again. "Sophia," she eventually answered.

"Hello, Sophia," The Governor greeted. He crouched down to her level. "Would you like to come live in my town? There are other children you'll be able to meet and become friends with. You'll even be able to have your own bedroom if your mother agrees to come back with me."

Sophia looked up at Jo, wondering what she should say, but Jo interjected first.

"Can you give me a second to talk this over with my daughter?" Jo asked.

"Most certainly," The Governor obliged politely, taking a step back toward his truck.

Turning her back slightly to him, Jo leaned in toward Sophia. "I don't think we have the luxury of turning down his offer," she admitted. "I think he really does have a place. He looks too clean not to."

"He thinks I'm your daughter," Sophia whispered.

"He doesn't need to know anything different, and it might be safer if we pretend I'm your mom. If this town of his ends up not being what we hope, I don't know what kind of bad people might try to take advantage. If I claim you as my child, I am your protector. I'll be able to continue to keep you safe."

Sophia nodded. "Okay. Let's do it."

Jo straightened back up and turned back to face The Governor. "You said this town has other children."

"It does. Several of them," The Governor reiterated.

"Does this town of yours have a teacher for them?"

The Governor shifted his weight around from one leg to another as he placed his hands on his hips again. "Are you merely curious or are you offering your services?"

"I was a first grade teacher before all this," Jo said. "If you can promise me, if you can swear on your life and the lives of those you love, that no harm will come to us on our way to and within your town, then I would like to earn my keep by helping my daughter and the other children."

"I swear on my life and the lives of those I love, no harm will befall you or your daughter," he swore, literally crossing his heart with his finger.

As Jo nodded in consent, the rain began to let up. Both her and The Governor looked up at the sky and then back at each other. She watched as he stepped back to his truck and opened the door up. When he began to rifle through some bag he pulled onto his seat, Jo got nervous again and once more reached for her sword's handle but didn't grab on to it. The Governor looked back at her and noted her stance as he held two ties in his hand.

"If you come back with me, I have to take a precaution to protect my town and my people in it," he informed. "For all I know you might have other people hiding out wishing to do _me_ and _mine_ harm. So, I need to make sure you can't find your way back to my town if you choose to leave."

"If we leave, what good does a blindfold do? We could just retrace our steps." Jo gestured at the road as if making a point.

The Governor smirked. "When you leave, you don't just walk out the front door, so to speak. You're taken by escort and driven away, blindfolded. You leave the same way you arrive."

"So, you want to blindfold us and yet we're supposed to trust you?" Jo boldly took a step forward to him. "If we had people, why would I drag my daughter out into the cold rain, with no guarantee of safety on these roads? The way I see it, you have every upper hand here. I have no one to tell about your town."

"I'm sorry. I can't take the risk," The Governor remarked, throwing his hands up defensively. "If you don't want to be blindfolded, you can't come back with me."

Jo sighed. Glancing down at Sophia, she placed her hands on her hips. "Fine," she caved. "You can blindfold me, but I will not allow you to blindfold her. She's a child and doesn't need to be scared any further than this world has already made her."

The Governor dropped his arms to his side and seemed to cave as well. He snickered and shook his head as he looked between the pair he assumed were mother and daughter. "Alright," he conceded. "I won't blindfold your daughter, but you—"

"Yeah," Jo cut him off. "Safety precaution."

"I'll need your sword and any other weapons you're carrying on you."

They looked at each other and both smirked despite the growing tension. Removing her scabbard, she handed it over slowly.

"Thatta girl," he jested, taking it from her.

"Don't condescend to me."

"I'm not, I swear," he chuckled. He placed her scabbard into the bed of the truck and then gestured to their bags. "I'm just trying to lighten the mood."

The rain completely stopped falling and the clouds overhead moved as Jo removed her backpack and took Sophia's from her. The Governor took both bags and threw them into the truck bed as well while all three of them just remained standing there.

"Any other weapons I'll need now," he added.

"We only have my sword," Jo lied. Sophia had her pocket knife but it was tucked safely away and she wouldn't allow The Governor, still just a stranger to them, to frisk the girl to make sure. "I found it in some basement apartment almost three weeks ago. Place was a nerd's paradise; had all sorts of sci-fi paraphernalia. I figure the sword must've been some sort of prop replica from a movie or TV show." Jo thought that if she chatted about the sword it would take his attention away from the possibility they were hiding another weapon. It seemed to be working. "There was even this Star Trek uniform signed by William Shatner that was framed on a wall. Whoever's place it was, they weren't there anymore, though I can't get this image out of my head of an undead Trekkie wandering around the streets of Georgia."

The Governor chuckled some more and smiled. "That would definitely be something to see, indeed." He gestured to the other side of the truck. "Go ahead and get in. I'll blindfold you once you're both in your seats."

Jo turned toward Sophia and crouched down. "Don't let him know about the pocket knife. Keep it hidden at all times, alright?" she whispered.

Sophia nodded obediently as Jo stood back up and led her around to the passenger's side of the truck. Opening the door, Jo helped Sophia inside but before she could pull herself up as well, The Governor was behind her. She jumped and whipped around, but he hushed her up.

"I gotta frisk you, to make sure you ain't concealing anything."

"I'm not," she assured.

"Well, I can't exactly believe a strange woman I've just met on the road and take her at face value alone."

"You believe me enough to offer us sanctuary."

"Two different things," he commented as he patted her down. When he finished, he pressed against her back and leaned over her shoulder. "All good."

As he backed away from her, Jo looked at him warily and then up at Sophia before pulling herself up into the truck. The girl scooted over, but then Jo pulled the girl onto her lap to keep her close as they watched The Governor open his own door and climb inside beside them. He caught their eye and smiled. He then gestured Jo forward so he could blindfold her with the tie. Leaning her head over, Jo obliged.

His fingers brushed her hair back over her shoulder and she could feel his warm breath on her forehead as he tied the tie; tight enough so that it wouldn't slip off but not too tight that it hurt her.

Not being able to see made Jo a touch more anxious and begin to second guess her decision to let The Governor drive off with her and Sophia to this supposed town.

Had she been too quick to give in?

Could she really trust him?

Was there even an actual town or was he just some psychopath with a charming smile and a convincing way with words?

Jo held Sophia tighter in her arms as the truck started up and lurched forward. Judging by the jerking movements, The Governor was making a three point turn to take the truck back the way he came. Jo could feel Sophia tensing in her lap as well, but she could also feel her pocket knife in Sophia's back pocket in between their bodies and knew that if she had to, she could reach it and use it to protect herself and the girl.

 

* * *

 

The drive didn't feel like it lasted more than a half hour. It was a silent drive, though. Jo didn't feel like talking much while she was blindfolded. Part of it was being blindfolded and in a moving vehicle, which was causing her suffer a bit of motion sickness. When he failed at having a conversation with Jo, The Governor attempted one with Sophia, but the girl gave brief answers and then shied away from talking altogether, so he gave up.

"That's alright," he remarked. "I understand your reservations. We still don't know each other and trust is something to be earned. But once you see my town, you'll see for yourselves that I mean no harm and have your best intentions at heart." Jo could hear the charming smile in his voice. "We'll have plenty to talk about then."

When the truck came to a stop after that half hour of driving, Jo could hear the dull scratching of metal upon pavement as if something heavy was being moved away.

"We're here," she heard The Governor announce.

Jo turned her head to her right as if she could see out the passenger window. The truck lurched forward again and Sophia seemed to relax in Jo's lap.

"What do you see?" she asked her surrogate daughter.

"It's a town," Sophia replied with a smile in her voice as well. "He was right."

"Told ya," The Governor chuckled.

"The streets are clean. There aren't any walkers, just people walking around."

Jo turned her blindfolded head toward The Governor as the truck ambled up a slight incline in the road and turned a corner. "How many people live here?" she asked him.

"With you and your daughter, that brings the grand total up to thirty-seven," he answered. "But every day we try looking for more people to bring here. People deserve a chance in this world and we can give it to them. We just have to stick together."

Jo relaxed as well.

When the truck came to a complete stop, she leaned back in her seat and didn't tense when she felt The Governor lean in to remove her blindfold. She found herself staring at a wall but then looked around and saw it was a sort of carport where a few other vehicles were parked. The Governor hopped out of the truck and Jo opened her door and did the same, helping Sophia out as The Governor grabbed their bags from the truck bed along with her sword and its scabbard.

"I'll have to keep your sword. You'll get it back if you choose to leave this place," he informed. "No residents keep weapons on them. The only ones are those on watch at the gates and walls, or if when we go on runs for supplies in case of biters. I'll also need to go through your bags to make sure you're not bringing in anything unsavory."

"It's just clothes, medical supplies and some food and water," Jo insisted.

"Well, the medical supplies can be taken to our medical office where they will be put to use, and the food and water will be added to the community supply." He caught her apprehensive gaze. "Don't worry, you won't go hungry here. But I have to think of everyone as a whole, not individuals."

The three of them were soon approached by two armed men; one black and one Hispanic, and both looked serious.

"New residents, Governor?" the Hispanic one asked.

"Fingers crossed," The Governor replied, smiling over at Jo and Sophia. "This here's Jo and Sophia Moore."

Jo nodded to the men. "Hey," she muttered, holding Sophia close.

"Jo, Sophia: this is Martinez and Shumpert, two of the best men we have here for our protection."

"So," Jo began looking at the Governor, as he led them away from the carport and out onto the main road. "Where is here exactly? Does this town have a name?"

"It does," The Governor replied with a grin as he gestured to it all with both hands outstretched. "Welcome to Woodbury."

 

* * *

 

The first week in Woodbury went by surprisingly fast.

The Governor, himself, had given Jo and Sophia the grand tour and showed them to a small two bedroom apartment above one of the storefronts for them to live in. Even though there was hot water for showers, they were advised not to take long ones, because the heat didn't always last too long. It was a kink they were still trying to work out in the town. Food and water were in the cupboards. There was even electricity, which was another thing they were advised not to use too much of. It was understandable. Heat and electricity were rare commodities nowadays and there wasn't enough of it to go around constantly in town for every person living there and every person that had yet to come to town.

Jo missed her sword at first. She had grown used to having it on her back and had really gotten a handle at using it. She had had plenty of practice with it on walkers, after all. A week in and she sometimes forgot the scabbard wasn't on her back and would go to reach for the handle to her sword only to remember it wasn't there anymore, but stored away wherever The Governor saw fit to place it. Jo and Sophia's medical supplies had, in fact, gone to the medical office, which was fine. But they got to keep their own food and water. It was added to their stock in the apartment. They also got their bags with their clothes and other odds and ends they had with them.

Settling in was surprisingly easy. It wasn't hard to remember how to live life like before. It was like riding a bicycle and it was so nice not having to constantly look over her shoulder, twenty-four seven, for walkers or other dangers. It was also nice, just having a warm bed and a roof over their head every night.

Soon enough, Jo was shown to a schoolroom set up in another one of the old storefronts, and introduced to the children. There weren't that many — eight, including Sophia — but it was enough for now. They ranged in ages from three to seventeen, and the only ones that would attend class were the older seven. The three year old wasn't old enough yet and stayed at home with his mother, a woman named Darlene. Darlene walked with a slight limp she received when jumping out a second story window a month earlier to escape walkers, just before she found her way to Woodbury with her son.

Later in the week, three new people arrived to Woodbury, bringing the population to an even forty, which The Governor saw as a reason to celebrate and throw a party. There were cold drinks, even beer, finger foods and music, and even tiki torches and fairy lights strung up. It was a wonderful evening, and Jo was happy to get to know her fellow townspeople. She also enjoyed watching Sophia mingle with two kids close to her age; a girl named Claire and a boy named Tommy. It was just really wonderful.

"How are you doing, Jo?"

Turning her head, Jo found herself looking at Milton, The Governor's advisor. She had met him briefly earlier in the week and he seemed to keep to himself. "I'm good, thanks. Yourself?"

"Good." He was frowning though.

"Who pissed in your cornflakes?" she asked with a chuckle.

"What—oh. I just think this is a waste of electricity. The lights and cold drinks? It's almost winter. Bonfires and hot cider would make more sense."

"Doesn't exactly scream 'party', though, does it?"

He shrugged. "I still think it's a waste."

"Maybe you should have yourself a beer and loosen up. We've all been through a lot of shit and this is some needed respite."

Looking her in the eye, Milton sighed. He stepped over to the metal tub full of ice and bottles of beer, grabbing one for himself, but then struggled to pull the cap off. Jo chuckled again and took the bottle from him.

"It's the twist off kind," she remarked, twisting the cap easily off and handing the bottle back.

"Well, that's embarrassing," Milton spoke.

"How's resident number thirty-six?" came the voice of The Governor, long before Jo saw him.

"Thirty-six?" she questioned when he sidled up between her and Milton.

"You and Sophia were the thirty-sixth and thirty-seventh residents to join Woodbury."

"Oh, right." Jo smiled. "I'm doing fantastic. I can't thank you enough for bringing us here."

"No need," he insisted with a wave of his hand. He then let his gaze fall over her in a way that made her blush and feel uneasy. It was hard to explain. "Would you like to take a walk with me? I'd like to discuss some ideas I have about the school when we get more children here."

Jo looked at Milton, who took his cue to back away, and then she looked up at The Governor. "Sure," she smiled. "I have some ideas, too."

"And I'd love to hear them."

Making sure Sophia was alright at the party before she walked away with The Governor, Jo shoved one hand into her pocket while the other maintained its grip on her beer bottle. The two of them walked along the sidewalk, away from the front lawn of the town hall where the festivities were taking place.

"So," he began, breaking the silence after a few moments. "I know there aren't many children yet, and those we do have at the moment are being taught at the same time, all together, like children were a hundred years ago. I mean, this apocalypse has more or less set us back to those times in all manner of ways. I was thinking that there should be a cut off, to group the children into two groups, where the younger ones attend class in the morning and the older ones attend in the afternoon." The Governor chuckled. "I remember, when I was a teenager, I hated getting up before noon."

Jo nodded with a smirk. "I was actually going to say something like what you just said," she remarked. "I mean, I only just started, but it's awkward trying to teach different things to such a variety of ages at the same time. Splitting them up would make much more sense."

The Governor smiled at her. "Exactly. Plus, who knows, maybe in time we'll have enough children where we can bring back grade levels."

"That would be something. Though, by that point I would hope there would be more teachers so I'm not stuck juggling all the kids."

He leaned in and nudged her with his arm. "Maybe, by then, you'll be the principal, in charge of all the teachers."

Despite how interesting an idea that sounded, she had to be realistic. "That's considering that day ever comes," Jo commented with a shrug. "I still have trouble accepting how safe this place is. I keep waking up thinking I'm out on the road again and that walkers will come at me at every turn."

The Governor stopped and turned to face her on the sidewalk and Jo followed suit. He placed a hand on her shoulder and gave a comforting squeeze. "You don't have to worry about those things here. I will personally see to the safety of you and your daughter. After all, you're the future of Woodbury's education system."

Jo grinned brightly at him and nodded. "Okay, that does sound pretty nice."

He pointed at her and chuckled. "Ahh—and look at the smile it brings to your face. That makes it worth it alone."

Pushing some hair behind her ears, Jo could feel she was blushing slightly. Whether or not he noticed, he didn't seem to let on, which she was thankful for. It would've only made her feel embarrassed.

They crossed the street together and reached the storefront which was being used as the schoolroom. He opened the door and let her inside first before entering. They gave the room a quick inspection and he began to rattle on about ideas of finding chalkboard paint and painting one of the walls with it so that she had something to write lessons and teach on. Then she mentioned different ways she planned on grouping the tables and chairs to make the layout of the space flow more easily and not feel as cluttered. There were just minor ideas they talked about; along with how he planned on taking a run one of these days to some of the abandoned schools nearby to grab up some school books that could be used by her and the children of Woodbury.

It was such a lovely chat with all the possibilities of rebuilding the society they had all lost months before that it made Jo's eyes sparkle with delight and, when she began to feel The Governor looking at her, she felt her cheeks get warm. Jo looked back at him and saw his head was tilted slightly and looking at her in a way she hadn't noticed a man look at her since her husband and it made her feel a little anxious.

"Do I have something on my face?" she asked lamely, touching her fingertips to her cheek.

The Governor smirked. "Not yet," he said, confusing her until he walked up and placed both hands on either side of her face. After a moment where she was completely dumbfounded by the gesture, he leaned in and kissed her.

While the kiss was a lovely one, it wasn't warranted in Jo's eyes. And although she couldn't deny he was a handsome and very charming man, she wasn't attracted to him in a romantic sense, or even a sexual one. The kiss just felt awkward to her and so she pulled back and looked a little bewildered at him.

"I apologize," he muttered. "I didn't mean to surprise you like that or make you feel uncomfortable."

"It's okay," she half-lied, taking a step back. "I just…I'm not in a place where I'm ready to move on from my husband. It hasn't even been four months since I lost him."

The Governor's gaze hardened slightly, but he nodded in understanding. "Was he bit?"

"No," Jo replied. "He got sick like so many in the beginning. The fever took him and that's when he came back, but I couldn't kill him. I locked him up in our bedroom and after a few days I had to leave. I just packed up some necessities and tried to make it to Atlanta, but the roads were backed up and then the city was bombed with napalm, so I turned around and went to the outskirts of town. I tried heading back home, but it was blocked off by then by too many walkers and eventually I ran out of gas and just went by foot everywhere."

The Governor narrowed his eyes. "Where was your daughter in all this?"

"Oh," Jo muttered, mentally kicking herself for letting her façade of being a mother slip. "She was with me."

"You know, the two of you don't look much alike, the more I think of it."

Jo's nostrils flared as she felt her nerves begin to jump around. "She's like a clone of her father," she said with a nervous chuckle. "She looked more like me as a baby, but as she got older, her looks changed."

Nodding, The Governor seemed to accept this. "I had a daughter," he admitted. "She died, though. Penny was her name."

Jo smiled sympathetically. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"My wife, she died eighteen months before the world fell apart. Car accident. Sometimes I think she lucked out, dying before all this happened; not having to experience this world or see our daughter die."

"That's terrible."

"Yeah, it was."

Looking toward the windows, Jo held tighter onto her beer bottle and shoved her free hand into her pocket as she rocked on the balls of her feet. "We should rejoin the party. I should see what Sophia's getting up to," Jo suggested. "I don't like to let her out of my sight for too long. Even in the safest place she could get hurt and I need to be there for her."

The Governor nodded. "I understand completely."

The two of them exited the schoolroom then, and more or less parted ways once they reached everyone else at the town hall's lawn. Jo found Sophia, laughing with her new friend Claire over cups of Kool-Aid and was content not to interrupt the girl and just allow her some adolescent distraction.

Through the crowd, though, Jo spotted The Governor looking at her again.

She just smiled politely at him, but couldn't shake the uneasy feeling that had now taken root inside her.

 

* * *

 

At the end of Jo and Sophia's second week in Woodbury, everything seemed the same. There were no new residents which meant no new children for Jo to teach. She had implemented the split in classes. Children ages five to eleven attended school from eight-thirty to eleven-thirty, then Jo had her break for lunch before the children ages twelve to seventeen showed up for noon until three.

Sophia was twelve, so she went to school with the older kids, which meant it was up to her in the morning to get up on time and have breakfast and get ready for the day while Jo was at the school room. After school Sophia got to hang out with her new friends for a while before it got too dark out because Woodbury had a curfew. She would get home in time for Jo to make them dinner and play some board games or for Jo to help her with the little bit of homework she gave the kids before they went to bed and started the day all over.

One evening, though, Jo and Sophia were invited to dinner at The Governor's apartment. His advisor Milton was there, which Jo was thankful for; it wouldn't feel as awkward for her that way.

Spaghetti was being served, along with wine for the adults and water for Sophia. It was a pleasant enough dinner but Jo couldn't help but wonder why they had been invited to it.

Did he invite everyone to dinner at his place at one time or another, or was there an ulterior motive?

Jo could feel his eyes on her every so often during the course of the meal but she kept her eyes averted at her dinner plate, or trying to find something interesting with her wine glass or whatever it was Milton was rambling on about. Sophia was quiet, but Jo could tell she was bored and would rather be at their apartment instead with just the two of them. It was also possible that Sophia was distracted because the following night she was having her first sleepover at Claire's home, which Jo was, admittedly, a bit nervous about. It would be the first time since they'd met that the girl would be spending a night away from her.

After dinner, The Governor asked Milton if he would be so kind as to escort Sophia home because he had some important matters in regard to the school in which he needed to discuss with Jo. She tried to insist that whatever it was could wait until morning, but The Governor waved Jo off with a charming smile, saying it was a Friday night and why not have a nightcap while they were at it? There was no school the next morning, so Jo could sleep in once she got home and Sophia was old enough to stay home alone for a little while. Sophia would be okay, he insisted.

When Sophia agreed that she would, Jo almost felt betrayed by the girl and just smiled politely at The Governor who seemed pleased with Sophia's response.

Once Milton left with her surrogate daughter, Jo turned to see The Governor standing over at the sink with his back to her as he poured them two new glasses of wine. She took that time to look around and found her sword in a display case, but pretended not to have noticed it when she turned back to see him approaching her with a glass of wine outstretched to her.

"Thank you," she said, taking the glass. "So, what did you need to discuss with me about the school?"

"To be honest, it's not really that important," he admitted, taking a sip of his wine. "Just that one of the mothers approached me this morning, wanting to know if she could help out in the morning class. Really, I just think she's incapable of cutting the umbilical cord. I told her it wasn't really my decision, but that I would ask you about it, since you _are_ the teacher and I don't want you to feel as if someone is encroaching on your territory, so to speak."

Jo nodded. "I appreciate that, but if it gives the mother peace of mind being near her child, then that's fine with me. Plus, the younger ones tend to have shorter attention spans. It might be nice to have someone else help rein them in." Taking a sip of her wine, she stepped over to the window and turned her back to it, leaning against the sill. "I mean, it's not like there's a lot of them anyway. There are only three kids in the morning right now and four in the afternoon, Sophia included."

The Governor raised his glass. "Well, here's to the future and more children for the school."

Jo mirrored his gesture and then took another sip of wine while wondering why it tasted so bitter. "Is this the same wine you served at dinner? It tastes different; a bit sour."

He shrugged and sniffed his glass, before continuing to drink from it. "Tastes fine to me," he remarked.

Jo looked into her glass and shrugged as well. She continued to drink and The Governor began to talk to her about his other plans for Woodbury, which was quite honestly very interesting. Since winter was fast approaching, he mentioned the idea of a tree lighting ceremony for everyone to participate, and that maybe the school children could make ornaments and maybe even put on a Christmas pageant, but Jo shot the latter down, saying she was no school play director.

After a while, Jo began to feel tired. She set her wine glass down on the table and placed her thumb and index finger to the bridge of her nose while The Governor walked over to his CD player and turned on some music.

"Would you care to dance?" he asked.

"I'm…I think I might fall asleep on you," she slurred. "I'm feeling tired."

"Oh, you'll be fine. Trust me."

Walking up to her, The Governor took her right hand in his left and encircled his right arm around her waist, pulling her up against his chest as they danced to what sounded to be Sting's 'Fields of Gold.' As he twirled her around, Jo felt as if she was floating on air. And it wasn't because he was that great of a dancer, but because her legs felt numb and she was beginning to feel, over all, like dead weight in his arms.

"You really are tired aren't you?" he asked.

She nodded slowly. "Yeah," she slurred again. Her entire world felt like it was moving in slow motion. "I think I should go home and sleep."

"Here, why don't you come sit down?"

Jo found herself barely able to figure out where he was leading her but she knew where he sat her down was soft and comfortable. Her head bobbed and felt heavy as well as she turned and looked around and finally realized she was sitting on the edge of his bed and that he was unzipping his leather vest and tossing it onto a chair.

Before she could form any words, she fell back onto the mattress and looked sleepily up at the ceiling as her eyelids grew just as heavy as the rest of her felt.

"What's going on?" she continued to slur, her voice barely audible.

The mattress moved as he climbed up onto it and just as he hovered over her, Jo's eyes fell shut and everything went dark on her.

 

* * *

 

During the night, Jo dreamt wildly.

In her dreams, she could've sworn her husband was there with her, alive and well, making love to her. But it felt different. It was rougher and she couldn't move. She felt like she was trapped in a coma; aware but incapable of communicating. The dream changed, and it was no longer her husband, but The Governor instead, and she still couldn't seem to react.

But then the dreaming seemed to stop and a deep, dreamless sleep took over.

When Jo woke up in the morning, she stretched and rolled over, but stilled when she realized she wasn't alone in bed. And not just that she wasn't alone, but that she wasn't in her own bed. Sitting up, the blanket fell off her and she noticed she was completely naked and her clothes were folded neatly on a nearby chair. At her left was The Governor, lying face down and presumably just as naked as her under the covers and Jo suddenly felt like she wanted to throw up.

She didn't remember taking her clothes off and but she knew by how she felt that they had had sex, although she didn't remember that as well.

She did remember her wine tasting funny and getting sleepy.

"Oh god," she cried. Turning her body and growing angry, Jo punched him in the arm which woke him up with a start.

"What the hell—"

"You roofied me," she accused, gathering the blankets up around her body.

The Governor sat up and scowled at her. "I did no such thing."

He was lying. She could tell.

"Liar."

"I am not," he maintained. "We had a few glasses of wine, got a bit drunk and then you came onto me. I will admit, I could've rebuffed your advances, but I find you incredibly attractive and I am a man, after all. I'd be blind and stupid to not sleep with a beautiful woman who clearly wants to sleep with me."

"I don't remember having anything more to drink or coming on to you. I sat on the bed and felt tired, and then nothing."

"Your body's obviously not used to alcohol anymore since the world fell apart," he offered. "You're a lightweight. Doesn't take much for you to get drunk apparently."

"I've always been a lightweight, but I've never blacked out."

"Well, it's a shame you don't remember," he remarked, sitting up and then standing up, butt naked, to pick her clothes up off the chair for her. "It was a wonderful evening and you were marvelous."

Jo definitely wanted to vomit now.

But then she remembered something.

"Sophia," she muttered.

"She's fine," he assured. "After you fell asleep I sent someone to keep an eye on her. Though, it's still early enough. She's probably still asleep. You could get home before she even wakes up, I bet."

Glaring at him, Jo stood up and swallowed her nerves as she took her clothes from him and began to pull them on while doing her best to ignore him.

"Would you like some coffee before you go?" he asked her.

"No," she spat. "You'll probably just slip something into it."

When she looked over her shoulder at him, she saw his jaw clench. "That's enough of that. I won't have you spouting lies about me, understand?" He sat back down on the bed and pulled the covers back over him, making himself comfortable. "I mean, I'm The Governor and people admire me here. You're new and people don't know you very well yet. The people of Woodbury trust me. I keep them safe. Who do you think they're gonna believe?"

With a smile, he winked at her with his right eye and Jo just stood there, staring back at him as her fists balled at her sides.

All she could think of was two things: how dirty she felt and how much she wanted to rip that right eye of his out of its socket.

"Don't touch me again, _Governor_ ," she glowered.

Stalking out of the bedroom, she grabbed her jacket from the living room and made a beeline for the apartment door. Slamming it shut behind her, Jo dropped down to a crouching position and placed her head in her hands.

"What do I do now?" she asked herself.


	5. Consequence

_"To all those who have suffered as a consequence of our troubled past I extend my sincere thoughts and deep sympathy. With the benefit of historical hindsight we can all see things which we would wish had been done differently or not at all."_  — Queen Elizabeth II

* * *

  
The caravan of vehicles came to a halt outside the gates of the outdoor self-storage facility that was just off Highway 74. The fence surrounding the facility was intact but the front gate was open and there were at least a dozen and a half walkers milling aimlessly around until they sensed the vehicles. As the walkers approached with a sort of renewed vigor, Rick and Glenn hopped out of their truck while Maggie climbed out and hopped into the truck bed alongside Shane who had gotten out of his car. They fired from a safe distance at the skulls of the walkers, letting the undead come to them, so it meant fewer bodies to remove from inside the facility.

"We can line the bodies up along the outside perimeter, mask our scent from any other walkers that might come this way from the road," Rick announced.

"Can't we just burn the bodies? Leaving them to rot, it just seems so callous," Dale commented, sticking his head out the driver side window of his RV.

Rick looked back at him, before turning to focus on the walkers once more. "You want a bunch of walkers coming up to the fence and taking it down because there's too many of them? All that weight pushing against it would take it down and we'd be overrun and trapped."

"Now ain't the time for some moral high ground, Dale," Shane remarked, firing a round into one of the walkers approaching Dale's window. As the walker went down and Dale looked back at Shane, the younger man smirked. "You're welcome."

It was a month since leaving Hershel's farm and increasingly closer to winter. The chill in the air was more pronounced and everyone was wearing warmer coats or blankets wrapped around them most of the time. The days were easier, with the sun being out and offering some semblance of warmth, but the nights were getting brutal, which was why they needed a secure shelter that could get them through the winter months. The storage facility wasn't ideal, but it would have to do for the time being.

Once all the walkers they could see had been dispatched, they pulled the vehicles just inside the fence. Dale parked the RV directly in front of the gate after they closed it as an extra barrier against anyone or anything that might try to get in. The other vehicles were lined up, from bumper to bumper along the fence to block them from the sight of walkers who might approach the fence, as much as possible. The dead walkers had been taking outside the fence and propped up all around it before they realized there were more walkers inside some of the storage units, of people who had been locked inside and subsequently died.

Fortunately, in that craziness, none of the group was bit or died and they all began the next process of opening up more of the units and trying to clear them out to make them livable for the next few months. Most paired up, like Glenn and Maggie, Carol and Patricia, Daryl and T-Dog. Andrea opted to stay in Dale's RV with him and Rick chose to stay in a unit with Hershel because it had become increasingly more obvious that he and Lori hadn't been able to get past their issues with each other. And the fact that Lori had found solace with a more than willing Shane, more and more, as time went on just increased that wedge between husband and wife, as well as between the friends.

Rick couldn't and wouldn't fight for Lori. Like her, he was too broken from losing Carl, and after learning about the pregnancy she terminated and fully understanding the child could've been Shane's, Rick didn't think he _wanted_ to fight for her. Their marriage was strained before the outbreak, and now it was virtually nonexistent.

He didn't hate Lori. In fact, he would always love her, but he just couldn't be the husband she needed anymore and she wasn't the wife he wanted anymore either. And they both knew it, but both seemed incapable of just coming right out and declaring to one another that their marriage, for all intents and purposes, was over.

If Shane felt he could love Lori better and be a better husband for her, and if Lori was willing to accept him in Rick's place, then so be it.

Rick didn't have that fight in him anymore.

He had enough to worry about and fight for — like the safety and well-being of eleven other people aside from himself.

Their first night in the storage facility, Rick and Hershel laid in their sleeping bags with a battery-powered lantern between them.

"I know none of us has really said anything to you, Rick," Hershel spoke quietly, "But on behalf of everyone, I need you to know we're all very grateful for all you've done to keep us alive since leaving the farm. I know it hasn't been easy, taking the reins and leading us all, but you've done a fine job of it."

"Thanks," Rick replied laconically.

"You and I have lost quite a bit and it is far from easy to get over, but I admire you for being able to trudge through it. Better men would've given up by now."

Rick turned his head slightly, his arms crossed over his chest. "Are you trying to flirt with me by complimenting me, Hershel? If so, I regret to inform you that I don't swing that way."

Hershel snickered. "You're not my type even if I was," the older man joked.

"You have a type?" Rick asked with a chuckle.

Hershel joined in with the chuckling but then they both fell silent.

"I mean it, though, Rick. We owe you a lot for everything you've done. Don't doubt for a minute we don't see it."

Turning his head to stare directly up at the ceiling, Rick sighed and reached his arm out to turn off the lantern. "Yeah, well, _someone_ has to take care of us. Might as well be me," he remarked. "Not like I have anything else to do."

 

* * *

 

Ever since Jo had woken up in The Governor's bed that morning nearly a month ago, she did everything in her power to avoid him like the plague. She kept to her work with the school but was expected to attend weekly meetings at the town hall since she did play a vital role in the community, which meant she _did_ have to interact with him but she kept it to a minimum; only speaking to him when spoken to and or addressing him indirectly. And Jo knew he was aware of how she felt about him, how she despised him now. But, for Sophia's sake and their continued safety, she played nice and remained in Woodbury.

She knew The Governor wielded power in the town and she knew she had to do what she could to get by until there might come a time where she could leave with Sophia. Or maybe someone could dispose of The Governor; someone not like him at all.

But, until then, she played her part.

On one of the early mornings on her way to the schoolroom before the younger children arrived, she made it halfway there when she felt suddenly nauseous. Running to a nearby flowerbed, she leaned forward into it and vomited. Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Jo stood up straight and looked around to see if anyone had noticed, but there were barely any people out on the street yet for the day and those that were seemed too preoccupied with whatever it was they were doing.

Ducking into the schoolroom, Jo closed the door behind her and went over to her desk and sat down. She glanced lamely at the books in front of her and then over at the lesson from the previous day's afternoon class with the older students which needed to be erased and set up for this morning's morning class with the youngers students. It was going to be basic math problems and then practicing writing in cursive; the latter which seemed to have been a dying art form, in a sense, long before the outbreak occurred, that she was determined not be forgotten by the younger generations.

As her stomach began to sour again, Jo stood up and went to the schoolroom's bathroom in the back near the storage area where she hoped would be cleared out in time and turned into a second class room for when even more kids joined the town's numbers.

Thoughts like that are what helped keep her in Woodbury. She couldn't just think about herself, but she had to think about Sophia and the other kids. Someone had to keep their futures in mind.

Holding onto the sink in the bathroom, Jo glanced briefly at her reflection before turning abruptly to lift the toilet seat lid, bend down and throw up some more. She rinsed her mouth with water from the tap after flushing the toilet and looked once more upon her reflection as fear entered her eyes.

"Oh no, no, no, no, no," she muttered.

Sinking down to the floor, she pulled her knees to her chest and placed her face in her hands as she mentally counted back the days.

"No, no, no," Jo repeated. "No."

Her heartbeat began to quicken and she felt a different sort of nausea; not of sickness but of unease.

"I can't be…I just _can't_ be…"

 

* * *

 

Rick walked along the aisle in between the storage units with his gun holstered as he did an early morning safety check of the storage facility's property. It was early morning; cold, but the sun was shining, which was always better than cold and grey. Cold and grey was always so depressing. At least the sun being out gave a sense of warmth, even if it was a false sense. Brighter days just seemed brighter on the whole, which was always welcomed considering how the world was now. It reminded Rick of his childhood, sleeping over at his grandparents' house on weekends during the summer when he would wake up extra early and take walks with his grandfather.

Rick sighed, looking at the slew of closed storage unit doors on either side of him. With Carl gone he would never be a grandfather. Not only did he lose his son, he lost the chance of grandchildren in the future, even if he lived long enough in this world to see them born.

As he walked toward the back of the facility, he heard one of the doors glide open and footsteps approaching.

"Hey, Rick."

It was Shane.

Rick stopped and waited for the man he had a strained friendship with to join him at his side like he did most mornings.

"Up earlier today than usual," Shane remarked, zipping up his jacket.

"Couldn't sleep."

"Yeah, I hear ya." When Rick stared back at Shane, Shane laughed nervously. "'Cause the floor of the storage unit is literally hard as a rock, even with a sleeping bag, not because—"

"We don't need to go into it."

"You _never_ want to go into it, brother."

Rick began to walk again. "What do you want me to say, Shane? We ain't exactly the best of friends anymore."

"Whose fault is that?" Shane asked, swatting at Rick's arm.

Stopping once more, Rick looked down clenched his jaw. "You're implying it's all mine?" Lifting his gaze toward his oldest friend, he appeared almost amused. With a head tilt, he gestured to himself. "I don't recall asking you to bed my wife while I was in a coma and then continue to do so after I lost my son."

"It didn't happen like that and you know it. You know there was nothing I could've done for you. You were as good as dead for all I knew and it was up to me to keep Lori and Carl safe when the world fell apart, and I did. I won't make excuses and I won't apologize for falling in love with Lori. It happened. I only regret that—"

"That I survived and came back?"

"No, that we lost who we were to each other."

Both men continued to walk side by side around the perimeter together, but Shane wasn't done talking.

"You let Lori go. You wouldn't fight for her, but I did and she saw that. I'm sorry it happened this way, but I'm not sorry it happened at all. I love her and I will fight for her until I die."

Rick's nostrils flared. He _really_ didn't want to talk about this. "Then I guess Lori's a lucky woman, ain't she?"

Shane shook his head in disbelief. "The woman lost her son and you just checked out on her. You gave up, man. How do you just do that?"

Turning angrily at Shane, he jabbed the other man in the chest with his finger. "I lost Carl, too, and I was dealing with it the best I could. I still am. I didn't just _check_ out. I _broke_ , Shane. I couldn't look at Lori because all I saw was Carl and we had to look for Sophia and everyone looked to _me_ as if I was some goddamned savior. Well, guess what? I'm fucking human and I make mistakes. I've never lost a child before. How would you have liked me to mourn my son, Shane? Should I have found some all black clothes to wear, sitting in my tent day in and day out with Lori, wallowing in my grief? Would that have worked for you? Well, I couldn't do that. I _can't_ do that." He threw his hands up in the air and stalked off a few feet from Shane, but Shane caught up. "And don't you throw it in my face that I checked out on Lori. She checked out on me just the same. She terminated her pregnancy, something that might've brought us closer together again or maybe not. She kept her secrets from me and she didn't want to see me half the time because I reminded her of Carl, too. Same eyes, she always said."

"Brother, I know it—"

"Don't call me brother anymore," Rick snapped and Shane looked as if he'd been slapped across his fast.

Biting his tongue, Shane nodded and clenched his jaw. "Yeah, alright, fine. We ain't brothers, but you're still my friend and, no matter what's gone down between us, I ain't giving up on that."

"Good luck with that."

Rick stalked off alone then, and Shane chose to stay behind and give him space.

 

* * *

 

Throughout the next few days, Jo did her best to keep her nausea under control. She did the math a second time in her head and could confirm with herself that she had missed her period by over a week, and she had always been regular. The signs were all there.

She was pregnant and nothing terrified her more.

Not being pregnant, as she'd always wanted children; just not this way.

This wasn't exactly the world she dreamt of bringing a child into and The Governor was not the man she wanted as the father of her child. It was supposed to be her husband, Oscar, or at the very least someone else she would've fallen in love at some point in the future. Not now. Not only months after losing her husband to the damned outbreak.

She made peppermint tea, remembering her grandmother having always said it was a natural remedy for nausea, and it did seem to work to an extent. However, she was so distracted and still throwing up here and there at different times of the day — why it was called morning sickness, she'd never know — that she had to cancel classes a few times.

Milton came by those days to check on her, but whether it was of his own volition or if he was sent as a mole for The Governor was yet to be seen. Throwing up her own defensive walls, she chose to believe the latter, and claimed she was just having very bad cramps. It was enough to make Milton stumble over himself. Most men, in her experience, blanched at any mention of the goings on of the female reproductive system. It worked in getting Milton to leave without a second thought, though.

In the meantime, as well, when in a public setting as more people were brought to Woodbury, Jo would glimpse The Governor. She would watch how he spoke and smiled so charmingly with everyone. She watched him carefully. She watched how, the second he was so sure no one was looking at him, his face fell and his demeanor changed. His face was like a blank slate, devoid of emotion or caring. It was almost scary, the way he could turn it on and off like that.

This was not the man she wanted as the father of her child.

She no longer trusted him.

He gave her bad vibes and she wanted to be as far away from him as possible, but that was going to be difficult.

She needed to keep Sophia safe, but now she also had the child growing inside her to think about. Despite whom its father was, Jo was going to keep it. She would do what she had to do. And the more she considered her options, the more she just wanted to leave Woodbury. There was no guarantee the walls closing in the town would hold forever. There were no guarantees on anything anymore. If she could just get her sword back from The Governor's apartment, she could get her and Sophia out. She was familiar with the weak spots in the wall when it came to watch; as in who was more vigilant than others.

Jo was convinced, if they could get out, she and Sophia could make a successful run for it if they left at night. By sunrise, they could be far enough away. Not that everyone in Woodbury was a bad person — most everyone was wonderful — but it was The Governor that had ruined it for her. If he wasn't there, she would stay without a second thought. But there was no sign of him ever leaving or backing down from his position of power. He was a big fish in a small pond and he clearly enjoyed where he stood above the others. She could tell he wouldn't give it up without a fight, and a bloody one at that.

So, Jo began to formulate a plan on getting the hell out of dodge.

 

* * *

 

Another couple of weeks had passed and Rick still would not have a direct conversation with Shane. When it came to going on runs he more often than not went on them with Daryl or Glenn. And, Rick wasn't there to see it most of the time but, the looks Lori received from the other women most of the time left a lot to be desired.

She expressed her frustrations with Shane or Dale; the only two men who didn't share an ounce of judgment with the women against her. Patricia was the only one who seemed to make an effort, and that was probably because she didn't know the group until after they arrived to Hershel's farm and she felt guilty on behalf of her dead husband Otis for being the one who shot Lori and Rick's son. Carol, who had been one of Lori's only friends in their camp, had begun to choose Rick's side after leaving Hershel's farm. Originally it seemed as though Carol had her doubts about Rick, but something changed. She now seemed to look up to the man with a lot of respect. It might've had a lot to do with Rick being only one of the few in their group that had been determined enough to continue the search for Sophia even after hope seemed lost on that forefront. There was also Maggie who had developed a terse relationship with Lori after her and Glenn nearly got killed by walker trying to get the morning after pills for Lori. And, as for Andrea, while she was definitely attracted to Shane, she was more loyal to Rick and had always seemed to butt heads with Lori from the get-go. The fact that Lori was with Shane now might've put a greater wedge between both women, because that meant Andrea's chance with Shane diminished.

Yet another reason why Andrea sided with Rick.

As winter rolled in, slowly but surely, it was harder to avoid each other. They needed to stay together for warmth most nights. Two to a storage unit wasn't cutting it and they needed the extra body heat, so everyone ended up doubling up; four to a unit if possible.

Glenn and Maggie joined Patricia and Carol while T-Dog and Daryl joined Rick and Hershel. Dale and Andrea remained in the RV and Andrea refused to allow Shane and Lori to join them or the other way around which meant Lori and Shane were alone together still.

"We need to be doubling up," Lori remarked one evening, holding a pillow in her arms as she eyed Andrea.

"You and Shane create enough body heat by sharing a sleeping bag, don't you?" Andrea threw back.

Lori bypassed the desire to snap back at the blonde as she rolled her eyes. "It's not the same as more bodies."

"There are plenty outside the fence to choose from."

"Andrea—"

"Lori," Andrea bit out. "You and I aren't friends and this world is miserable enough. I am not about to make my life even more miserable by sharing a storage unit with you."

"Andrea, I'm sure we can all—" Dale began to say, ever the peacekeeper.

"You can sleep in the RV with them, then, but I won't. I'll sleep by myself in a storage unit or squeeze in with one of the other groups."

Lori scowled at how unreasonable she felt Andrea was being, but Andrea just didn't care. The blonde stormed into the RV and gathered up her belongings and then stormed back out as she gestured to the vehicle.

"There, princess, it's all yours."

"There's no reason to be a bitch about all this."

Andrea laughed. " _I'm_ the bitch? Me? You're funny."

"Alright, alright ladies. Let's put a sock in it before this leads to bloodshed," T-Dog piped up stepping between both women.

Rick and Daryl were returning from a run on Daryl's motorcycle at that moment. As Rick hopped off the back with a hefty looking bag on his back, he walked over to the tense standoff there appeared to be forming.

"What's going on? Did something happen?" he asked.

"Just a change in sleeping arrangements," Andrea replied civilly as she smiled back at Rick. She walked over toward Carol and Maggie and asked. "Can I squeeze in with the four of you?"

Carol nodded and placed a hand on Andrea's shoulder. "Sure, there's plenty of room." She looked at Maggie to be sure.

Maggie in turn looked at Glenn who would be stuck in a storage unit with four extra women instead of three. "I'm fine with it if you are."

Glenn shrugged and smirked. "If my high school friends could see me now," he attempted to joke.

Lori threw her hands up. "This is ridiculous," she announced and stalked off toward the storage unit she'd been sharing with Shane.

"So, are the two of you going to be sleeping in here or not?" Dale asked Shane.

Shane ran a hand over his head and threw his hands up as well. "I don't even know."

"This is more than just about sleeping arrangements, isn't it?" Rick questioned.

"No, this is literally just about sleeping arrangements. Both literal and figurative, wouldn't you say, Shane?" Andrea asked with a smirk.

"Woman, I swear you are pushing buttons that you shouldn't be pushing," Shane glared at her. Stepping over to Rick, he whispered, "You best get your bitches on a leash."

Rick leaned back, tilting his head, and scowled. " _Excuse_ me? You _really_ wanna do this _right_ now?"

"I've been waiting to do this for a while, _Rick_ , because you _won't_ do this."

"'Cause there ain't nothing to say, _Shane_."

"There is plenty to say."

Rick stepped closer, getting in Shane's face and Shane matched him step for step. The others got tense watching as the two alpha males looked as if they were going to throw down, and all this in-fighting was not what the group needed right now, at all.

"You wanna talk?"

"Yeah," Shane nodded.

"Alright, let's talk about how you fucked my wife, and I'm not talking while you thought I was dead, but after my son died? Is that what friends do, Shane? Is it? Do friends lust after their friend's wives?" Rick stepped back a few paces and turned around briefly, trying to avoid the eye contact of others who had fallen awkwardly silent. Whipping around, he glared back at Shane. "I was grieving, she was grieving, but you took advantage of her. She could've thrown herself at you seven ways to Sunday and you should've turned her away. Comfort her with a hug and kind words, not with your dick."

Shane pursed his lips and clenched his jaw, taking a few steadying breaths. He had always been quick to anger, but he had been working on his temper lately; trying not to let it win every time. "We found a connection with each other, and I was mourning Carl, too. You made me his godfather, for Christ's sake, Rick. I was there the day he was born, and for every birthday party and every holiday. I might not have lost him the same way, but I lost him, too. And Lori and me — I love her, I admit it openly and I give zero fucks about who knows it. I didn't take advantage of her grief. She came to me, Rick, 'cause you weren't there for her. _I_ was there for her and I _wanted_ to be there for her."

"That doesn't give you the right to fuck her."

Lori came hurrying out from her storage unit, hearing the commotion between her husband and her lover. "Hey, we really don't need to do this now," she insisted, holding her hands up.

"I think it's just getting good," Andrea quipped.

"Really, Andrea? Can you just shut the hell up?"

Andrea turned to Lori, taking a defensive stance. "You gonna make me, Walmart?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You know, open twenty-four seven…"

Lori launched herself at Andrea, but T-Dog grabbed her back. As Andrea went to react as well, Glenn got between both women as Rick and Shane's arguing seemed to stop as well.

"Enough!" Hershel shouted, looking at each and every person. "You're acting like children having a pissing contest. Pull yourselves together for the love of God. We cannot afford dissention among our numbers. We need to put personal issues aside for the greater good of this group." He looked at Andrea and Lori. "You two quit your bitching and grow up." Then he looked at Rick and Shane. "You two have been friends since childhood from what I've gathered and yes, some horrible things have happened in the last several months. You all made mistakes and choices you have to live with now. Rick, you lost your son and you grieved the best way you knew how, and in doing so you pushed Lori away. Shane, you slept with your best friend's wife and that is inexcusable in most cases, but this is not most cases. Yes, Rick didn't fight for his marriage but neither did you, Lori." He eyed the brunette woman again. "You made your bed, literally and figuratively, and now you are lying in it. If you want to work things out with Rick, then you cannot be with Shane. If not, then come right out and say it now, because this tension cannot continue. And Andrea, we all get you have some sort of problem with Lori, but we also don't need your two cents at every turn."

Maggie covered her mouth with her hand to hide her grin as she looked at Glenn. When her father laid the law upon other people, it amused her quite a bit. Not only that, but she knew everything he had just said was what needed to be said and she agreed with all of it. Pulling on Glenn's sleeve she gestured toward the aisle between the storage units. "C'mon, baby," she said to him.

Obediently, Glenn nodded and stepped away from in between Andrea and Lori and followed after Maggie. Carol and Patricia retreated as well while the others still remained where they were, either looking awkwardly at each other, sheepishly at Hershel or at the ground to avoid any eye contact altogether.

Hershel focused once more on Lori. "I'm serious, Lori. Speak up now or forever hold your peace."

Lori sighed and looked between Rick and Shane, and then down at the ground. "I don't think there is a marriage left to save anymore," she muttered, eyeing Rick. "It was getting strained before you were shot, before the coma. The one thing that was keeping us going is gone now. I thought I needed you when we lost Carl, but I didn't want to be around you at the same time. We did that to each other. We didn't handle our grief properly, if there really is a proper way, and for what it's worth I am so sorry. I just…" she trailed, placing her hands on her hips and looking down at her feet. "I think we're done."

Rick swallowed back a lump in his throat as he nodded slowly. "I'm sorry, too, for not fighting for you when I had the chance and just giving up. But you blamed me for Carl's death and I did, too, and still do to a degree. But I didn't pull that trigger; I had no way of knowing he would've been shot. You agreed to let him come with me so I can't hold all that blame. It wasn't fair of you to do that to me. You also didn't have to pull the trigger when our son came back as a walker. You cried and walked out of the room and left me to do it. How do think it feels to have to shoot your only child in the head, Lori? I see his face every day in my head. I still see the blood painting the pillow underneath him as I put him down. And then you wouldn't look at me. When I tried to talk to you in Dale's RV, you walked out." Rick shook his head. "You can't blame me and not want to talk to me, and then accuse me of pushing you away. You pushed me away first, Lori. This little confrontation," he gestured between them, "is pointless because you made your decision that we were finished when you chose to sleep with Shane after the fact. You getting rid of the baby: that was the nail in the coffin of our marriage. That was you telling me you were done fighting for me as well, that you didn't want a life with me anymore, not just that you didn't want to bring a child into this world. I've known we've been over, I just didn't feel like hearing it out loud, I guess. We all fucked up, but Hershel's right; we can't fight about this anymore. We have enough to fight out there," he pointed beyond the fence, "that we don't need to worry about fighting in here, too."

Hershel glanced among them all again. "Can we move on from this now?"

Rick nodded, Lori nodded and Shane nodded. Andrea sighed and also nodded after a few moments.

"Shake hands," Hershel added. When everyone hesitated, he frowned. "Did I stutter?"

Rick and Shane looked at each other and extended their hands to one another. Briefly and begrudgingly they shook hands as Lori and Andrea did the same. When Rick looked at Lori, he was tempted to shake her hand as well, but it felt like a weird gesture to make with the woman he'd been married to for thirteen years. Stepping over to her, he hugged her, which took her by surprise. She laid her head down upon his shoulder for a moment and returned the embrace and when they stepped back from each other, it was as if they had both just signed divorce papers.

It was like a goodbye in a way.

Not wanting to remain in this moment any longer, Rick turned and walked away toward the storage unit where they kept all their food supplies so he could drop off the items he and Daryl had gotten on their run.

And he also just needed alone time with his thoughts.

 

* * *

 

A few days later, Jo had figured out a plan she hoped like hell would work. She quietly picked away at one of the gates which rarely had a lookout and opened it up enough so that nearby walkers could get in and cause the distraction she needed. It was near curfew so there barely any citizens of Woodbury on the streets at that time in the evening. The cut she had received when she fell down that ravine a couple months ago with Sophia she took a knife too to open it up fresh, but only a little bit. She needed fresh blood to attract the walkers. She knew it seemed like an insane plan, but if it went accordingly, everything could work and she could get Sophia and herself away.

She wiped her blood on the outside of the gate and then used a dishcloth to wipe away the rest of it before rolling her sleeve back down. Tossing the cloth out the opening in the gate, she made quiet little whistles and waited, looking over her shoulder constantly to make sure no one would catch her in the act. When she turned back and peered through the darkness, she spotted three, possibly four, snarling walkers stumbling near, picking up the scent of her blood in the cold air.

Waving her hand at them to get their attention, they began to move toward her. Slowly, she backed up, making sure they got through as she stared into their dead, yellowed eyes.

There were, in fact, five walkers in total that slipped through the gate and she led them out onto the street before turning on the act she had planned out.

"Walkers! Walkers!" she shouted, running out into the street, knowing the noise would rile the walkers up and draw them further out.

Martinez and Shumpert were at the main gate, too far away to do any damage in taking out the approaching walkers, but the building where The Governor's apartment happened to be was much closer and Jo knew the commotion would draw him out as well as he lived up to his leadership role she knew had to be self-appointed. Running off toward the apartment building, she almost bumped into The Governor as he came out with a gun aimed at the ready.

"I was taking a walk and saw them coming from the gate," she muttered to him in passing.

Taking his tunnel vision focus as her opportunity, Jo slipped into the building and ran for the stairs, taking them two at a time. She didn't know how much time she had so she had to move fast. Reaching his apartment, she knew he would've left it unlocked, so she slipped inside and walked right over to the display case where he kept her sword.

She smiled happily to herself as she pulled it out, gripping the handle in her hand.

Now, she had to slip back out of the apartment and the building altogether without being noticed by anyone. That part she hadn't thought out much because she had focused most of her energy on getting the walkers in and how she would get her and Sophia out.

But, before she could slip back out of the apartment, she heard a thumping noise from The Governor's bedroom and curiosity got the better of her. Walking into the room, the noise seemed to be coming from a door she believed belonged to a closet.

Was someone inside?

Rushing to it, she turned the handle and pulled the door open. Stepping inside the room on the other side of the door, Jo was immediately greeted by a wall of illuminated fish tanks which held a handful of walker heads that were snapping pointlessly at nothing in the water. She was so disgusted by the sight it churned her stomach something fierce and she had no option but to throw up on the floor beside a leather chair.

After wiping her mouth, she looked up and saw a wall to ceiling grate with a sliding lock. Peering through the grate, she could see movement a few feet in from what seemed like a cage. Pulling the sliding lock open, she pushed the grate aside and shuffling forward was the figure of a young girl with some sort of straight jacket tying her arms down and a bag over her head. There was also a chain around the girl's neck that horrified Jo.

"Oh my God, honey; are you okay?" she asked. "What is he doing to you?"

Walking behind the girl, she unhooked the chain and then crouched back down in front of the girl before removing the bag from over her head; something she instantly regretted.

Jo wasn't staring up into the face of any girl.

She was staring into the snarling face of a reanimated dead girl, and not just any dead girl.

She recognized the face, despite the decay, to be that of The Governor's daughter.

"Oh God," she remarked.

"What are you doing in here?"

Jo turned around and saw The Governor standing there in the doorway, looking a little panicked.

"You're keeping your dead daughter chained up in a room with heads?" Jo questioned rhetorically. "What kind of sicko are you?"

"You shouldn't be in here," he growled, and then noticed her sword in her hand. "You broke in to steal your sword."

"I can't steal what belongs to me."

As she turned, The Governor's daughter snapped her teeth at her and fell forward on top of her. As the girl tried biting into her neck, everything happened so quickly. Before The Governor could move forward to pull his daughter off, Jo reacted quickly by burying her blade through the girl's right temple and out the other.

The Governor shouted in grief as his daughter's already dead corpse fell even more dead, fully, upon Jo's body. He pulled the girl off Jo and cradled her in his arms.

"My Penny, oh my Penny, I'm so sorry," he cried.

Jo pulled herself up and just sat there. "I'm sorry, I had to do it."

"No, you didn't," he spat. "You broke in and you snooped where you shouldn't have and you killed my child."

"Your door was unlocked," Jo remarked, "and she was already dead. It wasn't really your daughter anymore."

Setting his daughter gently down at the ground, The Governor was fast to get to his feet and launch himself at Jo. In her surprise, he was able to easily knock her sword from her hand and then wrap both of his around her throat. As she gasped for air, Jo tried reaching for her sword but it wasn't close enough so she reached up with her hands and tried clawing at his face. His legs were pinning hers down so she couldn't knee him in the groin so Jo resorted in the only logical move she could make.

Using the thumb on her left hand, she pushed it into his right eye and wouldn't stop until she felt it practically pop under the pressure she applied to it and blood sprayed down onto her face.

The Governor shouted out in agonizing pain and stumbled back, but through the pain he was able to grab for her sword before she could and hold it at her chest.

"Wait, wait, wait!" she shouted, holding up her hands in surrender. "Stop! You can't kill me!"

"Why not?" he questioned, angrily. "You took my daughter from me and you just took my eye, you bitch."

"Because I'm pregnant!"

The Governor hesitated. "What?"

"I'm pregnant," she repeated. "You got me pregnant."

"Liar," he sneered, pressing the tip of her blade more against her chest. Less than a pound a pressure more and she would be impaled upon her own blade.

"I'm not, I swear. Have your doctors or Milton examine me," she pleaded, her hands still raised. "If you kill me, you kill your chance at another child."

Pausing, The Governor considered his options as blood continued to gush from his eye socket. He was growing tired from the blood loss so he had to make a quick decision.

"Stand up," he demanded, keeping the blade still pointed at her. Once she got to her feet, he then gestured toward the small cage-like room he'd been keeping Penny in. "Get in there."

"What—"

"I said get in there."

Obeying, Jo stepped back into the small room but, before The Governor pulled the grate closed, he hauled off and punched her in the head. As she fell back upon the floor, unconscious, he shut he grate and slid the lock in place. Stumbling backward a bit, he turned around and managed to walk out of the room; shutting the door behind him and locking it. He then stepped out into his kitchen and went over to one of his windows that looked out at the main street. Dropping Jo's sword to the floor, he tiredly lifted the window open and leaned his head out.

"Martinez!" he shouted.

The Hispanic man was still on the street, gathering up the walkers they had put down. Martinez turned around and looked up. "Yeah, Gov?"

"I need you up here now."

Narrowing his gaze, Martinez became concerned. "You okay?"

"Just get up here. And bring Milton."

Sliding the window back down, The Governor picked the sword back up and made it to the kitchen table where he sat down and waited, slouching slightly as he did so. After a few minutes of fighting the urge to pass out, The Governor was greeted by the visage of both Martinez and Milton stepping into his apartment approaching him quickly.

"Oh my God, what happened?" Milton asked, reaching for a dishcloth to try and stop the bleeding from larger man's destroyed eye.

"Jo," The Governor responded. "She snuck inside here and attacked me. We fought."

"But why?" Martinez wondered.

"Before I tell you anything else, there are some things you need to know that I want neither of you to breathe a word of to no one else..."

 

* * *

 

Jo awoke sometime later in a dark room.

Bringing a hand to her aching head, she sat up and peered through the darkness and let her eyes slowly adjust to it. Looking around, she could tell she was lying on a plain mattress and there was a bucket a couple of feet away.

As she tried getting to her feet, something prevented her from moving freely. She tripped and fell forward; landing back onto the mattress where she realized her left ankle was chained to the wall.

"What the hell?"

"Ah, you're awake," came The Governor's voice.

Focusing toward the metal door at the opposite end of the room, Jo saw a small window in the door that was slid open and The Governor's face was filling it completely.

"Where am I?" she asked.

"This is your new home for the next seven or eight months."

"What?"

"While you were unconscious I had Milton examine you and he determined you were telling the truth about being pregnant. Congratulations to both of us are in order."

" _Why_ am I in here?"

"Well, I can't very well have you walking around freely anymore, can I? Not after Penny and my eye. How would I explain that?"

"People are going to wonder where I am and wonder what happened to you. And what about Sophia? Where is she?"

"Sophia is just fine. Ms. McLeod is going to be taking care of her now, don't you worry," he assured. "You, on the other hand, are dead as far as anyone is concerned. I told everyone this morning that I was wrong to trust you, and you broke in and attacked me and as you ran away, you fell down the stairs and broke your neck. Everyone believes Martinez took your body outside the town to burn your corpse. Martinez and Shumpert carried you here in the middle of the night where Milton examined you and we chained you up. They're good men, loyal to me. They won't tell a soul you're really still alive and that you're pregnant."

"You're just going to lock me up and throw away the key?"

"Not forever."

Jo leaned forward and gripped the chain around her ankle, struggling pointlessly to get it off. As tears began to sting her eyes, she looked up in his direction and shook her entire being with frustration, but he merely chuckled.

"Don't worry; you'll only have to be in here until the baby comes."

"What happens after that?"

He chuckled again. "Well, I certainly won't be needing you any longer."

Jo's face fell.

The Governor slid the door window shut and she could hear his footsteps fading away as fear and anxiety washed over her. At the top of her lungs, she screamed. Standing up, she walked carefully toward the door but the chain didn't allow her to go that far, but she could reach the bucket. Lifting it up by the handle she tossed it at the metal door and the sound of it clattering upon the door and then to the ground echoed annoyingly in her dank cell.

All Jo could do was scream and scream in hopes someone could hear her and would come help her.


	6. Chickadee

_"We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated."_ — Maya Angelou

* * *

  
The only reason that Jo knew Christmas had come and gone was by what she considered to be a cruel joke played on her by The Governor when he hung one of those Little Trees car fresheners from the door's sliding window. Eventually, though, she lost track of time.

In the beginning of her confinement, she was able to mark off the days by picking at the scab on her arm from where she'd been cut, dabbing a finger in the fresh drop of blood that formed and then wipe a small streak on the wall nearest her. However, the scab grew smaller and smaller, despite her daily ritual of picking at it. Despite her best efforts, the wound healed and her only option would've been to somehow cut her arm open again.

That was another issue.

Jo was not allowed sharp objects or anything that she could use to harm herself or the baby, as if she would actually hurt her child. The Governor wasn't about to take any chances with her, though. She was brought food in the morning that was meant to last her all day, which had also been her way of trying to keep track of the days, but after a while she tired and sometimes forgot if she'd counted that particular day or not already. Her food was originally brought in on a metal tray, but when she had thrown the empty tray at Milton, who had been tasked with bringing food to her and removing the tray afterward, the mode in which her food was delivered changed to Milton removing everything from the tray and leaving it on the floor beside her.

The conditions she was kept in were deplorable and yet decent. It was an odd mix. The bucket near her mattress was all she had for a toilet but at least she was given a roll of toilet paper. She was bathed every other day by The Governor himself, but Milton was with him. Knowing she would try to put up a fight, Milton would administer a sedative to relax her and then The Governor sponge bathed her, and every time she was too lethargic to react or care. Then there was the issue of her having at least a mattress to sleep on and not just the hard floor, but on the downside she was not allowed a blanket of any kind in case she used it to somehow hang herself or strangle anyone who entered with food, to bathe her or change out her bucket.

Weekly, Milton was also tasked with giving her prenatal check-ups, which was a laugh considering he wasn't actually a doctor, but Jo was aware that The Governor's circle of trust where she was concerned was limited to only a small handful.

Over time, though, it appeared as if that circle expanded slightly by the introduction of The Governor's new right-hand man, which was ironic because he had no right hand.

Merle Dixon seemed to be the epitome of a redneck the first time she'd heard him talking outside her cell door. She didn't see him for the longest time. He was apparently given the occasional job of keeping watch outside the door in case anyone chose to wander down. Sometimes she would call out to him and get him to talk to her, but he never responded. She wasn't sure if he was forbidden from talking with her, if he couldn't hear her through the door or if maybe he actually wasn't there at all.

Judging by how large her stomach was starting to get, she was able to wager a guess that she was about six months pregnant by that point.

"I know you're there," she called out in the darkness of her cell.

She had heard a cough outside the door.

"It is Merle, right? I've heard the others call you that." Nothing. "Please, I've had no one to talk to in months. I've been talked at, but not with."

"I'm not supposed to talk to you."

Jo smiled with hope. She sat up and crawled along the mattress on her hands and knees before getting up to her feet and going as far at the chain around her ankle would let her. "I won't tell anyone, just…please…talk to me."

"What do you want to talk about?"

She raised her brow. "Uh, maybe the reason why I'm here," said remarked. "Did The Governor tell you his truth or the real truth?"

"Is there a difference?"

"Yes."

Merle cleared his throat. "He said you broke into his home, stole a sword and attacked him because you're batshit crazy. You're the one that poked his eyeball out."

"Half-truths," Jo muttered, shaking her head. She placed her hands upon her head which had become a sort of blonde rat's nest with not being able to brush her hair like a regular human being anymore. "He drugged me, months ago, and he raped me while I was unconscious. I found out I was pregnant and I wanted to get away from this place. I wanted to get me and my daughter out. He took my sword when we came here, so I went to get it back. I—I created a distraction, let some walkers in, and yes, I snuck into his apartment, but I didn't break in. The door was open."

"Same difference, sweetheart."

"No, not really," she insisted. "I got my sword and I would've left right then and gotten away, I'm sure of it, but I heard a noise and curiosity killed the cat, unfortunately." She licked her dry lips and tried to lean closer to the door. "He's got a room in his apartment with a bunch of fish tanks where he keeps severed heads of walkers, like trophies. There's a chair aimed at them all so he can sit there and look at them whenever he wants. And, inside this room is this extra, cage-like room that was locked up and there was a girl inside, wearing a straight-jacket, a bag over her head and chained at the neck. I had to stop and save this girl, but when I took the bag off her head I realized it was The Governor's dead daughter, Penny. He was keeping her like a pet. And I killed her, I put her down and then he attacked me. We fought and he choked me and so I stuck my thumb in his eye. He was going to kill me right there but I told him I was pregnant and he stopped. Knocked me out cold, but he stopped. Next thing I knew I was locked up in here and I've been here ever since."

"Likely story for a crazy woman to tell."

"No, crazy is locking up the mother of your unborn child in a dark cell with only a mattress and a pot to piss in as the only creature comforts."

"Why should I believe you?"

"Open the window and see for yourself."

Jo stepped back and waited.

She almost gave up and moved to sit down on the mattress when she heard the creaking of the small window slide open and she stepped into the little amount of light from outside the door that filtered in. She held her hands to her burgeoning belly and smiled with hope at the face of Merle.

"I haven't seen my daughter since I've been in here," she mentioned, referring to Sophia. "The Governor told everyone I fell down the stairs and died when my neck broke, and he has someone else looking after her now. Mrs. Mc-something or other. I don't remember. I've asked him about her over and over and he won't tell me anything; if she's safe and doing alright. I promised her she would always be safe with me and now here I am."

"What's your daughter's name?"

"Sophia."

Merle smirked. "I knew a little girl named Sophia once."

"Before the outbreak or after?"

"After," he replied. "My brother and I ended up at this camp outside Atlanta with a bunch of people. There was this husband and wife, Ed and Carol, and their daughter Sophia. Ed was an abusive asshole, though. If I hadn't gotten separated from the group I might've ended up beating Ed to death in the long run."

"Wait—Carol, did you say?"

"Yeah, why?"

Jo could barely make out that Merle was narrowing his gaze at her as she tried to move closer to the door again. "Sophia's real mother, she said her name was Carol but that her father was dead. I told The Governor Sophia was mine to keep her safe when he found us on the road," she admitted. What else did she have to lose now anyway? "Sophia got separated from her group when walkers chased her into the woods, where I found her. I tried to help her find her way back but we got thrown off course by more walkers in the woods. By the time we got back to the main road, there was no sign of her people, her mother, so she stayed with me. I showed her how to protect herself."

"You said you was tryin' to get out of here with her?"

"Yes, I told her to wait for me at our apartment. I was going to go back there after I got my sword and then we were going to sneak out the same way I got the walkers in. We were going to get back on the road and try and find her mother again."

"Her mother was with my brother, the last time I was at that camp. I got my hand chained up to a pipe on a rooftop by this cop, Rick."

"Rick, yes—Sophia said that was the leader of her group who she said was trying to lead the walkers in the woods away from her."

Merle sniffed. "Officer Friendly," he muttered; a mix of sarcasm and resentment in his voice. "The other dumbass, T-Dog, lost the key down a drain and then left me there to die. I had to cut my own hand off and cauterize it. I was on the road, hiding out for quite a while, barely surviving, when The Governor found me and took me in. I got this self-made metal cap for my hand with a sort of bayonet blade." Merle banged it on the door and then stuck the blade inside the window a bit. "It's come in pretty _handy_." Removing the capped arm, he peered his face back inside. "I owe a lot to The Governor and he's given me no reason to question my allegiance to him."

"Have you always taken orders so obediently?"

Merle smirked. "Not exactly, sugar tits."

Jo rolled her eyes. "He's not a good man. I know it," she insisted.

"What do you expect me to do about it?"

"Help me."

"How?" he almost sounded amused.

"He's only keeping me alive until after my baby is born. He's going to kill me after," she commented. "This is the kind of man you swear allegiance to? If you remain at his side after all I've told you, from what you can see with your own two eyes, then you're every bit the monster that he is. And your brother, wherever he is, if he's still alive, is better off without you."

"Don't you talk about my brother," Merle growled, banging his metal-clad stump against the metal of the door.

Jo tutted. "You care about your brother, right?"

"What kind of question is that? Of course I do."

"Then help me get out of here. Get Sophia and me out of here. The three of us, we can take off together, find your brother and Sophia's real mom," she suggested. "They weren't bad people, were they?"

"A bunch of idjits and assholes and nig—" For whatever reason he chose not to finish that sentence. Merle sighed. "No they was good people. But there's good people here, too."

"But they're led by a psychopath."

"Rick ain't no prize either," Merle quipped.

"I'll take my chances with a cop who chained a redneck to a roof than a 'Governor' with a hard-on for power and malice." When she watched as Merle stepped back and clicked his tongue against the inside of his bottom lip, Jo placed her face in her hands and knelt down upon the floor. "Please," she begged. "I want to see the child I'm carrying grow up. I don't want to die at the hands of that man, and I just want to see that Sophia finds her mother again."

Merle twisted his mouth in thought, and then he nodded. "I'll tell ya what, I'll look in on Sophia and see how she's doing and get a feel for things," he offered. "I'm making you no promises at all, but I can do that for now."

Jo nodded. "That's okay. Every little bit helps. Thank you."

"Don't mention it," he remarked. Then, "Literally, don't even breathe a word that I'm doing this for you."

"I have no one else to talk to other than you."

 

* * *

 

Rick and the group were at the storage facility just over two months, which was longer than they could've hoped for and it got them through the worst of the winter months. Having a place like that to stay in for as long as they had it had been a good time for recuperating; mentally, physically and emotionally. They had that down time where they could just literally lock themselves away for a while and just wade through their thoughts and feelings.

After Hershel forced Rick, Shane and Lori to more or less get through the bulk of their issues, life amid the group seemed less tense and they were all somehow more capable of holding civil conversations with each other. Although, it would never be perfect between them, at least they weren't going to be at each other's throats any time soon unless some new personal issue decided to get thrown their way.

Thanks to Dale and the little notebook he kept, he was able to determine when Christmas was. In one of the storage units, there was a fake Christmas tree and a box of ornaments. Lori and Patricia pulled it all out and decided to decorate it. They even strung up Christmas lights even though there was no electricity to let them shine. It was the aesthetics of it, they insisted. Glenn was the one who then suggested they exchange gifts. When Shane snickered and asked how, Glenn just chuckled in response and gestured to all the storage units.

"Take your pick," Glenn had responded.

And that's what everyone did. They all wrote their names down on pieces of paper given to them by Dale and then put it in a hat and took turns grabbing a different piece of paper to take part in a sort of Secret Santa gift exchange. No one would know who they were getting a gift from until Christmas Day. In the meantime, they went through the belongings of people who were most likely dead, scavenging for clothes or little trinkets they thought the person they picked would like and wrapped the items in newspaper left behind in several of the storage units. It was amazing how many people saved old newspapers.

Christmas came, gifts were exchanged, and Andrea whipped out a bottle of scotch to share with everyone that she had found and had been saving for a special occasion; deciding Christmas was as good as any. And, in a show of holiday spirit or good faith, Andrea poured a cup for Lori first. Both women smiled politely at each other and then the bottle got passed around. The night progressed with everyone loosening up, telling stories and laughing together.

It was a really good night and it was something they all needed.

A week later, another bottle of booze was broken out for New Year's' Eve and they all stood around as Dale studied his watch and then looked up, smiling at the others. Holding up his little, paper Dixie cup full of brandy, Dale announced a happy new year to all.

"Here's to the hope that this year will be a little easier to get through than the last," he said. "Here's to the hope that we stay together, that we continue surviving together and that there will be a light at the end of the tunnel from all this chaos that we can hopefully all live to see someday."

"Here, here," Rick agreed, raising his Dixie cup as well. "To us. To Life."

Everyone else raised their cups as well with a nod of their heads and then emptied their cups into their mouths.

"Happy New Year, everyone," Glenn remarked.

It was about a month and a half later that a herd of walkers had formed along the fence, pushing on it too much that the gate gave way under the collective weight of all those dead bodies. In a frantic rush, the group had to grab what they could from their storage units, and make a break for their vehicles. They got the front gate open and tried shooting at all the walkers flooding the area, but there were too many and they had formed quite literally overnight. The storage facility was no longer an option for them and it was time to leave again; to hit the road once more for yet another unknown destination.

"Wait!" Maggie shouted. "Where's Patricia?"

Rick, Shane and Hershel hopped out of their vehicles, not realizing the older blonde woman wasn't with the rest of the group. They found her toward the back, trying to get away from a grouping of walkers that were encircling her in front of a storage unit she had been coming out of with an armful of blankets and something else that went unseen because of the undead bodies blocking the men's view. They shot their guns at the heads of the walkers, but it wasn't enough to save Patricia in time.

Rick, Shane and Hershel stood in stunned horror as one walker ripped into Patricia's screaming face and another into her neck. Hershel stepped forward in his grief and shot at as many of the other walkers as he could but Shane pulled him back.

It was Rick who walked straight into the foray and aimed his Colt Python, not at the walkers but at Patricia. Pulling the trigger, Rick watched as she dropped dead to the ground thanks to his mercy kill. Tipping his head down for a moment, he looked at the other two men and then they all silently agreed they had to keep moving. Patricia felt no more pain and she would not come back as a walker. They couldn't save her, but Rick gave her that at least.

As they approached their caravan, Maggie looked upon them with a knowing expression on her face as she sank back down into her seat beside Glenn in their car. Dale was the one shouting to know where Patricia was before they left, but when he saw Rick shaking his head, the older man frowned sadly and returned to his driver's seat as Shane hopped inside the RV where Lori, Andrea and Carol were. Hershel hopped inside Glenn and Maggie's car and Rick got into Hershel's old truck that T-Dog was behind the wheel of and was barely sitting with the door closed when T-Dog peeled out of the lot behind Dale's RV. Daryl rode up along the side of them on his motorcycle while Glenn, Maggie and Hershel brought up the rear.

When they were on the road again, with no clear destination, a sense of tension returned. The good tidings they'd felt at the holidays faded a little.

They had no idea where they would end up next, but fate would lead them where they were meant to go.

 

* * *

 

Merle was returning back to his own little apartment after an evening of participating in a wrestling match with Shumpert, surrounded by chained walkers. It was a twisted affair, sure, but something about it excited Merle; got his adrenaline pumping.

It had been weeks since he'd last had a proper conversation with Jo, The Governor's baby mama, as he referred to her, and he had yet to follow through with his promise of looking in on Sophia and seeing if she was alright or even bothering to see if there was anything he could do to get both Jo and Sophia free. He had always been a bit selfish, thinking of numero uno first and foremost, but sometimes he surprised himself, and this night was one of those moments.

Leaving the town's little "event", Merle spotted an old woman shaking her head with disapproval with a young girl at her side that he recognized at once to be Sophia.

It had been a while since he'd seen her, but remembered her face all the same.

Crossing the street, he sidled up beside the old woman, throwing his good arm around her shoulder and smiling a shit-eating grin as he looked between her and Sophia.

"Hello, there. We ain't been properly introduced," he greeted, surprising the woman. "The name's Merle Dixon and you must be Mrs. McLeod who's taking care of young Sophia here."

Sophia looked up at him with surprise as well; not that she recognized him but that he recognized her.

"I am," Mrs. McLeod nodded.

"I knew this one and her mother back in a camp outside Atlanta last summer. We all got separated after I went on a run into the city where I lost my hand." Merle didn't mention that Carol was the mother he was referring to, knowing that Jo had told him The Governor and the rest of the town believed she was Sophia's mother, and he chose to keep that ruse going as well. "I bet you miss your mother a great deal, don't you?" he asked winking at her.

Sophia didn't seem to know how to react or how to answer.

"She was a decent woman who taught these children here. I still find it hard to believe she attacked The Governor the way she did. Jo didn't seem to have a mean bone in her body."

Merle looked between the old woman and the young girl. "Yeah, it's a damned shame. People do a lot of crazy shit and make a lot of mistakes, and hers just happened to get herself killed."

"She was going to take us away from here," Sophia finally spoke up. "We were gonna go find my—the rest of our group."

"Don't you like it here?" Merle asked, feeling her out.

Sophia shrugged. "It's nice."

"But…"

"It's not home without the others," Sophia admitted sadly. "I miss them. I miss my mom. I just feel like a guest here, not like I belong."

"Oh, honey," Mrs. McLeod sighed, running a hand affectionately through the girl's hair. "You've got a home with me."

"I know. It's just not the same."

Walking off ahead of the adults, Sophia went by herself the remainder of the way to the building where she lived in an apartment with Mrs. McLeod. The old woman turned to Merle and frowned.

"She's been a very sad and distant girl since The Governor put her in my care. This is the most she's said in a very long time," she remarked. "She was quite close to her mother."

Merle nodded and then focused his attention off Sophia. "Did you enjoy the fight tonight?" he asked with an impish grin.

Mrs. McLeod scowled. "I thought it was detestable. Those biters were people once. They shouldn't be chained up like animals while you men fight each other. We are all above that."

Turning away from him, the woman waddled off to the same building Sophia went in and Merle just frowned back at her.

"Not everyone," he muttered.

Looking behind him, in the direction of the where The Governor was managing to keep Jo quietly tucked away, Merle decided to go off in that very direction.

The town's entire population, which had just broke sixty-five recently, had been in attendance at the "event" except for two specific people who had left halfway through: The Governor and Martinez. Merle hadn't thought much of it in the throes of the fight, but in the afterglow, so to speak, he wondered what could've pulled town's leader and his other right hand man away.

Stalking up the road with the intention of being somewhat of a decent human being and tell Jo he'd seen Sophia and she was safe and healthy. When he heard The Governor's voice coming from the back alley at the edge of town which led to where Jo was kept, Merle ducked into the shadows. He watched with curious eyes as The Governor and Martinez stood side by side, talking among themselves.

"This the last time you gonna do that?" Martinez inquired; his voice uncertain.

The Governor chuckled. "You're not going soft on me now, are you?"

"No, I'm not just that comfortable with—"

"Caesar, Caesar. Remember who she is and what she did. I offered her a life here and you saw how she repaid the kindness I showed her," The Governor reminded. "She's nothing more than the Whore of Babylon."

"She's also about seven months pregnant with your child and—"

The Governor brought a finger to his lips and shushed Martinez. "An unplanned blessing."

Martinez shook his head and then nudged The Governor's arm with his elbow. "You might wanna check your fly," he informed before walking off.

Hesitating, in a sort of childishly defiant protest, The Governor finally reached down and zipped his pants up before heading toward the direction of his apartment. Once the coast was clear, Merle slipped out of the shadow, running through his mind the conversation he'd just eavesdropped on and then snuck quietly around the back alley and pulled open the heavy door to the building where Jo was imprisoned.

He had to go down a flight of stairs and turn down a corridor, but there, at the end, was that familiar door and there was a chair outside it he had sat upon several times in the past few months.

Merle lifted his left hand to slide open the window but then dropped it down as he reconsidered being there at all. He even turned around and prepared to leave without announcing his presence, but the still small voice in the back of his head chastised him something good and he felt a rare wave of guilt wash over him.

Turning back around, he raised his metal-clad right stump and banged gently upon equally metal door.

"Go away, please," came Jo's shaky voice. "No more. I'm tired."

Merle knitted his brow. "It's Merle," he clarified, leaning his face closer to the metal surface.

"Merle?"

"Yeah, sugar tits, your ol' buddy Merle."

"What do you want?"

"I saw Sophia tonight," he said, listening closely as he heard the chain around her ankle rattle as she began to move around.

"You did?"

"I most certainly did. Not fifteen minutes ago, too."

"Is she okay? Is she doing well?"

"She is, and she misses you." There was no further verbal response from Jo, so Merle pressed on. "She doesn't seem very happy with Mrs. McLeod, though. Not that the old bag is mean to her; she just ain't you or her real mama, I s'pose. The girl says she don't feel at home without you. Kinda sweet, I guess."

Merle leaned in even closer, pressing his ear to the door, when he heard some muffled sobs. He frowned and wondered how a woman he barely knew could pull what little heartstrings he had.

"Now, stop that right now," he chastised. "I ain't got a hanky I can throw in to ya."

"I'm gonna die in here," Jo finally spoke. "My child is gonna be taken from me and then he's gonna put a bullet in my head, and that's if I'm lucky. Though, I guess that would be a beautiful respite from what he's already put me through."

Thinking back to the conversation between The Governor and Martinez, Merle sighed and slid the window open with his left hand. "What happened with The Governor just a little while ago?"

"He didn't tell you? I thought you were best of friends?" There was bitterness and sarcasm oozing from her voice, but also dejection and grief.

It was too dark inside the windowless room for Merle to properly see her and, in finding himself feeling oddly worried about her, he made the bold decision to lift the metal latch which unlocked the door. Holding it open all the way, the single light bulb from the corridor illuminated into the room and revealed Jo to be lying on her side with her legs pulled up as far as she could manage due the overwhelming bulge of her belly and from the chain around her left ankle.

What Merle found shocking was the smell of piss from the bucket a few feet away from the mattress she was lying upon, wearing nothing more than a long skirt and an oversized T-shirt, and the fact that she had no blanket to keep her warm and also that her hands were handcuffed behind her back.

" _Damn_ , woman," he muttered in amazement. "How haven't you just withered away and died in here? I don't think I could've survived six weeks in here, let alone six months, and I did a _sixteen_ month stretch in an _actual_ prison before."

"Warrior spirit," she mumbled, looking up at him through the blonde tresses covering her face. "That's what The Governor said." Rolling her head back a little to see him better, Jo sighed. "What are you doing in here? You weren't even allowed to talk to me from  _outside_ the door and now you're _inside_ doing it?"

Merle cast his eyes down to the floor and spotted a pair of discarded women's underpants and, firstly, thought she must've taken them off to piss in the bucket and then never bothered putting them back on because it was too hard to do with her hands bound behind her. But, then, Merle once again remembered the conversation between The Governor and Martinez, and how The Governor had to zip his fly.

"What did he do to you in here tonight?"

Jo scoffed. "Just tonight?" She rolled her body to the right and let her knees hit the ground as she struggled to sit up. Merle moved to help her, but she shied away and he took the hint. Jo managed it on her own and sat back down upon the mattress, but this time sitting upright. "The same thing he's done every night for the past week."

Merle's face soured.

He loved women as much as the next heterosexual male and wasn't always the nicest or kindest to the opposite sex, but forcing himself upon a woman was where he definitely drew the line.

Jo sensed his reaction, not by his expression, but by his silence.

"Not the biggest fan of your precious Governor now, are you?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize."

Jo couldn't deny she wasn't a little touched by the sincerity in his voice when he spoke. "Would you have done anything to stop him or would you have hung back, as nervous as a little church mouse like Martinez?"

"You'd be damned sure I'd have stopped him," Merle insisted, crouching down to her level. "And I tell you, it'd take a lot more than a _Governor_ to take ol' Merle down. Maybe a _President_."

Jo smirked, despite herself, as she looked back at him. "What are you gonna do now? Are you gonna turn your head the other way and pretend it never happened or are you going to help me and Sophia get out of here like I asked you a while ago?"

Merle breathed heavily out his nostrils and rested his forearms on his knees. "I'll help you," he caved.

Jo nearly fainted from happiness. It was the first moment of true happiness she'd felt in a long time. It had been touch and go for her in the last month, wherein she had contemplated how exactly she could end her life in this prison of hers. She knew it would mean ending her unborn child's life, but she had been getting that desperate about not wanting her child to be raised by him that she was willing to prevent her child from ever taking a breath. And she had even doubted her child's chances out of the womb as well. What kind of life would it have, would it lead? She didn't have proper prenatal care — Milton did what he could — so there was no way of knowing if the baby would have any birth defects. Not to mention, once The Governor would've killed her, he would need formula to feed the baby and who knows how much of a supply of that was lying around anymore.

Then there was the whole issue of how long the walls of Woodbury would last. Say they remained intact against walkers for years and even decades to come. But who's to say they don't end up being torn down by worse people than The Governor, if worse people could possibly even exist? Would The Governor protect the child at all costs? Would he put the child's life before his own or would it be the other way around? If the child died, would he tie it up and lock it away like he did with Penny?

These had been the thoughts twisting in Jo's mind while she wallowed in the darkness, day in and day out. Those thoughts were the only thing that kept her occupied in between the visits in the morning from Milton, when he emptied her waste bucket and brought her food, the sedated sponge-baths she received every other day from The Governor, and the nightly, unsolicited visits from the latter within the last week.

Merle, in all his brash, redneck glory, was her unlikely knight in shining armor and she would owe him a big debt.

"How?"

He frowned and thought about it for a moment. "Well, it can't be done during the day. We'd be seen and it'd be pretty damn obvious, but if I wait until tomorrow night The Governor will be paying you another unwelcomed visit." Standing up, Merle looked down at her and shrugged. "Guess we're gonna have to do this shit tonight."

"Like, right now tonight?"

"Like right now tonight," he repeated. "Let's get you up first." Offering her his left hand, Merle then stopped, realizing she couldn't accept his hand because hers were still cuffed behind her back, so he leaned down and grabbed her arm to help her up to her feet. Turning her around, he stuck the tip of his arm blade into the key hole of the cuffs. He had gotten himself out of these things plenty of times in the past and knew just the right way to turn—

 _Click_.

The left cuff popped open, unbinding her hands, but the right cuff still remained attached to her right wrist. But that was fine. As least she had full use of both her hands now.

"You wanna put those on?" he gestured to her underwear.

"I can't get them back on with this on my ankle." She gestured to the chain. "The Governor removed it to take them off. Usually he puts them back on, but this time he didn't bother." She shivered at the recent memory and wrapped her arms around her bulbous stomach. "He has the key for it."

Merle snickered, crouching down. "Amateurs use keys," he commented, waving his blade. Jamming it into the lock on the chain, the same he did with the handcuffs, he wiggled it around for a few moments until it clicked open just the same. "Ta-da."

"Thank you, oh my god."

Crouching down as best she could, Jo rubbed her ankle in relief. She then grabbed her underwear off the floor and stepped into them, discreetly pulling them up without having to lift her skirt too much where Merle would get a glimpse of anything.

"I need to get you out first before I can get to Sophia," he remarked. "She's not at risk from The Governor if she stays any longer. Not like you are."

"But—"

"Don't get those panties in a bunch. I will get her out, too, just you first, alright?" he assured. "We'll stick to the shadows and the back alleys behind these buildings here. Not many people, if any, frequent this end of town, especially at night. I saw The Governor head back to his apartment, so I doubt he'll be back at all until morning when he would be bathin' you, unless…" he trailed, tilting his head slightly at her. "You get your sponge bath from him today or are you due tomorrow morning?"

"No, I'm good," Jo replied, rolling her eyes.

"Alright, then, just askin'." Merle held his hands up defensively. "So, we get you out through the wall nearest here. One of the idjits is probably on detail. I can coax 'em away, saying I'm there to relieve them for a fifteen-minute break or somethin'. Once the idjit's gone, you slip out and you go hide in an abandoned car or something. Then, when the idjit comes back I go to Mrs. McLeod's and tell her I need to ask Sophia something about the group we used to be with outside Atlanta after I got left behind. I tell Sophia about what I'm doing and tell her to pack light and sneak out after Mrs. McLeod's gone to bed. I'll meet her outside and lead her out the same way. Tell the same idjit I'm relieving him of duty for the rest of the night. I lead Sophia out and we find you."

"How though?"

"I'll whistle three times. If you hear me, whistle back twice like the male, black-capped chickadee does," he replied. "You do know what a male, black-capped chickadee sounds like, don't you?"

Jo smirked. "You're lucky they're my favorite bird. I used to mimic their song when I was a kid."

"'Atta girl." Without waiting any further, Merle nudged her on. "Alright, let's move out."

Merle took the lead, blocking her from view in cast anyone came down into the building before they could get out. He had closed the room's door and slid shut the door window to give the impression she was still inside in case anyone came round between now and morning when Milton. However, he made sure the latch was open, thinking that maybe The Governor might assume he or Martinez accidentally left it unlatched and Jo had somehow found a way out on her own.

Everything Merle told Jo about how they would get her out first is exactly what he made sure happened. Once they were out of the building and slinking along the back alley within the shadows, Jo waddled along beside him, reveling in the fresh air on her face and filling her lungs. It was still a bit cold and she was only wearing that T-shirt and skirt, but it was just all so refreshing and she was just so happy to be free from that prison of hers that she didn't really care.

"Stay right here," he told her as they quietly approached the furthermost fence at the edge of Woodbury from the main gate.

"Hey, Rico Suave, get your ass down from there and grab yourself a quick fifteen, why don't you?" Merle called out, stepping out from the shadows and addressing the young man perched on a lawn chair at the top. "You deserve it. I reckon you've been here a few hours — even missed the fight, too? It sure was somethin'. I gave Shumpert a run for his money."

The young man smirked. "I hear y'all stage those fights."

"Like hell we do. I win my fights fair and square."

The young man stood up and cracked his neck. "Yeah, I s'pose I could use a break. Thanks, Merle." As the young man climbed down the stairs he gestured at the older man. "Want me to grab you a beer or something on my way back?"

"Nah, I'm good. No drinking on watch," Merle pointed knowingly.

The young man nodded with a sheepish smile. "Yeah, sorry, of course."

As he walked away, Merle watched him go and waited until he was completely out of sight before turning toward where Jo was hiding and urging her out of the shadows.

"C'mon, quickly now," he coaxed, beckoning to her with a curl of his left index finger.

Like a cat, Jo tiptoed stealthily over to him and he used his body once more to cover hers, walking in step with her as he guided her to the gate. Reaching around her body on either side, he lifted the wooden board that kept the gate closed, the same as the door to the room Jo'd been kept in for the last six months. He only opened it wide enough for her and her big belly to slip through, and then gave her a slight shove forward.

"Hurry up."

"My sword, though," she exclaimed in a whisper, turning around to face him.

"That's not important now."

"I still need a weapon of some sort."

"For Christ's sake," he grumbled, pulling his gun out of his back pocket her handed it over to her. "Take this. It's all I got to give you right now."

"Won't the gunfire draw more walkers to me?"

"Well, then, don't shoot it unless you absolutely have to," he said to her as if she were a little soft in the head. "No, go on. Hurry up. I'll get Sophia to you as soon as I can and then we'll all leave together."

"You're really gonna come with us?"

Merle nodded. "Who else is gonna protect the pregnant lady and the defenseless child? Plus, wherever Sophia's real mama is, my brother might just be, too, and that's a chance I gotta take."

Without another word, Jo gripped Merle's gun in her hand and took a steadying breath as she darted out from the gate and into the unknown beyond the figurative safety of Woodbury. If this was when she died, she would rather it be by a walker outside the town limits than inside by The Governor.

There were a few dead walkers lying on the ground and her first instinct was to run over to their bodies and stick her hands into their bloody entrails. She then wiped her shirt, her arms and neck, and down the fronts, sides and back of her skirt with the cold, sticky, smelly mess. Satisfied that her own scent was masked enough in case walkers approached her and the gun wasn't enough to protect her, Jo continued down the remainder of the road that led to parts unknown to her.

There were abandoned houses on either side of her, as the protected town of Woodbury seemed to be mostly the business section of the main road through the original town. The actual homes from the original town now sat empty, ravaged from looters, walkers and time. Some homes even look as if they'd been hollowed out by fire at some point, but that was of no concern to her.

As Merle had instructed, Jo found an abandoned car about half a mile down the road, and she slipped inside the back seat and crouched down, but she rolled the window down a little to make sure she could hear Merle if he whistled and that he could hear her when she whistled back.

And there Jo remained for what felt like an eternity.

She wondered — if Merle didn't make it out with Sophia — what if she returned to Woodbury and made a commotion, drawing people out of their homes and revealed she was still alive, and showed everyone just who The Governor truly was. However, she was admittedly too terrified to return, for fear that The Governor would be waiting for her, and that he wouldn't just kill her on the spot, but that he would lock her up and slowly continue to destroy her, one nightly visit at a time.

Eventually, though, while lost in her thoughts, she heard three short whistles.

Trying to dislodge her body from the floor of the backseat, Jo leaned up against the window and whistled back twice, like the male, black-capped chickadee.

Opening the door, Jo slid out of the car and stood beside it, peering in the darkness in the direction of Woodbury and soon enough making out the approaching figure of Sophia. With her heart practically leaping out of her chest, Jo beamed brightly and hurried over to the girl with open arms and Sophia reacted the same way. Sophia looked pleasantly surprised in seeing that Jo was both alive and also very pregnant.

As they embraced, Sophia looked up at Jo and smiled. "You're gonna have a baby?"

Jo nodded, running her hands through the girl's dirty blonde hair which was now down to her shoulders. "I am."

"Who's the father?"

Jo frowned. "The Governor, but I didn't want him to be," she replied sadly. "Did Merle tell you where I was?"

Sophia bobbed her head. "He said The Governor lied about you, and that you'd been locked up in a terrible place all this time and he helped get you out."

Looking over Sophia's head, back toward Woodbury again, Jo asked, "Where is Merle? He said he'd bring you to me and all three of us would leave together."

"He couldn't get me and him both out. The guy who was guarding the gate came back and he killed him so he wouldn't say anything. He told me to go without him and how I was to whistle three times and you would answer with two whistles. He gave me the guy's knife, though, to protect myself."

"So he's not coming?" Jo clarified.

"He said he had to stay behind for now, and would make up a lie about how the guy died, say it must've been you. He said it would buy us all sometime but we had to go fast before The Governor starts looking for us."

"Well, then, let's not dally."

Grabbing Sophia's hand, she led the girl away down the darkened street before veering off down a side road that led to some woods. There would be no time to sleep. They needed to put as much distance between them and Woodbury as possible for any thoughts of resting could be entertained.

All things considered, Jo couldn't help but smile.

 

* * *

 

"We're just going in circles."

Rick looked at Andrea and discreetly rolled his eyes.

"I'm pretty sure we've been to this house before," Andrea continued, gesturing to the abandoned, old home on the outskirts of some town.

"So, what's your suggestion then?" Rick questioned, growing frustrated. "We find a house in a subdivision — clear it out, secure it — and get to stay there for, what—a few days, a few weeks? Then what? We get trouble with a bunch of walkers and we're on the road again and the cycle repeats. It's what we've done for months now and nothing changes. So, yeah, maybe we are going in circles, but constantly moving is what's kept us alive. We get too comfortable and we end up letting our defenses down."

"How is that living?"

"It's not _living_ ," Rick agreed. "But it's _surviving_."

"Think of it as backpacking through Europe, if you got to," Shane quipped, tapping the hood of his car, which Glenn, Hershel and Maggie had been mostly prone to driving.

"I think Rick's been doing a super job leading us," Carol remarked, making a joking kissy face at him.

Despite himself, Rick smiled and shook his head. "Listen, right now, it's this house or nothing. We can try again for the Ritz-Carlton tomorrow," he muttered sarcastically. "And, for the record, we haven't been to this house before."

Everyone grabbed their weapons to prepare for walkers that might be inside the house so that they could secure it. Rick went first, with Daryl and Shane flanking him and T-Dog bringing the real muscle behind them. The others remained near the vehicles, waiting for the all-clear.

As soon as they entered inside, there were a few walkers scratching at a closet, that Rick and Shane took out while Daryl went off in another direction and T-Dog headed upstairs. As Rick opened the closet door, he held his flashlight up in his other hand and noticed another door at the end of the narrow space. Pumping himself up for whatever might be on the other side, Rick whipped the door open; only to find Daryl on the other side.

Nothing.

The rest of the downstairs was empty.

"Yo, guys, I found something up here you definitely need to see!" T-Dog shouted happily from upstairs.

Taking the steps two at a time, Rick once more led the way. Shane and Daryl were fast on his trail as he turned and spotted T-Dog standing in one of the rooms with his hands on his hips and smiling like a loon.

Stepping into the room, Rick followed the large man's gaze to two people huddled together on a bed across from them.

And not just any two people, either.

One was a very pregnant blonde woman.

And the other was—

"Sophia!"


	7. Discovery

_"Life has its own hidden forces which you can only discover by living."_ — Soren Kierkegaard

 

* * *

  
"Sophia!"

Rick rushed forward and the girl practically jumped off the bed into Rick's awaiting arms, hugging him. He crouched down and knelt so he was at her level and just reveled in the reality that she was safe and sound. He also couldn't wait to tell Carol the good news. Tears of joy not only stung his eyes, but the eyes of the other three men standing around behind him.

"We thought you were dead, honey," he remarked sadly, speaking into Sophia's shoulder-length hair.

"I'm not," she stated the obvious with a smile. When she pulled back, she gestured to the woman on the bed. "Jo found me and kept me safe."

Rick looked once more upon the woman who looked a little less apprehensive about the men in the room than she originally had. Her hair was understandably disheveled and she looked completely exhausted. What was the only odd thing about her was the handcuff dangling from her right wrist.

"You're Jo?" he asked her, standing up, giving her a semi-guarded look as he kept Sophia at his side now.

Jo nodded, sitting up a little more and trying to throw her legs over the edge of the bed, all the while holding her still-cuffed hand to her stomach. "I am."

"Is that short for something, like Josephine?" Shane inquired.

"Joanna." Jo looked between the men before settling on Rick. His was the name she knew the most from Sophia's former and, as it would happen, current group. "Sophia told me about you; the leader of the group who tried leading away the walkers that chased her into the woods." Off his nod from her bringing up the memory, she added, "I happen to be the person who found her in the woods. I was trying to help her back to you lot, but walkers—"

As Jo moved to stand up, her knees buckled from her exhaustion and she fell back down onto the mattress. Sophia ran over to her side to help her almost instantaneously, which was enough for the men to know they could trust the woman. There were a few reasons, actually, why she could be trusted. The obvious was she was could barely move from being too tired and too pregnant to move quickly enough where she posed any threat. Then there was the fact that she was the one responsible for making sure Sophia survived all this time, and the fact that Sophia clearly trusted her, judging by how the girl worried for Jo and clung to her when the guys came into the room.

Rick reached forward, taking Jo's right hand in his left. He felt her pull away at first, but he maintained his hold; making sure it wasn't too firm, just reassuring. "It's alright. Just take it easy there."

"We haven't had anything to eat in a couple of days," Sophia spoke, a hand on Jo's shoulder, looking at the woman. "We were going to try someplace else but the doors downstairs don't stay closed very well and those walkers got inside. Jo passed out and I had to get her upstairs to safety."

"I'm the one who's supposed to be taking care of you, not the other way around," Jo admonished, weakly, but it seemed like she was talking to herself, berating herself for her weakness.

"Listen," Rick said crouching down at the edge of the bed, in front of where Jo sat as he kept looking between the woman and Sophia. "We got a little bit of food, not much, but you definitely need to keep up your strength, for you _and_ your baby. The two of you are a priority now."

Jo narrowed her gaze down at him. "You don't even know me."

He smirked slightly. "I know all I need to know," Rick replied giving her a quick pat on her knee before looking back at the other three men. "I think a pregnant woman and a child should rank high on the list, don't you?"

T-Dog nodded. "S'alright with me."

"We're just glad you're alive," Daryl commented, eyeing Sophia. "Your mama is gonna be over the moon."

Shane was the last to say anything, when Rick eyed him. "Yeah," he agreed. "Women and children first, and all that."

Pulling himself back up to his feet, Rick offered his hand to Jo again. "C'mon. We secured this place for now; put down the walkers that were downstairs. We got the rest of our group, including Sophia's mother Carol, waiting on us outside. We'll get you both something to eat and I'll see what I can do about getting this cuff off your wrist," he offered. "I know Carol will want to personally thank you for taking care of her daughter all this time."

"Well, I did in the beginning," Jo admitted sadly as she let Rick help her to her feet. "I was separated from her during the last six months."

Sophia slipped in beside Jo so that the woman's arm fell around Sophia's shoulders as Sophia wrapped an arm around Jo's waist as the pair began to walk out of the bedroom with Rick. T-Dog and Daryl had already stepped out first and headed straight down the stairs while Shane lingered in the room last, following everyone out in his own time.

"Why was that?" Shane questioned from a few feet behind them.

Sophia looked over her shoulder at him. "The Governor locked her away for trying to leave."

"The _who_? From _where_?"

"The Governor," Jo said, pure hate oozing from her voice; as if just the mention of him was like eating a spoonful of toxic waste. "He has this town called Woodbury. There were only about forty people there before he locked me up and threw away the key, but I know there's plenty more now. The numbers might've doubled. The town is mostly one street with one intersection, but it's a long section of road that's gated off and safe from walkers, but The Governor rules that place with an iron fist and a smile that can easily charm the pants off you if you don't know any better. He found Sophia and me on the road and brought us there, took my sword and said I could have it back if we decided to leave. Well, he did some things and I no longer felt it was the safest option for us anymore. I didn't feel comfortable, so I tried to get my sword back and he caught me, and we fought and I took his right eye from him."

They reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped out into the empty living room where the walkers were laying with their brains on the floorboards. Rick eyed Daryl and Shane while T-Dog began to remove the bodies.

"You took his eye out?" Daryl questioned, smirking a little.

She nodded at the man with a crossbow on his back. "With my thumb."

"Shit," he muttered; impressed.

"Yeah, well, he was still going to kill me right then and there but I got him to stop when I told him I was pregnant. Then he forced me into this small, caged room and knocked me out cold," she replied; hating to relive the last six months over again in her mind. "I woke up chained in some sort of windowless basement room, lying on a mattress with only a bucket to piss in. And that's where I was kept for the last six months. He told Sophia and everyone else I attacked him and that I broke my neck and died after falling down stairs to get away from him. Then he put Sophia in the care of some old woman."

"Shit," Rick mirrored Daryl's word choice, but not because he was impressed. He was disgusted. "But you got out; you and Sophia."

"We had help."

"Daryl's brother," Sophia spoke up.

"Merle was there?" Daryl questioned.

Sophia nodded. "He showed up to Woodbury a few months ago. He has this metal cap with a blade on his arm where his right hand used to be. I think he worked for The Governor, but he didn't seem to like the Governor anymore when he came to get me. He said Jo was alive and The Governor lied and he was getting me out. He was going to come too, but he had to kill someone who caught him with me, so he stayed behind to buy us some time."

"That doesn't sound like the Merle Dixon I remember," Shane quipped, dryly.

"You'd be surprised the shit my brother is capable of. He ain't always been an asshole," Daryl insisted.

"He really was nice to me," Jo remarked. "He was the only one, of those who knew I was still alive and where I was, that seemed to give a shit about me. When he realized what The Governor was really doing to me, I think that was the push he needed to make his decision to leave as well." She shrugged and frowned sadly over at Daryl. "I'm just sorry he didn't make it out with us. I hope he's okay."

Lifting a hand, Rick rested it on Jo's shoulder in a show of solidarity, to let her know she was among friends now, despite having just met. Whether or not she had been with Sophia one hundred percent of the time or not was beside the point. Because of her, Sophia survived the walkers in the woods and was alive today. For that alone their group would be indebted to her.

"We don't need to talk about what happened to you right now," Rick said. "I can tell it's not an easy subject to discuss and, like I said, we know all we need to know; at least for now. When you're ready, you tell us the rest. But, in the meantime, we got a mother-daughter reunion to take care of."

Ushering Sophia to stand behind Jo, Rick brought a finger to his lips and then walked to the open front door where the others noticed him standing there after a moment. With his hands bracing either side of the door frame, Rick nodded over at them.

"Is it clear? Can we go in yet?" Lori asked, hands on her narrow hips, as she stepped forward from among the group.

Rick held a hand up and then gestured to Carol. "We need Carol first."

"Me?" Carol questioned, pointing to herself.

"Yeah," Rick nodded. "There's something in here we need you to take care of."

Shrugging, the pixie cut-haired woman walked up toward the house as Rick backed up, throwing a knowing smirk over to Daryl and Shane. Before Carol entered the old house, Rick's gaze fell upon Jo who looked like she was going to pass out at any minute, which lessened his happiness for Carol's reunion with her daughter, so he kept a keen eye on the blonde in case she did, in fact, begin to pass out and needed someone to catch her before she fell.

"So, what's this thing I'm supposed to take care of? If it's dirty clothes you want me to wash I'm gonna shove your face in some mud," Carol teased as she looked to her right and spotted the gradually weakening Jo standing there, with Daryl and Shane flanking her to further conceal Sophia. "Oh. Wow. Okay, I see what you mean."

Rick chuckled. "No, not her," he shook his head, placing a hand on Carol's shoulder. "But you should be introduced to each other. Carol, this is Jo; Jo, this is Carol."

Carol seemed a little confused as she gave a little wave to the blonde before her. "Hello." She then looked up to Rick. "She's joining us? I mean, she's gonna have to. We can't leave a pregnant woman alone like this."

"Yeah, she's gonna join us, but not just 'cause she's pregnant," Rick informed. "She's done something pretty amazing for us; but mostly for you."

"Huh?"

Carol was even more confused, so Rick gestured for the guys to step away. Daryl took Jo by the arm and pulled her aside as well, seeming to catch on to Rick's earlier thought process that the woman needed someone there in case she fell over. And it was in that moment, once everyone had stepped out of the way, that Carol's world was pulled back together as she found herself staring at her daughter.

"Oh my God—Sophia!" Carol cried. She practically lunged at her daughter, sweeping the girl up into her arms and pressing the girl's face to her chest. Tears stung her eyes and quickly fell down her face, as she let out a laugh of joy, looking around at the men and then Jo. "You found my daughter?"

"The same day you lost her," Jo nodded with heavy-laden eyes. "I was in the woods, we crossed paths and I was going to bring her back toward the road but we got thrown off course by walkers." She was fighting to stay conscious. Even her child seemed to sense she was just as tired, hungry and anxious. It was kicking and moving around inside her womb like crazy. Of course, if she was hungry, her child was just hungry, too. "When we couldn't find anyone, I kept her with me."

"I don't know how to thank you," Carol remarked, looking down at Sophia and brushing her fingers across her face, as if trying to commit her image to memory again. "I broke when I thought she was gone forever. A part of me died all those months ago, and now, to have her back, it feels like being brought back from the dead." Turning back to Jo, Carol beamed with such gratefulness and reached a hand out to take Jo's and give it an appreciative squeeze. "You've given me back my life. Thank you."

"You're welcome," Jo nodded, tears in her own eyes now. "I'd relive every moment of the last eight months to make sure she got to you again. I'd want someone to do the same for me. And I—" Jo cut herself off and looked over at Rick as her head suddenly felt way too heavy for her neck. "Excuse me…"

And then Jo passed out from lack of sleep and food; her body forcing itself to shut down.

"Daryl," Rick barked.

"On it." The archer, who was closest to Jo, tucked his hands under her arms and caught her. He turned so that she leaned back against his chest and he slowly and gently let her lay down upon the ground.

"Is she infected?" Carol asked with worry.

Sophia shook her head and looked up at her mother. "We haven't eaten or had anything to drink in a couple of days. She hasn't slept much either. We've been trying to get away and find shelter."

"Get away from walkers?"

"Walkers and The Governor."

Carol knitted her brow and looked to Rick again. "Who's The Governor?"

He shrugged. "Some asshole who took Sophia and Jo into a walled up town he runs. He's the father of Jo's child, apparently, and he had her locked up in some basement most of the time."

"Guy sounds like a real winner," Carol commented, still hugging Sophia close.

"Merle's there," Daryl said, offering his two cents.

"Your brother?"

Daryl nodded. "He helped them get out but he got stuck behind." He pointed at Rick. "We need to go to that town and get my brother out."

"We ain't exactly in a position to 'storm the castle' for a multitude of reasons; at least not in the near future. We gotta worry about our own right now—"

"Merle _is_ my own," Daryl cut in, defiantly.

"I get that. I do. But we gotta think about the people we're with now; getting shelter and food, keeping safe," Rick continued in an understanding tone. "Jo said there could be eighty people in that town by now. If they're fortified enough to have an entire town that's safe for them, you know they got weapons and manpower; something we are terrifically lacking in. We find this place and go in guns-a-blazin' to find Merle; it would be a slaughter…on _our_ end. It's not just us anymore." Rick gestured to Sophia and Jo. "We got Sophia back, and Jo here's gonna have a baby in a month or so, judging by how big she is."

"In all fairness, we don't really know Jo that well," Shane offered up, pointing at the unconscious woman lying at Daryl's feet. "For all we know her and Merle got something cookin' up between them. Merle wasn't exactly an upstanding citizen at our camp outside the city."

Rick turned and glowered at his longtime friend. "You _seriously_ think a malnourished pregnant woman who just passed out in front of us and has been keeping Sophia alive has some evil, master plan in the works with Merle Dixon?"

Shane shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe." However, it was obvious that _he_ didn't even believe that was an actual possibility. "Desperate times, desperate measures and whatnot."

Tilting his head slightly, Rick maintained his gaze on Shane but eventually looked away when Sophia reached out and grabbed the sleeve of his jacket.

"She's not a bad person. She was my mom when I didn't have one and I love her like one. She taught me how to protect myself when it was just the two of us, before Woodbury. She told me to never let my guard down for anyone until I was one hundred percent sure I could trust them with my life."

Rick looked back at Shane. "Yeah," he muttered, and then, sarcastically, "Real Disney villain we got here."

T-Dog came back into the house, wiping his hands on his pants as he gestured over his shoulder with his thumb. "The others are asking me if they can come in yet—woah. Did she die?" He pointed down at Jo and looked among the three men, Carol and Sophia.

"She passed out," Rick replied. "Go ahead and tell the others it's safe to come in now. Daryl," he looked to the archer, "can you head upstairs and find an extra blanket or something for Jo here?" Off Daryl's nod, Rick crouched down and moved behind the blonde's shoulders and began to lift her up as Shane came around and helped by lifting Jo up at the ankles.

"Where we taking her?" Shane inquired.

"There's an old sofa in the other room."

As both men began to carry Jo's sleeping form into the living room of the house, the rest of the group began to filter inside and took turns stopping in their tracks to take in the sight of the unconscious pregnant woman being carted away and then realizing Sophia was there, and very much alive and well. Who Jo was fell on the backburner while everyone went over to the girl to embrace her and express their feelings for how glad they were to see her again.

After Sophia was introduced to Hershel and Maggie, the only two she didn't know before she got separated from the group, she explained to them who Jo was when their focus shifted to the mysterious pregnant woman that Rick and Shane had propped up on a sofa.

As everyone got comfortable on the other chairs or on the floor with their blankets and pillows and other belongings, Daryl handed off a blanket he found upstairs. Carol took it from him, taking it upon herself to cater to the woman who had kept her daughter alive. It was the least she could do.

"In light of what Jo's done for Sophia, and therefore us as a group, and because of her condition, she's part of this group now." Rick was standing in the middle of them all, hands on his hips as he looked from one face to the next. "Does anyone take issue with that?"

No one spoke up against the decision.

"Good." With a nod of his head, Rick focused on Hershel. "Will you be able to look after Jo's medical needs and help her when it comes time to deliver her baby? I know we don't have all the supplies you might need right now, but I'm sure we can find some."

"I'll do everything I can," Hershel consented.

"If we're gonna stay here, we need to clean this place up," Lori suggested. "We need to make this place safe, too. That front door doesn't even close anymore."

"This is a temporary place. We came here because we need a place to rest our heads for a few days," Rick clarified. "This will just serve as a base camp while we scout out the area and see if we can find something more fortified than this. We're gonna have to make runs anyway for food. We're running extremely low and right now, we need to get some of that to Jo and Sophia."

"I'm fine," Sophia insisted. "Jo and her baby need it more than me. I don't think The Governor fed her well while he kept her locked up."

"Yeah…" Andrea shook her head in confusion. "Who is this Governor, again? He's a leader of some fortified town? And Merle's there, too? Maybe we can sit down with this Governor and come to some sort of agreement and we can all live there."

"While I appreciate the sentiment and your desire to be pragmatic about this, do you _really_ want to live somewhere headed up by a man who locks up the woman carrying his child like a prisoner in the middle ages?"

"We could go there and expose him for the monster he clearly is," Carol commented, siding slightly with Andrea's suggestion. "Maybe we could rally his people against him and dispose of him."

"We don't even know where this place is," Glenn remarked. "I don't remember seeing a place called Woodbury on the map."

"I do," Maggie said. "It's probably a twenty minute drive from here."

Rick pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger. "We ain't going there."

"Then _I_ will," Daryl affirmed.

Pointing at the other man, Rick shook his head. "No, we're _all_ staying together." He made a circle in front of himself, referring to each and every one of them. "We can't take that kind of risk right now. We need you here with us. Your brother survived this long. He can survive a while longer until we can get our bearings and figure out everything we can and need to about this Governor and his town. When we go there, _if_ we go there, we ain't going in half-cocked." Daryl seemed unconvinced, so Rick stepped closer to him and pressed his hand briefly to Daryl's chest. "Listen, I promise, it may be weeks or months, I don't know, but however long it takes us to get settled somewhere safe again, we will head to this Woodbury. Maybe we'll even have more numbers in our group by then and we'll have the manpower needed if it should come to that. But can you trust _me_ and agree with me that the safety of the people here under this roof needs to come first?"

Daryl pouted as if he was a moment away from throwing a tantrum, but instead he shrugged and nodded. "Fine. Have it your way."

"Rick's right," Dale commented, taking off his fisherman hat and holding it against his chest with one hand while rubbing his head with his other hand. "We have too much personally at stake right now — our own safety and well-being. I don't like the idea of going up against something we don't fully understand yet. This is an issue of what's good for the whole."

"Exactly," Lori agreed. "I don't know about anyone else, but I think having food to eat and water to drink is more important than a vendetta against someone we don't know and hasn't personally attacked us."

"Well, it is a little personal," Carol shrugged. "That man is in charge of a place where my daughter was living, and he cruelly imprisoned Jo, who's carrying his child. We don't know the exact details of the conditions she was kept in, but I dare any of you to just look at her and tell me they were okay. This woman saved my daughter's life and we owe it to her to help take care of her and, if we can manage it, in the future, bring her some justice. This world has gone without it long enough."

Rick stood there, listening to all the other voices giving their two cents now and it was getting tiresome. Everyone had valid points, either way on the subject they leaned. But he had the final say because he was the one they looked to as their leader and he was the one who always rose to the occasion when everyone else hesitated.

Because they knew he always would and he knew he always would.

"Should we wake her up and get her something to eat?" Glenn wondered, gesturing toward Jo.

Rick looked toward Hershel, their resident medicine man, for confirmation. Off the older man's nod, Rick did the same. "Yeah. She can sleep as much as she needs to later, but she needs some food in her."

Carol took went over to Jo and crouched down, giving the younger woman a gentle shake on her arm. "Jo, honey, wake up. You need to eat something, okay?"

Standing up with a backpack in her hands, Lori opened it up and then crouched down to rifle through the limited about of canned goods they had left. Jo stirred awake, blinking away the sleep in her eyes as she tried focusing on the two women looking back at her.

"Hi," Lori greeted. "I'm Lori."

Jo tried lifting her head as she looked around the room, wondering how in the hell she got there. The last thing she remembered she was standing in the front hall near the stairs, talking to Rick and Carol was holding onto Sophia. Now there were more people and they were all staring at her which felt a bit unsettling.

"Hi," Jo replied in a wary voice.

Lori pulled two canned goods out of the backpack and held them up. "The choices are incredibly limited, but you need to eat, for the sake of you and your baby. You gotta keep up your strength, so…your options are canned lima beans or canned spinach." Lori's smile was warm and inviting. "I think there's some canned beets and spam, too, if you're feeling bold."

Jo tried sitting up on her own but Carol was right there to assist with a smile of her own. "Spinach, I guess," she gestured to the can with the darker green label. "Maybe it'll make me strong like Popeye."

"That's the spirit," Carol quipped.

While Lori finagled getting the can of spinach open, the others still looked upon Jo like she was a zoo exhibit. Or, at least, that's what she felt like they were doing. She focused her own gaze upon Sophia who was smiling at her, so she smiled back and reached her hand out. The girl came over to her and sat down beside her, hugging her side.

"We're gonna be okay," Sophia said leaning her head into the side of Jo's chest.

Jo rested her chin on top of the girl's head and smiled contentedly. "Yeah, I think so, too." Lifting her head, she set the opened can of spinach that Lori handed her onto her stomach and took the fork that was offered; the latter being just as much of a rare commodity these days as food and safety. "Thank you," she spoke, casting a glance at the brunette and then to everyone else as well.

"You're welcome," Lori replied, getting to her feet and going back to where she had been sitting before with the backpack.

Carol gestured to Sophia to move away a little to let Jo eat, but just as Jo was about to stick the fork into the can, her baby somersaulted inside the womb and kicked out a leg. The can popped, but Jo was able to catch it in time.

Everyone stared and slowly began to smirk.

Well, most everyone did.

Shane and Daryl seemed equally disinterested.

Jo held the can firmly in her hand and chuckled a little, a warm smile taking up residence on her face. Her unborn child didn't move around much, but when he or she did, it was such a surreal experience. The first few times she felt movement, she mistook it for gas, but as time went along she realized her child was growing and learning to stretch and flex.

Chuckling over the movement and the way the can popped felt good. She hadn't had anything to laugh about in such a very long time, and that, in itself, suddenly made her sad. In truth, there were so many things she was feeling all at once; happiness that her child was literally still alive and kicking, sadness over how her life had been and what had been done to her and overwhelming gratitude over the honest to God kindness being shown to her now.

Tears brimmed Jo's eyes; both happy and sad, as she stuck the fork into the can and brought the wet, clingy spinach to her mouth and began to eat it.

It felt amazing to have food in her stomach and the more she ate the more her child began to wiggle around as well, expressing its own contentment with being nourished again.

Jo had to stop halfway through, and set the fork down. She looked at everyone who just remained there in silence, watching her or keeping lookout from the windows, or talked quietly among themselves.

"I can't begin to thank all of you enough," she expressed through tears. "It's been way too long since I've felt this safe and cared about."

Daryl sniffed, focusing his gaze on their vehicles outside.

Jo turned her green eyes to him. "Your brother gave me a fighting chance," she said to him. "I owe him, and I hope he found a way out, and if he didn't I'll do whatever I can to help you find him again. I just…I can't go back there."

His shoulders slumping, Daryl turned his head slightly; not giving Jo is full attention but not ignoring her either. "I appreciate that," he muttered with a small nod.

"He has quite a colorful vocabulary."

Daryl and a few others smirked. "Yeah, he does."

"I really do hope he's okay," Jo pressed. "He's crude as all hell, but he's not without compassion. He's a decent man, if given the chance."

"Are we sure we're talking about the same man?" Andrea quipped.

Daryl shot her a look. "Shut up."

"I'm just saying. Last time we saw him he insulted us all left and right and was ready to beat us all to a pulp."

"In fairness we _did_ chain him to a roof," T-Dog replied.

Rick stepped forward. "No, _I_ chained him to the roof. That's on me."

"Yeah, and I lost the key, but the rest of us didn't do shit," T-Dog continued. "When we find him and he sees us, I don't think we're gonna be his favorite people to see."

"I don't think he'll care," Jo said, returning to eating. "He only seemed interested in finding his brother. That was why he was going to come with Sophia and me. That and he said only he could protect a child and a pregnant woman."

"You made it this far, and survived," Rick said, stepping even closer to her. "I'd say you can protect yourself well enough when it comes down to it." His blue eyes softened as he crouched down and looked up at her. He placed a hand on her knee and smiled. "And Sophia here tells us you taught her how to protect herself, too, so there's that. I think despite being pregnant, tired and hungry, you got plenty of fight in ya."

Jo nodded. "I suppose so."

"And now you have people who will fight beside you," Maggie stated, reaching over from where she sat with Glenn and placed her hand on Jo's shoulder. "You got us."

"We're Glenn and Maggie, by the way," Glenn introduced. He pointed to Hershel, "This is Hershel, Maggie's dad. He's used to be veterinarian, but he's still gonna be able to look after you and your baby, so you don't have to worry about anything when the times comes."

Jo nodded and smiled appreciatively. "I think I'll still have plenty to worry about. I've had months to think about every way this could go. Of course, that was when I thought I'd be giving birth in a basement cell and murdered afterward." She looked around at all the faces staring back at her again, this time looking a little concerned or awkward. "Sorry, I didn't mean to be Debbie Downer just then."

"No, it's alright," Rick assured. "You're with good people now and you don't gotta worry about this Governor anymore. We're gonna keep you safe. We take care of our own. We're a family."

"And now you're part of the family now, too," Sophia added, returning to hug Jo once again.

"You make it sound like a mafia thing," Jo joked. She set her fork in the can of spinach and then set the can down on the opposite side of her before placing a hand on the side of Sophia's head and pulling the girl close to give her a kiss to the temple. "I couldn't be happier," she insisted. "I miss having a family."

"We were kind of a family, when it was just us."

Jo narrowed her eyes. "We still are." Grinning, she turned her gaze to Carol and teased, "I grew pretty attached to your girl. I hope you don't mind sharing your motherly duties with me."

Carol nodded and laughed. "I don't mind at all."

In the midst of all the sudden lightheartedness, Sophia finally looked around and finally took in all the people sitting or standing in the room, when she focused on Rick and then Lori. "Where's Carl?"

Lori and Rick's smiles faded. They would've answered her with the truth, but Carol cut in first.

Taking her daughter's hand in hers, she informed, "There was an accident while we were looking for you. Carl got shot. Hershel here did what he could to save him but he died."

Sophia looked from her mom, up to Rick. "Did he get shot because of me?"

Rick looked absolutely distraught at the suggestion. He shook his head adamantly at the girl. "Oh, honey, no. It was just an accident. A man Hershel knew was hunting a deer we happened upon. The deer getting shot first slowed the bullet down. It gave Lori and me more time with our son before we lost him."

"I'm sorry," Jo remarked, looking at the leader of the group, and then to Lori.

He looked back at her with an appreciative nod. "Thank you."

"It hasn't been easy," Lori spoke, "but we're doing the best we can."

Jo nodded. "Of course."

"Ugh, guys…"

Everyone turned and looked to T-Dog who was gesturing out the window. A few of the others stood up and peered outside as well, to find a small herd of walkers approaching.

"Shit," Rick muttered under his breath.

They weren't exactly prepared to fight off a herd that size at the moment.

There was really only one option for them: run.

"Okay, get your things. We gotta leave," Rick informed, gesturing for everyone to hurry up.

He tasked himself with reaching out to Jo, offering the blonde his hands and helping her up to her feet. Making sure the blanket Daryl had found for her was secured around her shoulders and she kept the can of spinach in her hands, Rick placed an arm around her back and led her outside along with everyone else.

T-Dog went straight for Hershel's truck, firing off a few shots into some walkers that were getting a little too close for comfort, while Carol led Sophia into the RV alongside Dale, Andrea, Shane and Lori. Glenn took the wheel of Shane's car while Maggie slipped in beside him, and Rick handed care of Jo off to Hershel, who helped the pregnant woman into the backseat of Shane's car with him. Rick was last, hopping into the passenger seat of Hershel's truck while he watched Daryl already peeling away on his motorcycle. The window to his door was rolled down so Rick stuck his arm out and waved the others on and then banged his hand upon the door itself as he gestured for T-Dog to head onward as well.

 

* * *

 

After about only ten minutes on the road, the caravan stopped and gathered around the hood of Shane's car, pulling their map back out again to formulate a plan on where to go next.

"We got no place left to go," T-Dog remarked.

Maggie held the map spread out wide, pointing to a few spots. "When this herd meets up with this one, we'll be cut off. We'll never make it south."

"What would you say?" Daryl asked, leaning on the hood and looking over at Glenn. "That was about a hundred and fifty head?"

"That was last week. It could be twice that by now," Glenn replied.

"We should just leave Georgia altogether, head to the coast or something," Shane threw his hat into the discussion. "Find a boat, head to an island somewhere. Live off fish and coconuts. _That_ sounds like a plan to me."

Rick smirked, despite the situation they were in. "Let's shelve that idea for now and think more realistically."

Shane rolled his eyes and gripped his shotgun, taking point in front of the others while Dale maintained point behind the RV.

"This river could have delayed them," Hershel gestured to the blue, curving line on the map. "If we move fast, we might have a shot to tear right through there."

T-Dog began pointing to another spot on the map. "Yeah, but if this group joins with that one, they could spill out this way."

"So we're blocked," Maggie deduced.

"Only thing to do is double back at 27 and swing towards Greenville," Rick suggested, gesturing from right to left on the map.

T-Dog rubbed the back of his head and looked at the former cop. "Yeah, we picked through that already. It's like we've spent every waking moment after the storage facility going in circles."

"That's what _I've_ been saying," Andrea remarked, her hands on her hips.

Rick frowned at her. "Yeah, I know. I know. At Newnan we'll push west. Haven't been through there yet. We can't keep going house to house." Rick stared through the windshield of Shane's Hyundai Tucson. Inside, in the backseat and sleeping, was Jo. Sophia had climbed in beside her as Carol kept watch on them from beside the vehicle. Rick hoped they could get a good long while out of a place for Jo's benefit. She shouldn't have to give birth on the road. "Need to find someplace to hole up for at least a few weeks; preferably a few months, if we're lucky enough."

"Yeah, right. _Us_? _Lucky_?" Andrea continued, raising an eyebrow.

Lori placed a hand to her forehead. "Seriously Andrea, can you just not?"

"I'd say we _have_ been pretty damn lucky, Andrea," Rick added. "We're alive, we ain't exactly starving, and we even got Sophia back. If that's not luck, I don't know what is."

The blonde former attorney threw her hands up defensively. "Fine, fine. We're living the good life and everything's coming up roses."

"We could do without the sarcasm, if you'd be so inclined." Hershel eyed Andrea up and it seemed when he spoke, people obeyed. He just had that fatherly tone that made everyone, Rick included, figuratively sit down and shut up.

"Alright. It cool if we get to the creek before we head out?" T-Dog asked as Maggie rolled up the map and walked along with him. "Won't take long. We got to fill up on water. We can boil it later."

Rick nodded. "Knock yourself out."

As everyone went off, either to get water as well, take a piss break, wash their clothes or head into Dale's RV, Hershel pulled Rick aside.

"She's got at least another month or so left, but she can't take much more of this moving about." Hershel gestured to the sleeping Jo.

Rick followed the older man's gaze back to Jo once more. "What else can we do? Let her give birth on the run?"

"Do you see a way around that?" Hershel questioned, placing a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "Incidentally, I don't think she got to move around much in the last few months that man kept her locked up. She has some light scarring around her left ankle. It doesn't look like it came from a rope, but she was tethered to something like an animal. We also need to get her some shoes. She shouldn't be walking around barefoot."

Rick nodded. "See if one of the girls has an extra pair in their bags, will ya?"

"She has small feet. Carol might be her best bet."

As Hershel walked away, Daryl walked up.

"Hey, while the others wash their panties, let's go hunt."

Rick nodded again. Gripping his gun with a silencer made out of an old flashlight, he stepped up near Carol and gestured to Jo before he went off with Daryl. He wanted to make sure Jo and Sophia were okay beforehand. After Carol assured they would be, Rick gave her shoulder a squeeze and walked off with Daryl at his side, throwing a brief look over his shoulder to see Lori joining Shane as he kept watch.

His jaw clenching involuntarily, Rick wasn't sure he'd ever be used to seeing the woman who had been his wife at the side of the man who had been not only his best friend, but a brother to him.

But he couldn't focus on the past right now. He had to focus on the present and the future.

Heading into the woods, Rick and Daryl kept their weapons trained ahead of them in the event of walkers. They followed along an old, overgrown train track that eventually opened up to a slight clearing.

Beyond the clearing, down a slight incline was a prison.

"That's a shame," Daryl commented.

Sure its grounds were covered with dead inmates stumbling aimlessly around, but Rick could only see its potential.

For the first time in a long time, he had honest to God hope for their group.

He smiled.


	8. Safe

_"There is nothing more important than a good, safe, secure home."_ — Rosalynn Carter

* * *

  
Jo was still asleep when the rest of the group had reconvened and were informed about the prison. She didn't hear about how Rick believed in its potential or the fact that the grounds were scattered with walkers that had once been inmates and guards alike. They let her sleep up until their caravan of vehicles reached the prison.

Glenn and Maggie turned around from the front seat of Shane's Hyundai Tucson and then Hershel looked upon Jo, giving her a gentle shake to wake her. He felt bad because the poor woman could barely get any decent sleep. He hoped for her sake that tonight would be a different story for her; that once they got inside the prison and could secure it enough, Jo could finally lay her head down and catch up on some much needed rest.

When Jo stirred awake, she lifted her head off the window on her left and looked at Glenn and Maggie smiling back at her. "Where are we?"

"Rick and Daryl found shelter for us," Maggie informed. "We just have to secure it first."

"Yeah, we just need to get past a shit ton of walkers, but hey—when don't we?" Glenn quipped with a shrug and a grin.

Jo reached forward and grabbed the back of Glenn's seat to pull herself up so she could look out the windshield at the facility before them, across a small, moat-like pond. "A prison?"

"Yeah, imagine that. We're breaking _in_ to a prison."

"It's completely overrun," she remarked, looking between the three people she shared the vehicle space with.

"Don't worry. Rick has a plan," Hershel assured, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.

The other vehicles were parked beside each other and everyone had climbed out with only their weapons. They would come back for their supplies after they had secured their place inside the gates. Rick came walking over to the Hyundai and knocked on Glenn's window, but instead of rolling the window down to talk to the older man, Glenn simply opened the door and climbed out, resting his right arm on the roof of the vehicle.

"We're going in quiet," Rick said. "Want to draw as little attention to ourselves and the fences as possible from the walkers outside the property." Off Glenn's nod, Rick opened up the Jo's door and offered her his hand to help her out. "You doin' okay?"

Jo nodded up at him. "I'll live."

"Good."

The entire group made their way across the moat over a small wooden footbridge and over to the outermost fence. In his hands, Rick held a pair of bolt cutters and began to cut up the chain-link fence as quietly as possible. Jo stood back, her hands on her stomach as she waited for Rick to finish while Glenn and Shane took out a few close-by walkers with a shovel and a machete, respectively.

"Watch the backside," Rick called out over his shoulder.

"Got it," Lori replied, flanking the more vulnerable Jo and Sophia, with the help of Dale, Carol, Hershel and Andrea.

Once the fence was cut open, Rick gestured them all forward, pulling the opening up wide enough for them all to slip through. Jo trailed last, letting the others go first because her belly would take more time to get her in. In the process, though, the handcuff which was still unfortunately dangling from her right wrist got caught on part of the clipped links, causing her arm to more or less snap back. Rick reached his arms around her, helping her get unstuck before while also pushing the fencing apart even farther for her, and caught her eye as she looked back at him in some sort of mix of appreciation and admiration. In response to her look, he nodded at her and then turned back toward T-Dog once Jo was safely through.

"Hurry. Hurry!" he whispered loudly.

As soon as T-Dog stepped inside the fence, Rick followed suit. Glenn was quick to pull the fence back together with Daryl's assistance so no walkers could get in behind them. They tied it back up with some red wiring they had found at some point along the way and had been saving for an occasion such as this.

As they stood in between the outer and the inner fences, they paused to look around them, at the walkers drawing near on either side of the chain-link, and then began to sprint along the path leading to the main gate. All the while walkers snarled and hissed at them and tried futilely to reach for them.

Once inside the main gate's entrance, Rick looked upon the prison and declared simply, "It's perfect." Holding his machete up, he gestured to the fence before them and the walkers clamoring at it. "If we can shut that gate, prevent more from filling the yard, we can pick off these walkers. We'll take the field by tonight."

"So how do we shut the gate?" Hershel asked.

"I'll do it," Glenn offered, squinting from the sunlight just like the rest of them. "You guys cover me."

Maggie shook her head. "No. It's a suicide run."

"I'm the fastest," he insisted.

"No," Rick spoke, pointing at Glenn. "You, Maggie, and Andrea draw as many as you can over there. Pop 'em through the fence. Daryl, go back to the other tower. Carol, you've become a pretty good shot," he said encouragingly to the woman with the pixie cut. "Take your time. We don't have a lot of ammo to waste." He then turned around. "Hershel, you and Shane take this tower. Alright. I'll run for the gate."

As Glenn, Maggie, Andrea and T-Dog ran along the inner fence, they began calling out to the walkers to draw them over before stabbing them in the heads through the holes in the fence. Lori walked up to the inner gate and gave Rick a nod as she opened it for him and he slipped into the yard, sneaking around an overturned grey, prison bus. Lori then locked the gate behind him with a screwdriver to keep it in place and stepped back to stand beside Jo and Sophia, who could only watch and hope Rick was successful.

Looking down at the girl, Jo tugged playfully at the ends of Sophia's hair and then leaned down a little. "What happened to that hunting knife Merle gave you?"

Sophia looked up at her. "Oh, I think I left it in the RV."

Jo nodded, but then asked, "What about my pocket knife?"

Patting her pockets down, Sophia smiled as she shoved a hand in and pulled out the pocket knife and handed it over. "Here."

"Thanks, sweetie."

Stepping away from the girl she still considered her surrogate daughter, as well as Lori, Jo began to head over to where Glenn and the others were.

"Where are you going?" Lori asked.

"To earn my keep."

"You don't need to do that," the brunette insisted. "You'll overexert yourself."

"I'm pregnant, not an invalid," Jo threw back over her shoulder.

Sidling up beside Andrea, who looked at her with a smirk of approval, Jo began to call out to the walkers as she flicked open the blade of her pocket knife and jammed it into the nearest undead skull. Over the heads of the approaching walkers, Jo could see Rick weaving along the dirt roadway leading up to the innermost gate, shooting walkers as he went. After Rick closed said gate and disappeared inside another tower, Daryl called out to everyone else.

"Light 'em up!"

Gun fire quickly rang out as everyone with guns began taking out the remaining walkers in the yard that were too far away for them to stab through the fence. Rick had reappeared at the top of the third tower, aiming a rifle and joining in with taking out the walkers. Even Lori had a small handgun which she began to use.

With no more walkers at the inner fence for her to take down, Jo rejoined Sophia beside Lori and watched as the last of the walkers in the yard fell.

"Fantastic," Carol beamed as she came returned to the ground with Daryl, Hershel and Shane.

"Nice shooting," Daryl complimented her.

"You're becoming a regular Annie Oakley," Shane added.

"Yeah," Carol continued to smile, just overall happy with the turnout. "You okay?" she asked Jo as Lori opened the gate for them to enter the yard.

"I haven't felt this good in months," Jo smiled back, letting Carol briefly squeeze her hand.

"Good." Taking her daughter by the hand next, Carol led Sophia inside the yard. "Oh! Oh! We haven't had this much space since we left the farm!"

As they walked together through the grass, Glenn pierced a walker that wasn't actually dead through the skull with his pole.

T-Dog threw his hands up in the air in a sort of victory stance. "Woo!" he cried out happily.

Andrea came up alongside Jo and placed a hand on the small of her fellow blonde's back. "Glad you're still upright," she quipped. "You gotta be running on fumes, though."

Jo shrugged. "I think all this excitement's given me a boost of adrenaline. I think I'll be fine for the rest of the evening, though I will definitely sleep like a log tonight. I just hope no one wakes me up."

"Oh, don't worry. I don't think anyone wants to suffer the wrath of an overtired pregnant woman."

Jo and Andrea both chuckled as they approached the third tower with the others, waiting for Rick to join them all. When he did, he gestured to an area of the yard where very few walkers had gone down, suggesting that be where they build a fire and sleep for the night.

T-Dog walked over and helped Jo so she could sit down in the grass with Carol and Sophia. Andrea and Lori followed suit, but sat as far away from each other as possible; something that was not lost on Jo and she was trying to get a read on everyone in the group. She hadn't even been properly introduced to everyone yet, but had picked up on all their names by listening to them all talking to each other.

Hershel was Maggie's father and Maggie was clearly in a romantic relationship with Glenn. Andrea seemed to have eyes for Shane but it was Lori who seemed to be the one in the relationship with the man, which perplexed Jo, because she thought Lori and Rick were married. That was what she remembered Sophia telling her before when it was just the two of them on the road together. They had even had a son together — Carl, the boy who had died. Something went down there she wasn't sure of. Dale was an odd one to place. She wondered if he was Andrea's father or uncle, judging by how he seemed to hover around her, or if he just had some sort of unrequited love for her. Daryl was Merle's brother, but was more caring and seemed somewhat close to Carol. Jo wondered if there was something there between the pair or if they were just very good friends. T-Dog was a man unto himself, just friends with everyone.

And, again, there was Rick who remained on the outside of all of them, even though he was their leader. He seemed to keep a respectful distance from Lori and Shane, looked to Hershel as a fatherly figure for advice, and was like brothers with Daryl. He was hard to pin down. Rick was both involved and yet distant, and Jo was just grateful he seemed to generally care about her well-being by taking the time to check on her here and there to make sure she was okay.

As the evening progressed, their vehicles were brought to the front of the outer gates and the rest of their belongings carried inside to the yard. A fire was built up and everyone sat around it, huddled with blankets to keep out the cool night air that was falling down around them as they enjoyed a fireside meal consisting of squirrel that Daryl had killed, skinned and cooked before taking watch atop the overturned prison bus.

"Mmm. Just like mom used to make," Glenn joked, which brought a smile to Maggie's face, before throwing a small bone away.

"Tomorrow we'll put all the bodies together. Want to keep them away from that water," T-Dog began to say. "Now, if we can dig a canal under the fence, we'll have plenty of fresh water."

Hershel nodded, sifting some dirt through his fingers. "The soil is good. We could plant some seed. Grow some tomatoes, cucumbers, soybeans." He looked up, over at Rick who was pacing along the fence and pointed at the younger man. "That's his third time around. If there was any part of it compromised, he'd have found it by now."

"This'll be a good place to have the baby," Andrea said to Jo. "Safe."

Jo rubbed her belly as she caught a look from Lori she didn't understand. "It's better than anything I could've hoped for, that's for sure."

"You're in good hands," Maggie remarked, picking at some grass at her feet. "My daddy's gonna take good care of you and your little one."

"Do you have any names picked out?" Sophia asked, leaning into her mother.

Jo shrugged. "I spent the last six months believing I was going to be killed after my baby was born that I never saw the point in thinking of baby names," she admitted, ruefully. "I suppose now I should."

"If you have a boy, you can name him after me if you want," T-Dog offered with a chuckle.

"I don't think 'T-Dog' would fit. T-Puppy, maybe?" Jo laughed, and what a wonderful sensation that would always be.

T-Dog smacked his lips. "Nah, Theodore. That's what the T stands for."

"Ahh," Jo nodded. "I'll keep that in mind."

"If we're throwing names in the hat, I hear Dale is gaining popularity again," Dale joked, which brought the tiniest of smiles to Jo's lips.

"If you have a boy you can name him after your husband," Sophia suggested. "Even though it's not his baby, it'll be like keeping a part of him alive again."

Smiling appreciatively, Jo shrugged. "I loved my husband, but his first name was rather unfortunate. It's not something I would ever choose."

"You were married?" Glenn asked.

"Yeah. Five years." Doing the math in her head, she added, "Actually, it would be more like six years now if he was still alive."

"How did it happen? Was it before or after the outbreak?" Lori wondered, leaning back on her hands as Shane sat crouched beside her with an arm around her waist.

"After—or, well, _during_ , I suppose. You remember how that first wave began with so many people just getting sick with that fever?" Off Lori's and everyone else's nod, Jo continued. "He was one of those unlucky ones. Or, maybe he _was_ lucky. He didn't have to live long enough to see how the world fell apart." Pushing some hair behind both her ears, she stared into the fire. "He got sick one night and by morning he was dead. The news reports were still running on the TV then and showed what was happening to people, so I knew he would come back, but I still wasn't ready for when he did. I'd seen neighbors dying on the street, getting chased by their undead family and friends and shooting at them. I locked my husband in our room. I had figured out by then by looking out my windows that shooting walkers in the chest didn't do anything; that headshots did the trick, but that wasn't something I could bring myself to do to my husband. At the time, to me, he was still the man I married; just dead and still figuratively kicking. But, I couldn't stay there any longer, so I took my husband's pocket knife," Jo said, lifting up her little weapon, "and I left our house. I packed some clothes, some water, and headed to my father's house, but he was already dead, so then I went to my brother's apartment, but the building was swarmed and I couldn't get in, so I just hit the road and I was on the road by myself for a long time until I found Sophia." She smiled over at the girl. "And it was nice to not be alone anymore."

"So, what was your husband's name?" Shane asked, sounding somewhat bored.

Jo gazed at him and held his eye for a moment before looking down at her wedding band as she twisted it around her finger a little. "Oscar."

"What'd you do before all this?" Andrea inquired, turning the subject to something less sad.

"I was a first grade teacher in Decatur, my hometown. Oscar was a guidance counselor at the high school, where we were sweethearts from the end of junior year on." She smiled at the memory, but then grew a bit sad at how she would never feel his bright blue eyes on her face or the touch of his fingertips along her skin ever again. Tilting her head slightly, and holding a hand to her stomach as tears began to brim her eyes, Jo cleared her throat. "Excuse me."

Pulling herself up to her feet on her own, Jo pulled the blanket that was wrapped around her shoulders more tightly around her as she walked away from the fire and found her feet leading her over to where Rick had been pacing earlier.

He was a couple yards away by that point and made his way over to the others at the fire, but she could still hear him talking. In the silence of the night, his voice carried enough, even with how low he was speaking.

"Better all turn in. I'll take watch over there. Got a big day tomorrow."

"What do you mean?" Jo heard Glenn ask as she stared into the undead eyes of one of the walkers outside the fence that was snarling back at her.

"Look, I know we're all exhausted. This was a great win. But we've got to push just a _little_ bit more," Rick spoke. "Most of the walkers are dressed as guards and prisoners. Looks like this place fell pretty early. It could mean the supplies may be intact. They'd have an infirmary, a commissary."

"An armory?" Daryl wondered.

"That would be outside the prison itself, but not too far away," Shane offered up. "Warden's offices would have info on the location. Weapons, food, medicine."

Rick nodded. "This place could be a gold mine."

"We're dangerously low on ammo," Hershel commented. "We'd run out before we make a dent."

"That's why we have to go in there — hand to hand." Rick looked around at everyone, focusing lastly on Shane and Lori. "After all we've been through, we can handle it. I _know_ it. These assholes don't stand a chance."

Standing up, Rick left the group alone once more and walked over to where Jo was standing, doing her best to keep warm with the blanket as she seemed to be holding the gaze of some walkers at the fence.

"Who's winning?" he asked.

"Huh?" she muttered, turning to look at him as he sidled up beside her.

"You're having a staring contest, aren't you?" He caught her eye and looked at her with a small smirk upon his lips.

Jo returned the smile and pointed at the walker in front of her. " _He_ is. The dead don't blink."

Rick nodded and both of them looked away from the walkers and over to the prison buildings. "When we find the infirmary, we can see what supplies there are that Hershel will need for when your baby comes. Once we clear it out, we'll take you there so you can see it," he offered. "We'll clean it up, too; get it as sanitary as possible. It'll be almost like giving birth in an actual hospital."

"Thank you. I appreciate everything you're doing to accommodate me."

"It's nothing," he shrugged off, looking at her. "You had some bad shit done to you, more than you're probably letting on, which I get. You don't know us. It's hard to trust someone right away these days. But if I— _we_ can do something to make it right for you, then that's what we're gonna do."

"That's just it," she smirked. Jo reached out and squeezed Rick's hand. "I _do_ trust ya'll and I can't begin to thank you for taking me in and looking out for me. I'm just surprised the rest of ya'll aren't suspicious of me instead."

"You know why," he remarked, tilting his to the left a bit. "You saved Sophia."

"Still—"

"No," he said, firmly, cutting her off. "You saved her and we know your heart is in the right place, that you're a good person. I lost my son and I was in a dark place for a long time because of it. I don't think I've completely gotten out of that place either, but looking for Sophia and hoping she was still alive and out there somewhere gave me something to cling to. It kept me from losing my mind, I think. Too much shit was happening then, but looking for Sophia…" He trailed, placing his hands on his hips and looking down at the grass. "Even after we stopped looking, when we just figured she was dead, I don't think I ever really stopped hoping there was still a sliver of a chance she was alive. And then this morning, finding her with you in that house and all those hopes were validated." Rick lifted his head and looked back at her. "You saving Sophia and being there for her, keeping her alive all this time, even if you weren't with her these last several months — you've helped give me hope again and, so...thank _you_."

Pursing her lips together in a small smile, Jo nodded and swayed slightly. "Well, then…you're welcome?"

Casting his eyes down toward her right hand, he noticed a slight glint that caught his attention. Reaching out, he took her hand in his and lifted her arm out slightly from underneath the blanket wrapped around her, revealing the handcuff was still attached. "With everything going on I completely forgot about this," he said, sheepishly. "I'm sorry."

Jo looked at the cuff as well and shrugged. "It's alright. It's the least of my worries."

"I should be able to find keys to remove this tomorrow," he added. "I mean, this is prison after all. If I can't find a set of keys lying around, I'm sure one of those walkers that used to be a guard has something on them. We'll get these off."

"I appreciate it, but there's no rush," she assured as he let go of her hand, letting it drop. "Just secure this place first. That's what matters right now."

Rick nodded and smiled her again and then followed her gaze back toward the walkers in front of them. "You've had a long day. You should get some sleep with the others. You need it the most."

She nodded back at him, in agreement. "Yeah." Turning slightly back toward the group, she threw a quick look over her shoulder at him. "Don't stay up too long either. I heard you talking to the others. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow."

As she walked away from him, Rick watched her go and felt a little happier about everything for the first time in a long time.

 

* * *

 

Jo awoke the next day, lying on her side in the grass, with her blanket draped over her, as the sound of a gate rattling entered her ears. She blinked a few times, squinting at the sunlight beating down on her as she lifted her head and noticed someone else's blanket was rolled up and had been tucked under her head. It hadn't been there when she went to sleep the night before, which meant someone had done it after the fact. It brought a smile to her face, that little gesture of kindness, and she wondered who the culprit behind such thoughtfulness was.

Stretching, she placed her hands to her lower back and winced, slowly realizing that the lumpy grass had not been ideal for sleeping on, but she still finally felt rested for the first time in a long while. The embers from last night's fire were still smoking slightly, but there was no heat coming from them anymore, as Jo watched the tiniest plumes rising up and twirling slightly on the light breeze that came through.

Turning her gaze toward the gate at the entrance to the prison interior, Jo saw Rick, Shane, Daryl, Glenn, Andrea and Maggie running through to take out the walkers while the rest stood along the fence distracting the walkers, just like the afternoon before. Jo felt a pang of guilt for sleeping in while everyone else worked so hard to secure the prison. She hated not being able to pull her weight, no pun intended.

Since the rest of their belongings had been brought inside the yard the evening before, the hunting knife Merle had given to Sophia had been recovered, but it was missing at the moment. That was until Jo looked over at the thirteen-year-old girl who was standing alongside her mother with that very blade, taking down walkers along the fence without missing a beat.

Jo smiled.

Sophia had come a long way from the nervous girl she'd found in the woods about eight and a half, nine months before.

Pulling herself up to her feet, and feeling like a beached whale, Jo pulled her pocket knife out of her bra, since it was the only safe place she had to store anything for safe keeping. She was still wearing the same T-shirt and peasant skirt The Governor had given her to wear two weeks prior when her previous clothes had gotten too tight for her. She hoped for some fresh clothes soon; preferably pants. The skirt was nice and airy, but it was so very impractical. Her legs were too easily exposed to the elements; and by elements, she mostly meant poison oak and walkers.

Flicking her little blade open she walked up to the fence and stood beside Lori, giving the brunette a polite 'good morning' nod of the head before joining in with banging her hands on the fence to draw some walkers near so she could stab them in the head through the chain-link.

"How'd you sleep?" Lori asked.

"Better than I have in a while," Jo replied. "Though I wish someone would've woken me sooner. I hate feeling like I'm not contributing, considering everything ya'll have done for me so far and are still planning to do."

Lori smirked. "Being pregnant in an apocalypse gives you an exemption card from hard labor. Enjoy it while it lasts."

"I wish I could," Jo sighed. "I just hate sitting still. Always have. I like to be active."

The immediate threat of walkers nearest the fence was soon dispatched and half of the group that had gone with Rick moved further along into the interior which meant the half of the group at the fence lost their line of sight on them.

"I can't see them," Lori said nervously, gripping the fence with one hand and her crowbar in another while moving closer to where Jo stood. "Can you see them?"

Jo craned her neck and stepped a little to her right. "Back there," she gestured with her pocket knife.

She spotted two, then four and five undead guards wandering out in riot gear and Rick's group began to attack them as best as they could, while the group outside the fence could only watch anxiously and hope for the best.

Eventually, it seemed as the immediate sweep was over as Glenn began to run back over toward the fence, but Rick called out for him to stop so that they could talk among themselves about the situation. Without giving the group at the fence a heads up as to what was going on, Rick led his half into a fenced-in stairwell that led inside the actual prison building, and they slowly and cautiously slipped in with their weapons raised.

A short while later Rick's group returned back outside. He sauntered up to the fence with his slightly bow-legged gait and nodded to the others as he sheathed his machete at his side.

"How is it in there?" Dale asked.

"C Block is secure for now. T-Dog and Daryl are getting rid of the bodies," Rick informed. "We can start to move in."

Moving over to pull the gate open, he gestured everyone in even though they still had to double back for their belongings over by the fire pit. Jo began to follow suit, practically waddling like a penguin which brought a smirk to Rick's lips as he reached out and touched his hand to her arm to get her attention. When Jo stopped and looked back at him, he held up a small set of keys.

Smiling back at him, Jo held out her right arm to him.

"Told you I'd find some keys," Rick commented, sticking a key into the keyhole and turning. A click resounded not a second later and the cuff popped right off her wrist. "These things are basically universal." Taking the cuffs and hooking them onto his belt loop, he shoved the keys into one of his pockets and then took her wrist in his hand and gave it a good rub. "Better?"

Jo nodded appreciatively. "Much better," she replied, catching his eye. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it."

Letting her take her hand back, Rick remained at the gate as she rejoined the others around the fire pit, gathering up their belongings, even though she had nothing aside from that blanket Daryl had found for her the day before in that house. As everyone began to return to the gate with bags and blanket and pillows in their hands and arms, Rick stood off to the side. Glenn came out, taking Jo's blanket for her and flashing a bright smile at her. All she could do was smile back in thanks as she tucked her hair behind her ears and walked into the courtyard.

Subconsciously, Rick placed a hand to the small of her back as she walked by, while he waited for everyone to come inside before locking the gate back up. She looked over her shoulder at him and briefly caught his eye, but thought nothing more on it as Glenn led the others into C Block, where they initially found themselves in a communal area with some sort of guard tower. The place was a mess, but no one was expecting The Plaza Hotel.

Jo walked down the steps into the the communal area, wondering if maybe it had previously served as a visitation area for prisoners and their loved ones. Looking up, she took special notice of the guard tower where she could just barely see a dead guard slouched in a chair and blood splatter on the glass from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Making a face, Jo continued on behind Glenn through the barred gate into C Block where T-Dog was dragging a body that Daryl had just tossed over the railing from the upper level.

"What do you think?" Shane asked, walking down the set of stairs closest to the entrance in from the communal area.

"Is it really secure?" Lori question; a little unsure.

"This cell block is," Rick confirmed, bringing up the rear.

"What about the rest of the prison?" Hershel asked.

"In the morning, we'll find the cafeteria and infirmary."

Sophia looked nervously at Rick. "We're sleeping in the cells?"

"I found keys on some guards. Daryl has a set too."

"I ain't sleeping in no cage," Daryl quipped from up above. "I'll take the perch."

As Hershel walked by Rick, he patted the younger man on the shoulder, nonverbally congratulating him on a job well done on securing this place for them all. Rick smiled and watched after everyone as they headed to different cells, laying claim.

Glenn gestured to one of the cleaner cells on the lower level for Jo before handing her blanket over.

"Thanks," she muttered before stepping inside and taking it in.

Tossing her blanket onto the top bunk, she straightened the sheet on the bottom bunk's mattress and then gave the pillow a fluffing. She then pulled the top bunk's pillow down, which she planned on using to prop up her stomach when she laid on her side while looking forward to when she could sleep flat on her stomach again. Grabbing her blanket back off the top bunk, she unrolled it and did her best to make it look presentable, as if someone was actually going to chastise her if the bed wasn't made.

As Jo sat down on the bed, she noted the mattress was surprisingly comfortable. Gripping the edge of it, she crossed her legs at her ankles, staring down at her dirty bare feet. Hershel had mentioned to her in passing the evening before that one of the things they needed to do for her was find her some shoes. Apparently he had asked the girls, Carol specifically if they had an extra pair they could part with, but the women were wearing their only pair. The men didn't even have anything extra either. Jo had shrugged, insisting it was fine. She hadn't worn shoes in six months. She had become so used to not wearing shoes that she was sure she'd feel awkward in them once she wore some again.

While staring at the blank wall in front of her, she saw movement out the corner of her left eye. Turning her head she watched as Rick walked past, rotating his arm, giving her the impression it was sore from all the walkers he'd killed over the last two days.

She wondered if he'd slept at all the night before.

Jo had fallen asleep as soon as she had lain down and he was already up and moving with the others by the time she'd awoke. If he slept at all, she figured it may not have been for long.

Rick passed by her cell again a few moments later, seemingly pacing, while everyone was settling in. He was tilting his head from side to side, trying to crack his neck and putting off settling in himself.

"You're gonna wear a hole into the floor if you keep that up," Jo called out to him.

She heard his footsteps halt and a pregnant pause followed. A moment later, his footsteps continued again, but this time he was walking backward and peered inside her cell with a raised eyebrow.

"What's that now?"

"You're pacing," Jo replied. "I said you're gonna wear a hole in the floor."

Rick looked down at his feet and let silence hang between them for a few seconds. Lifting an arm up, he leaned against her opened cell door and looked around her cell. "You comfortable in here?"

"Why?" she smirked. "Is there a better option behind door number two?" Off Rick's slight snickering, she added, "No, this is perfectly fine."

He nodded at her and dropped his hands to his sides. "D'ya need anything?"

Jo sighed and shrugged. "I think I'm good."

His eyes falling toward the floor, he made a gesture toward her feet. "We need to get you some shoes."

"Hershel said the same thing."

"Don't go walking around the courtyard until it gets cleaned up a bit and we can get you something. I don't want you cutting your foot on broken glass or anything else like that."

"Yes, sir," she mock saluted.

Rick smiled. "You hungry?"

Jo hesitated, trying to ignore that aching pain in her stomach, but she relented and nodded. "Yeah."

"Alright."

Without another word, Rick walked away and Jo was left to stare at her feet again, and then over to the tiny sink and toilet to her right.

A minute or so later, Rick reappeared at her cell's entrance and stepped in, offering her an opened can of lima beans. "It's all we got left."

"I can't take it all. It should be shared evenly," Jo insisted.

Rick rolled his eyes as he stepped directly in front of her, lifted her hand and set the can in it. "Eat," he said. "I won't hear otherwise."

Jo stared up at him, slowly allowing an amused but appreciative smile take up residence on her lips. "If you insist."

"I do." Turning, he began to step back out of her cell but then stopped to add, "And eat the whole can. I don't wanna find one bean left in there, understand?" His tone was chastising but lighthearted.

When Jo was alone again, she looked down at the can and stood up. Placing her other hand around the top of the can, she tipped it upside down over the sink to let most of the water drain out so it was easier and less messy when she stuck her hand in to scoop the pale colored beans out with her hand.

She'd never liked lima beans, but when eating was a luxury, lima beans were suddenly akin to caviar.

Jo sat back down on her bunk to eat, practically inhaling the can to the point that she barely even tasted the beans. She didn't care about the flavor, only the sustenance. And, oh, how wonderful it was to fill that void that hunger produced.

When she was finished, she stood back up and wandered out of the cell, her bare feet shuffling along the concrete floor. Rick was slouched against the opposite wall, with his legs outstretched before him and his machete strewn across his lap. He looked up at Jo walking toward him holding the can out toward him. He watched as she casually tipped the can so he could see inside it, which brought a new smirk to his tired face.

"Good girl," he quipped, and then winced at the way that sounded.

"Haven't you claimed a cell yet?" she asked, holding the can down at her side. "Or are you planning on sleeping out here?"

Rick lifted up an old, discarded pillowcase that sat bunched up beside him. "Maybe," he said, propping the pillowcase behind his head for cushioning against the concrete wall, and shrugged up at her.

"You look out for everyone else, but who looks out for you?" Jo inquired in all seriousness.

He couldn't find anything to say to that, so he just looked down at his feet. Without saying anything else, either, Jo crouched slightly and set the empty lima bean can down between his boots and walked back into her cell, while holding her hands to her stomach.

Rick watched her waddling away again, thinking about what she'd just said, and then looked at the empty can.

 

* * *

 

In the middle of the night, C Block was silent, except for the occasional snoring coming from multiple persons who couldn't exactly be pinpointed. Inside Jo's cell, she was lying on her side with one hand underneath her head pillow while her other hand rested on her stomach, which was propped up by her second pillow.

She was beginning to toss and turn; her generally inane dreams giving way to the beginnings of a nightmare. As quick glimpses of The Governor pierced through the veil of her dream world, Jo's brow knitted together and a pout formed on her lips. Her heartbeat began to race and her breathing became more pronounced.

It all culminated in her kicking her legs out and crying out, "Stop!" and hearing her own voice is what woke her up.

Jo's green eyes popped open and she peered up at the underside of the top bunk above her, letting her sight adjust to the darkness around her. She let her mind wrap around the nightmare and then do its best to force it away.

She was with good people now. She was safe.

She didn't want to dream about The Governor.

He didn't _deserve_ to be in her dreams and she didn't deserve to have nightmares about _him_.

Letting out a sigh, she realized others might have heard her cry out and it embarrassed her somewhat. She didn't want to have woken anyone up and have them coming to check to make sure she was okay. She didn't want anyone to fuss over her and treat her like she was some porcelain doll who would break because she knew in her heart of hearts that she was far from that.

Scowling as she forced herself to sit up, she gripped the edge of her mattress tightly in her hands and felt the sudden urge to rip it all to shreds.

She hated the fear she had in her in regard to The Governor. She hated that she let her guard down around him and somehow gave him the impression she was available. She hated that he took advantage of her and got her pregnant. She hated that he tried to kill her. She hated that he locked her up like a dog. She hated that he raped her after the fact. She hated that he planned to kill her.

She used to hate the word hate, but she hated him with every fiber of her being.

Jo could feel her face flushing with heat as anger began to envelope her, and all she could think of, for some reason, was former president George W. Bush and the War On Terror and how if we did something or other, then the terrorists have won. The more she thought about that and attributed it to how she felt, the more sense it made for her and put her at ease.

If she let herself become consumed by her hate for The Governor and let him infect her dreams, he won.

If she worried about him finding her and what he'd do to her, he won.

If she even wasted an ounce of her energy merely thinking of him, he won.

And she refused to lose.

It wasn't something that would happen overnight, but she was willing to try.

Inhaling deeply, she held her breath for a few beats and then exhaled just as deeply while releasing her tight grip on her mattress. As she looked down at her feet, she shifted her weight around and pulled her belly pillow out and pushed it behind her. She then reached her arms up and gripped the underside of the bottom bunk as she helped pull herself up to her feet.

Quietly, Jo walked out of her cell and looked around, listening carefully.

There was no movement, only some snoring.

It appeared no one was awake, which meant no one heard her — a small relief.

Shuffling off toward the communal area, she just needed to walk around. Her back was starting to ache anyway, and not from the mattress, but from just being pregnant. So, with her hands on the small of her back, Jo stepped through the open, gated doorway, into the communal area and sat down at one of the octagonal tables, straddling the seat. Placing her hands on her upper legs, she closed her eyes and let out a sigh as her mind wandered.

She was so lost in random thought, trying to avoid even the image of The Governor in her mind, that she never heard Rick approaching from behind her until she felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Couldn't sleep?"

Jo jumped slightly and then chuckled a little at her own expense as she shook her head up at him. With an understanding nod, Rick walked around to sit kitty-corner from her at the same table. He leaned forward with his hands folded on the smooth, grey surface and looked down at his dirty fingernails before lifting his gaze back to her.

"Was that you crying out like that a few minutes ago?" he asked.

Jo went stock still and the embarrassment she thought she had avoided reared its ugly head. She nodded sheepishly, lifting a hand to run her fingers through her blonde hair, brushing it back away from her face.

"Unfortunately," she finally muttered.

"Bad dream?"

She nodded again, but it was clear to him she wasn't going to tell him what it entailed and he was okay with that.

"Yeah, I couldn't sleep either," he continued. "Too much on my mind, you know?"

"Yeah," she agreed.

They both cast their eyes away from each other, focusing on random spots in the room. Silence fell over them both for a while as they just sat there together, saying nothing about nothing.

That was until a smirk appeared on Jo's lips and a small laugh bubbled out of her mouth.

Rick snapped his gaze back to her and narrowed his eyes at her. "What's so funny?" he asked with a smirk of his own.

"I was just thinking of the irony of all this." She lifted her eyes and looked into his, noting that he wasn't following what she meant. "I was in an actual town that was supposed to be safe, but I ended up a prisoner where I felt anything _but_ safe. And now, here I am, in an _actual_ prison, where I'm free and I've never felt safer." She watched how he tilted his head and nodded at what she said. "Ironic, right?"

"Yeah." Leaning forward, closer to her, Rick covered one of her hands with his own. "And you are now. _Safe_ , that is; or at least as safe as we _can_ be in this world these days."

"I appreciate every effort taken to ensure that." She added, "It's not necessary, but it's appreciated all the same."

"It _is_ necessary," he insisted, giving her hand a squeeze before letting it go and sitting back, dropping his hands into his lap.

When silence began to fall between them again, Jo puckered her lips in thought and decided to change the subject. "Do you know if anyone has any playing cards?" she asked. "I can't sleep, you can't sleep. We might as well keep ourselves occupied."

Rick looked off toward the gated doorway to C Block and tried to think. "Actually yeah, I think I have a deck in my bag."

"I used to have playing cards. Sophia and I would play Go Fish."

Rick smirked as he stood up. Gesturing between the two of them, he said, "Go Fish is for children. You and I can play Gin Rummy."

Letting a brighter smile take up residence on her lips, Jo nodded. "Sounds good."

With a pat to her shoulder with his right hand, Rick sauntered back into C Block, to his cell to find his deck of playing cards. Jo lifted her right leg and turned her body, slowly but surely, so that she could sit normally at the table, and just waited.

This was nice.

This was nice and normal.

This was safe.


	9. Stronger

_"That which does not kill us makes us stronger."_ — Friedrich Nietzsche

* * *

  
The first full day inside the prison began with Rick, Shane, Daryl and T-Dog finding a plethora of weapons which they brought back to the communal area to sort through while mostly the women resorted to the antiquated roles of cleaning. Brooms were discovered which helped removing debris, making it twice as easier. Water from the sinks in each cell seemed to work and the women were able to use that to fill up some buckets that had also been found in order to clean up some of the blood splatter on the walls and floors. The goal was to make the space as livable as possible, and hopefully even homey.

Andrea, who was far from suited for housework, approached Rick, offering to further explore the rest of the prison with him and the other guys, but Rick shot her down, asking her to stay back and keep an eye on the others. When she seemed as if she were about to get huffy, he amended his statement, claiming he valued her ability to keep the others safe, which appeased the woman somewhat.

As Rick and the others were about to head out in search of the infirmary and the cafeteria, Dale approached next, asking if he could tag along because he needed to feel more useful.

With a nod, Rick consented, and Shane passed the older man a handgun and a small flashlight as the others began suiting up with some of the riot gear they'd taken off dead walkers outside.

Jo was sitting with Sophia in her cell, brushing the girl's hair for her when the men gathered in C Block to finish getting ready. Glenn was joining, too, as was Maggie, which pissed Andrea off.

"How come Maggie gets to go and I get to play babysitter?"

"Because where Glenn goes, I go," Maggie retorted, flashing a stone-faced look at the blonde. "You got a problem with that and we can discuss it later, after we get back."

Jo smirked at the interaction.

Carol and Lori were busying themselves with piling dirty sheets in the center of the cell block to try and wash at some point. There was talk of even hanging some sheets up in front of each cell's door for the sake of everyone getting some sense of privacy when they needed it.

Hershel gave Andrea a squeeze to her shoulder. "There will be plenty of times for you to play with the boys," he quipped. "In the meantime, why don't you give Carol and Lori a hand?"

Rolling her eyes like a petulant child, Andrea let out a sigh of quiet aggravation but agreed. Rick, meanwhile, simply shared a withering look with the older man before letting his gaze wander into Jo's cell. He didn't say anything to her and she didn't seem to notice he was looking, but he still looked regardless, finding something nice about brushing Sophia's hair in such a tender, motherly way.

Smiling to himself, Rick was soon distracted by Shane clearing his throat to get Lori's attention. The brunette pair had long since gotten past that awkward stage among the group where they avoided public displays of affection. It was really only within the last two months where they basically said 'fuck it' and stopped caring. Even though there would always be a feeling of tension between them, Lori, Rick and Shane had found they were able to keep the peace and get past the bulk of their anger and resentment. So, when Shane encircled and arm around Lori's waist and pulled her into a kiss before he left with the other guys, Rick was able to ignore it and not let it bother him so much anymore.

"We ready?" Rick asked. Off the other men's silent nods, he did the same. "Great. Let's go."

Jo lifted her head then, looking back out her cell in time to see the men and Maggie step out of the cell block. Andrea took Rick's set of keys and locked the gated door behind them and then turned to face Lori and Carol with another eye roll.

"I'll be in my cell if anyone needs me," Andrea commented.

Jo watched as her fellow blonde walked off and then disappeared from her line of sight, but heard well enough the sound of the woman's footsteps echoing off the metal stairs up to the upper level. As she brought her focus back to Sophia's hair, Hershel stuck his head in and smiled at the twosome.

"How're you feeling today?" he asked, directing his question to Jo.

She met his gaze and nodded. "I'm fine."

"Did you sleep better last night?"

"I did, actually. There was a small hiccup where a nightmare was concerned, but I walked it off and was able to go back to sleep eventually."

"Oh, I know," Hershel smiled, not just with his mouth but with his eyes. "I heard you and Rick laughing about something."

Jo ceased her ministrations with Sophia's hair for a moment. "He couldn't sleep either, so we played some Gin Rummy."

"Who won?"

"We each won once."

"Well, I gotta admit, it was awfully nice to hear Rick laughing. I don't think I can recall the last time I heard him do so." Hershel leaned against the doorframe of her cell and folded his arms across his chest, unaware that Lori was looking their way and eavesdropping on their conversation as discreetly as possible while she continued cleaning with Carol. "It might've been New Year's."

"That's definitely a while ago," Jo agreed.

"It is." Watching as Jo began to weave her fingers around Sophia's hair, pulling strands here and there to give her a fishtail braid. "How's the baby?" he asked further.

"Still kicking, thankfully."

"I don't want to come across as too forward and I understand if you feel awkward about it, but when you have a moment, I'd like to examine you a little to make sure everything is progressing well enough," Hershel informed. "This having been a men's prison, there won't exactly be the medical supplies I'd need, but we can make do the old fashioned way. But only with your consent, of course."

Jo looked over at him and nodded. "Whatever needs to be done to make sure my baby is okay, I'm all for."

"We don't need to do it now," he continued. "Let's wait till we get settled, perhaps after we find the infirmary."

"Sounds good to me."

With one more smile, Hershel ducked back out of her cell. Jo returned her complete focus to finishing Sophia's fishtail braid and then Sophia left the cell to show her mother and Lori while Jo chose to lie back on her bed and catch a catnap.

She wasn't sure how long she had been asleep for but when she woke up it was to the sounds of Rick's frantic shouting.

The door into C Block creaked open with a bang which made Jo bolt upright as fast as her bulging stomach would allow her. Staring out her cell she saw Glenn carrying an unconscious and bleeding Maggie in his arms as he and the others disappeared a few cells down. Jo was on her feet and hurrying out to see what had happened. To her right, keeping the door to C Block closed from inside the communal area, T-Dog and Daryl stood guard. To her left, everyone else was huddled or starting to huddle outside Maggie and Glenn's cell.

"What happened?" Hershel demanded from within the cell, quick to be at his daughter's side.

"Where's her arm?" came Carol's more poignant question.

Peering inside the cell as best as she could, through all the bodies blocking most of her view, Jo could barely make out the fact that Maggie's left arm, from just slightly above her elbow was missing and she was bleeding profusely. The ripped fabric from someone's shirt that was being used to apply pressure to the severed limb didn't seem to be doing much to help.

"Her arm needs to be cauterized," Jo muttered, not even realizing she'd spoken until a few heads turned and looked at her.

"With what?" Shane asked, throwing his hands out at his sides. "You see a soldering iron and a working electrical outlet lying around?"

"No, but there's plenty of metal and we can light a small fire to hold that metal over until it heats up enough," Jo threw back in his face with the same attitude he gave her. "It'll sear the wound, stop the bleeding and keep her from dying of blood loss."

"What—did you do a tour in Iraq as an army medic or something?"

"No, I saw it in movie my husband made me watch."

"I could light a fire," Glenn suggested, appearing very much at a loss.

"Wouldn't the shock kill her?" Andrea wondered from where she stood in the back of group near Shane and Jo. "Couldn't we just keep the wound dressed and let it heal on its own?"

"It's not gonna stop the arteries from bleeding and I need to give my daughter a fighting chance," Hershel commented. "Someone heat up some damned metal and do it quick."

Jo turned around; looking around the cell block as Rick darted out passed her, accidentally bumping into her in the process. "That bucket could work," she said, pointing out a bucket Carol had been using earlier to clean off old blood and other grime from the walls.

Spotting the bucket in question, Rick snapped it up and dumped the dirty water out. Jo darted into her cell and grabbed her extra pillow and pulled off the pillowcase before coming back out and tossing it to Rick.

"What's this for?"

"So you don't burn your hand when the metal gets hot."

Nodding appreciatively at her, Rick looked out toward the communal area. "Daryl! Throw me your lighter!"

Daryl pulled his lighter out and tossed it to T-Dog, who then tossed it through the door to Rick. Rick dropped it, trying to juggle the bucket in one hand and the pillowcase in the other, so Jo crouched down and picked it up for him while he wrapped the pillowcase around his hand and gripped the edge of the bucket a little better.

"Hurry up!" Glenn shouted.

"I'm going as fast as I can!" Rick shouted back.

He locked eyes with Jo who tipped the bucket upside down for him so that the bottom faced up toward the ceiling. Flicking the lighter open, she struck the flint a few times until a flame appeared and then stuck her hand inside the overturned bucket so that the flame was encased inside it; flickering and lapping at the base.

"Thank you," Rick muttered quietly.

Jo simply nodded as they waited for the bottom to heat up.

Every few moments Rick would take his free hand and tap his fingers to the bottom, to test how hot it was getting. He could see Jo wincing, knowing holding her grip on the lighter was starting to hurt her fingers and the heat emanating inside the bucket was also less than ideal, but she was a trooper and soldiered on for the sake of the life of one of her new friends.

Shouting from unknown voices alerted everyone suddenly.

"Who's that?" Sophia questioned nervously.

"Prisoners," Shane replied.

"Survivors," Rick clarified, a little more sympathetic in his tone. He took a few steps back, causing Jo to have to follow, as he looked at the group huddled anxiously around Maggie or just outside the cell. "It's alright. Everybody just stay put." Looking at Shane, he nodded his oldest friend over to take the bucket from him.

Carefully, the transfer was made and Jo was now standing in front of Shane while Rick walked off, pulling his gun out of its holster and stepping out into the communal area to see to _that_ developing situation.

"How's that cautery coming along?" Hershel called out.

Shane tapped his fingers on the bottom of the bucked and swore under his breath. "It's pretty fuckin' hot."

"Give it a few more moments," Jo advised him. "See if it turns red."

"Your hand's gotta feel like it's on fire," he quipped.

"I've felt worse."

With a respective nod, Shane accepted her remark and said nothing else; just occasionally tapping the bottom until a red glow began to show up in the center of the metal base.

"About damn time," Shane muttered.

Whipping the bucket off Jo's hand, he darted with it into Maggie and Glenn's cell, shoving a few people unceremoniously out of his way. Jo dropped the lighter to the ground. Shane's abrupt gesture caused her hand to hit the inside of the bucket, which briefly scalded her knuckles. While she moved to pick the lighter back up, Shane was lifting up what was left of Maggie's left arm and pressing the center of the bucket's base against her stump.

The searing heat brought the young brunette out of unconsciousness and she screamed from the pain. As her wound blistered, the overwhelming pain of it all made Maggie faint.

"Is she dead?" Sophia wondered.

Carol held her daughter close and shook her head. "No, honey. She just passed out."

"Is she gonna be okay?"

"Of course she is," Lori insisted from where she was crouching down between Shane and Hershel.

There wasn't anything else Jo felt like she could do at the moment, so she wandered over to the stairs and sat down. Andrea seemed to have the same idea and joined her, both blondes side by side on the same metal step, looking toward the communal area where Rick was talking down those prisoners he mentioned were the survivors.

_"…There's no government, no hospitals, no police. It's all gone."_

Andrea looked at Jo and gave her stomach a brief rub. "It'll be nice to have a baby around," she commented, trying to take their minds off…everything.

Jo smiled and looked down at Andrea's hand. "It'll be interesting, that's for sure."

"Are you nervous at all?" Placing her hand back in her own lap, the older blonde turned her body slightly so that she was more facing Jo.

"Of course I am. I wonder every day if my baby will even survive birth, or if _I_ will. I mean, how many women survived before modern medicine? I haven't had actual prenatal care and the stress I've felt can't have been good." With a sigh, Jo looked at Andrea. "Can I ask you a favor?"

"Sure."

"If I die giving birth, will you put me down so I don't try to attack my child if it survives?"

Andrea paused at such a request, but then she nodded. "Yes."

"And if my child dies…"

"Oh god, don't even think that."

"If my child dies," she repeated. "Put it down, too. I won't be able to do it myself and I don't want to see it turn. Or if both of us die…"

"You gotta think more positively. You should be asking things like, 'if my child and I survive, will you help me change its diapers or go on a supply run to find baby formula when I'm too tired to nurse in the middle of the night?' Shit like that," Andrea teased.

"Andrea."

Andrea sighed. "Alright, yes. I will or I'm sure anyone else will, too, if you ask them."

Jo shrugged doubtfully. "Lori and Carol are mothers, or…Lori was. I think they'd hesitate in doing what would have to be done. I feel like you can. I've watched you these last two days. You're thicker skinned." Gesturing toward Maggie and Glenn's cell, she added, "Herhsel's gonna be the one delivering my baby when the time comes, but he'll need a midwife with him I'm sure. I'd like you to be there, if you don't mind."

A smile appearing on Andrea's lips, she nodded. "I'd be glad to, if only to be there to tell you 'I told you so' when both you and your baby survive and are both happy and healthy."

Nodding, Jo smiled as well. "Thanks." Turning back to look over at the others who were still huddled around Maggie and Glenn's cell, her smile faded into a frown. "I hope Maggie survives."

"She's a fighter. I'm sure she'll pull through," Andrea insisted.

Carol stepped out of the cell then, with Sophia heading off to their shared cell by way of the second set of stairs directly behind the set the two blondes were sitting on. Carol was holding the metal bucket in her hand and the pillowcase, having taken it from Shane, and was wiping Maggie's blood off the bottom. She disappeared into another cell and the sound of weak stream of water trickled out. About a minute or less later, Carol reappeared with the bucket filled with some water with the obvious plans of using it and the pillowcase to clean up Maggie's cauterized stump.

Glenn stepped out of the cell next, followed by Lori; the latter heading upstairs to her own cell as well. Glenn, however, walked straight up to Andrea and Jo, wearing his riot gear and his girlfriend's blood all over his arms and smudged on the side of his face where he must've had an itch to scratch.

"Thank you for helping," he said to Jo. Without waiting for her to reply, Glenn walked back into his cell, looking both worried and dazed.

"You know how to do what needs to be done, too," Andrea remarked with a smirk. "You could probably be your _own_ midwife."

 

* * *

 

A while later, Rick and T-Dog returned with arms full of boxes and bags.

"Food's here," T-Dog announced.

"What you got?" Shane asked, walking over to take one of the boxes from the larger man.

"Canned beef, canned corn, canned cans. There's a lot more where this came from."

Andrea locked the cell block door behind them but kept a lookout, possibly wondering where Daryl was, while Rick walked over to Glenn.

"Any change?"

"The wound's been cauterized and the bleeding is under control," Hershel answered instead. "There's no fever but her breath is labored, her pulse is way down and she hasn't opened her eyes yet." The old man looked sad and tired, which was more than understandable. No parent wanted to see their child in such a way.

"Take the cuffs, put them on her." Rick gestured to the same cuffs he had taken off Jo the day before which were still hooked to his belt.

"She has no fever, Rick," Hershel reiterated, almost as if taking offense.

"I'm sorry, but I'm not taking any chances. I know you don't want to hear it, but Maggie could still get a fever and if she dies and turns, we can't risk the possibility of causalities she could create."

"So, uh, Rick…what about those prisoners?" Dale asked.

"We're gonna help them clear out their own cell block, and then they'll be there and we'll be here — living beside each other," he informed; his eyes ruefully following Hershel into Maggie and Glenn's cell. "I'm not giving up this prison."

"Do they have guns?" Andrea wondered, looking over the railing from up above where she now stood.

Rick looked up at her and tilted his head slightly. "I only saw one."

Shane stepped forward and rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah, I don't think coexisting with a group of men who were bad guys _before_ the apocalypse is gonna work out so well."

"Well, what are our options?" Rick turned around to face the other man.

"Kill 'em," Shane replied without missing a beat.

"Is that your answer? Just 'kill 'em'?"

"If it keeps our people safe, you best believe that's my answer."

Lori, who was standing nearby, and having heard the conversation, spoke up. "Rick, I know there isn't malice in your heart. You're not a killer, but if we gotta choose between us and them I don't think any of us would blame you for doing what needs to be done. So do whatever you gotta do to keep this group safe and do it with a clear conscience."

Rick just stared back at his ex with an expression that wasn't very readable. He didn't say anything in response to her. He just stepped away, peering briefly into Glenn and Maggie's cell to see her right arm was cuffed to the bunk. Walking over toward Jo's cell, he saw her standing at her little sink with her back to him.

"Should be able to find you an extra pair of prison overalls to wear," he commented.

Jo turned around casually, as if she had already sensed he was there. "Oh?"

He smirked. "That T-shirt and skirt have seen better days. Plus, the elastic from the waistband can't be comfortable on your stomach."

Smirking, Jo lifted the bottom of the shirt a little to reveal her bare belly. "That's why I've been wearing it lower on my hips."

"Still yet…"

"I'd be grateful for whatever you find that I can fit into."

Patting the side of her cell door and giving a nod of his head to her, Rick stepped away and then gestured to T-Dog and Shane to follow him out into the communal area. As the three men exited the cell block, Jo caught Shane's curious eye before he disappeared from sight.

After almost two hours away, the three men, along with Daryl returned to C Block where they were informed Maggie had come to and was showing signs of getting much better, which was a welcomed relief for all.

Holding his bloodstained machete at his side and with a dark, grey bit of fabric draped over his opposite arm, Rick approached Jo who was still in her cell, but this time lying on her side, holding her stomach and staring at the wall.

"I didn't ask before, but how's your hand?" he inquired, taking a step into the cell and leaning against the same wall which had her attention.

Lifting her eyes to him, Jo flashed a little half smile at him and then splayed the fingers of her right hand out. "It's fine."

"You didn't get burned heating up the bucket at all?"

"Maybe just a little scalded, but I'm fine."

Rick looked down and sheathed his machete, with Jo taking note of the condition it was in, before he extended his opposite hand out to her and offered her the grey fabric. "Here."

"What is it?" she asked, sitting up.

"Found a jumpsuit that should fit. Oh, and these." Putting his hand behind his back he pulled out a pair of flip flops that had been tucked into the back of his pants. "They might be a size or two too big. I'm pretty sure they were meant for the men who were prisoners here to wear into the showers."

Jo chuckled. "Apocalypse haute couture at its finest," she said, gladly accepting the jumpsuit and flip flops. Gesturing to him, she added, "Dare I ask how the other guy looks?"

Rick followed her gaze, taking in the sight of his arms and the front of his shirt which were splattered in fresh blood. "Yeah, there was an incident with a few of the prisoners."

"How many were there?" she asked, understanding that 'incident' meant some of them died.

"Five."

"How many are there _now_?"

"Two."

"Walkers?"

Rick tilted his head, prepared to avoid a direct answer. Casting his blue eyes upon Jo, however, he felt the need not to. "One of 'em got bit and was killed by his own. The latter was too much of a risk; reckless, a threat to the rest of us. I had to kill him." He looked down toward the floor, subconsciously palming the handle of his machete. "The third, he wasn't as bad, but I couldn't trust him. He ran off, I chased after him and then locked him outside with a bunch of walkers; told him to make a run for it. I assume he's dead. And if not, he will be soon enough. Him against all them?" He shook his head. The question was rhetorical. "I did what I had to do."

Jo watched how he looked back at her, almost sheepishly. "If you're expecting me to chide you for what you did, you'll find yourself to be sorely disappointed." Setting the jumpsuit beside her on the bed, she dropped the flip flops to the floor and slipped her bare feet into them. With a grin, she lifted both feet up and gave them a wiggle. "How can I think less of someone who finds me such terribly over-sized and impractical footwear?"

Rick nodded, lifting himself up off the wall, and smirked. "Well, at least now you won't cut your foot or anything."

"And as long as I don't need to run anytime soon because these babies will surely fly off with little effort." Looking from her feet up to Rick, Jo smiled. "Thanks again. For everything."

"You're welcome," he replied, making to exit her cell. "For everything."

 

* * *

 

That night, Rick and T-Dog had finished bringing in the rest of the food from the Cafeteria they had split between the prisoners. Although, with there being only two prisoners left, Rick felt it fair that his group get more because they had more mouths to feed. He checked on Maggie a few times; who was awake and uncuffed from her bunk now that there was no risk of her turning. Glenn wouldn't leave her side and Hershel rarely did either; the latter redressing the wound a few times as the night progressed. Maggie cried a few times as well, trying to come to terms with the loss of her appendage, and claiming it felt like her entire arm was still there. But she was okay. She had survived this obstacle. In time she would get stronger and find a way to adapt to this permanent, physical change.

Andrea, T-Dog, Dale, Carol and Sophia had all gone to their cells by nightfall to get some sleep, as did Shane and Lori, which would always feel weird for Rick. He doubted he'd ever get used to the pair being together so intimately in his presence, no matter how much he considered himself over Lori. There were no divorce lawyers anymore, so it's not as if legal documents could be drawn up to file a divorce. So, in that sense, they would technically be married for as long as they lived. They just had to go on with the feeling in their hearts and in their minds that they would not and could not consider themselves each other's spouses anymore.

Standing inside his own cell, washing the dried blood off his hands and arms in his little sink, Rick let out a sigh of exhaustion; equal parts mental and physical.

It had been an eventful day, but they were all alive and had food; so it was a good day.

Wringing his hands at his sides after her turned off the tap, he let his arms mostly air dry. Some of the remaining water on his skin he wiped off on the back of his pants as he walked out of his cell. He looked around; watching a few of his group aimlessly walking about in their own cells to get settled in for the night. The night before, Daryl had pulled one of the extra mattresses out and set it down on the perch where he chose to sleep rather than in a cell, and that's where the archer was now, lying on his back with his knees bent as he stared up at the ceiling.

Rick could tell the other man was still just as awake as he was.

In what was becoming a habit, he ducked his head into Jo's cell to check on her, but found the small room empty. Stepping back against the cell block's opposite wall, Rick stared up at the upper level, wondering if she had gone up there to chat with one of the others, because he hadn't noticed her in any of the other cells down below.

Nothing.

Casting a glance through the open, barred door that led into the communal area, Rick stepped out into it and continued to look around. She wasn't there either, sitting at a table like the night before. With a quickened pace he went over to the barred door at the other end of the room and checked it. It was locked, which meant Jo couldn't have gone that way.

Rick began to get a little worried and darted up the stairs that led outside to the courtyard. He had to go through the outer, gated stairs first and when he stepped out into the night air and looked around; his breathing became uneven.

She could be anywhere if she came out this way.

What if she went for a walk into the yard and was found by that man, The Governor, and he took her while Rick and the group were distracted with settling in for the night?

What if she'd been attacked by a walker?

What if—

"Psst," came a voice from up above.

His eyes scanning upward in the dark, Rick's eyesight adjusted to the figure standing on the bridge between cell blocks and he breathed a sigh of relief.

Backtracking back inside C Block, he locked the door behind him with his set of keys he had since gotten back from Andrea. He then ascended the stairs in the communal area to the slight catwalk and opened the door up there that led out onto the bridge, wondering why he hadn't thought to check it first before heading outside the other way.

"You gave me a scare," Rick said, looking upon Jo who held onto the chain-link fencing that encased the entire bridge.

She dropped one hand and turned to face him with a guilty smile. "Sorry. I didn't mean to."

With a nod, he stuck the fingers of his right hand through the links in the fencing as well before sizing her up. "I see you changed."

She was standing there, no longer wearing her skirt, but the grey, prison jumpsuit. She hadn't bothered to zip it up the entire way, instead letting the top half hang off so she could tie the sleeves around her hips, just under her stomach while still wearing her T-shirt, though with her stomach sticking out.

"It's very comfortable."

He looked down at her feet, which were bare again. "No flip flops?"

"They were too big. I tripped in them trying to walk."

"You alright?" he asked, growing concerned as he reached his left hand out to rest upon her shoulder.

"Yeah, I'm fine. It wasn't a major trip. Just a skip in my step, really. I didn't fall into anything."

Bowing his head, Rick pulled his hand away and dropped it back to his side. "Hopefully we can go on a run soon and we can find some proper shoes for you," he said. "We're gonna have to anyway. We're gonna need diapers, baby clothes, bottles and formula for when you can't, you know…"

He gestured to her chest, and even in the darkness, Jo could sense his awkwardness and the tinge of pink that was forming at his cheeks.

"Breastfeeding?" she questioned with a chuckle.

He smirked at his own awkwardness. "Yeah," he nodded. "You won't be able to do it forever, and we'll need those other supplies until your child can eat solids." Rick shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe we'll find a crib, too, or some toys to keep him or her occupied."

"That would be nice."

The pair of them looked out at the yard before them and beyond that to the trees. It was dark out, but not because there was no moon in the night sky to provide the world with some light, but because of so much dark cloud coverage.

"It's gonna rain," Jo continued. She sniffed at the air. "You can smell it."

"Really? 'Cause all I smell are the walkers rotting in that inner courtyard over there," he gestured behind them. "And myself."

Jo chuckled again. "Maybe you'll find soap for us, too."

"That would be nice."

A faint rumble of thunder in the distance alerted their senses, which was followed by a few little drops of water falling down upon them. They both looked up at the dark, cloudy sky at the same time before bringing their gazes back to each other.

"Or we could just stand here and let Mother Nature wash all the grime away," Jo quipped.

"Thunder, lightning and we're holding onto a metal fence; maybe not the best idea unless you call electrocution a good time."

Her smile becoming brighter, Jo nodded her head at Rick. "Yeah, maybe not."

Standing off to the side, Rick gestured for her to head back inside first. He followed in after her and shut the door quietly, though the creaking of the metal door still echoed throughout the entire cell block. Walking down the stairs, together, Rick gestured to the communal area.

"You up for another round or two of Gin Rummy tonight?" he inquired.

"You up to get your ass kicked both times?"

He snickered. "We'll see about that."

Jo went ahead and took a seat at one of the tables while Rick disappeared to get his deck of cards. She didn't have to wait long because he came sauntering back into the communal area not even a minute later. She couldn't help but smirk at how bow-legged he was. It was rather amusing and she was tempted to ask where the horse was, but decided it was a lame conversation piece.

Sitting down across from her, Rick opened the package and pulled the deck out before shuffling it a few times. As he doled out cards for the two of them, he looked at Jo and seemed a little serious.

"We're gonna start cleaning up the courtyard tomorrow."

"That's good."

"There's that basketball hoop out there, too," he commented. "It'd be nice to find an actual basketball. It'll give the guys something to do when we have downtime. Maybe even Sophia, too."

"I'm sure she'd have fun with that."

As they began their first game, Rick looked back up at Jo. "Can I ask you a favor?"

Jo locked up briefly and nodded. "Yeah."

"When you go outside, could you stay close to the buildings? Don't go out into the yard unless someone else is there."

Jo narrowed her gaze as she held eye contact with him. "Don't trust me to keep myself safe?" Her tone was one of half amusement and half offense. She wasn't sure how to take his request.

"It's not you keeping yourself safe that worries me. I'm certain you can handle your own. The fact that you've survived this long proves that," he assured, setting his cards face down for the moment. Resting his elbows on the table, he rubbed his palms together. "What I'm worried about is outside that fence; everything we're trying to keep out. Not just walkers." Rick dropped his hands to the table. "You know better than anyone that the dead aren't the only thing we have to fear anymore. The living are just as dangerous. I've looked at our map. Where this prison is compared to where Woodbury is…it's not all that far. Not even a half hour's drive. If The Governor came upon this place and you were outside walking around with no one else…"

Jo's lips pursed together and she looked down at the cards in her hands. She was going to attempt to say something in response but he continued after a moment.

"I just don't wanna see you get hurt or killed, least of all by a man like that. We all care about what happens to you. _I_ care. I just don't want him to find you, take you away from us and do anything terrible to you or your baby," he spoke in a way that made her heart swell a little by the kindness of his words. "You're part of this family now and I refuse to lose anyone in it. So, if you can just do me that favor, and stay close…"

Nodding slowly, Jo consented. "You don't have to ask me twice."

He smiled gratefully back at her as he picked his cards back up. "Thanks," he remarked; a flicker of something unspoken in his eyes.


	10. Labor

_"Each friend represents a world in us, a world not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born."_  — Anais Nin

* * *

  
In the days following, Rick and the others began the process of cleaning up the courtyard and disposing of the dead walkers with multiple bonfires, the latter of which being no picnic. There were quite a lot of bodies and the stench of burning, rotting flesh was more than a little nauseating. The scarves wrapped around their faces to prevent having to breathe in that smell and that smoke only went so far. But, in the end, they got through it and moved on to the next task of bringing their vehicles up through each gate, up the yard, and into the courtyard for easier access for when they began going on runs or if they needed to bail in a hurry.

Maggie was getting better. She had color in her face again, but she had a tough road ahead of her to get used to doing things with only her right hand. She was just fortunate that she was already right-handed and didn't have to relearn how to do everything with her left, had she lost her right hand instead, like Merle; something of which brought an idea to Jo. Having seen firsthand and up close the contraption on the older Dixon brother's right arm, Jo had suggested something similar be somehow created for Maggie.

She was going to have a difficult time of trying to protect herself from here on out with only one hand, but a cap over her left stump with some sort of blade attached, like one of the extra machetes. Jo didn't know how something like that could be put together, but someone should be able to figure it out. If anything, at least it was a suggestion. No one else seemed to be offering up anything other than telling Maggie she would be fine and they would help her. There were talks of finding her a prosthetic arm, but how would that help her protect herself? A prosthetic arm would mostly be for show and it wouldn't even be properly fitted to her. It could end up doing more hurt than good. Jo was trying to think of the long run, in keeping Maggie alive if she was cornered and by herself, not about the vanity the younger woman might possibly be feeling over having one less arm.

When Jo had expressed as much, Lori had snipped at her, and Shane got on the defensive, acting more like Lori's personal watch dog rather than her lover, as he claimed they had Maggie's well-being covered and not to "worry her pretty little head" about it.

Pissed, because she was only trying to offer up practical suggestions and commentary about the situation, just to be shot down so flippantly by the pair, Jo stormed out of C Block. She wandered out through the communal area and out the door to the enter the courtyard, which was fine, because Rick, T-Dog, Andrea and Daryl were out there, cleaning up a bit more, and Jo had agreed to go along with Rick's favor of her not going out there alone.

She stood off to the side, finding a metal crate to sit down on while she watched the others moving about, wishing like hell that she could do more to help. She had attempted to do even just the minimal amount of physical labor that she knew she could handle without any strain to her body, but Daryl had swooped in and taken it over for her when he spotted whatever she was doing. He even joked with her to kick back and relax.

"All I need is a rocking chair and some sweet tea and then maybe I could," she had responded.

"Sweet tea sure as hell sounds great right about now," Daryl agreed.

Even though she was more or less banned from physical work around the courtyard or inside the prison, she did what she could in preparing food for everyone with the double induction cooktop they found stored in the cafeteria that the prisoners might've used at some point. It was a blessing because now they could heat up some food without the need for electricity or gas; the cooktop heated food by way of magnetic coils inside. Even though their cuisine was very limited, it was just a nice change of pace to be able to have warm food that wasn't prepared over a fire.

In regard to the courtyard again, it always seemed like there was someone outside at all times. Rick was still a bit concerned with the possibility of The Governor finding his way to the prison and coming after Jo, and possibly the group, although he didn't really voice that concern. Instead, he made the excuse that there should always be someone on watch in case of an "outside threat" or if a herd of walkers happened upon the fences. There were plenty of them to take different shifts, and whoever was on guard duty at the time would alert the group by banging a frying pan taken from the kitchen against the railing of the inner guard tower where watch took place. The frying pan seemed a little ridiculous, but the sound it generated could be heard from inside C Block if the others were asleep in their cells.

A few times over the first couple of weeks in the prison, Daryl, who had a tracker's eye, swore he saw someone lurking around the woods. When he was on watch, he had his crossbow with him, but he also had a rifle with a scope on it. Whenever he thought he swore he saw someone that wasn't a walker lurking around the outskirts of the woods, he grabbed the rifle and peered through the scope, but by the time his eyes adjusted, whatever had been there was gone; having slipped back into the woods, or maybe was never really there at all. Maybe it was the darkness of night playing tricks on his mind.

When Rick was informed about these gut feelings Daryl was having, he had the archer come with him on a trek outside the prison grounds to slip into the woods and see if there was anything or anyone to be found. Footsteps were indeed found, and they seemed to be all over the place, but Daryl assured Rick they were from one person and not multiples. However, this person in question couldn't be found; only the remnants of a deer and a nearby fire that had been put out the night before.

This was enough to validate Rick's concerns, of which he eventually admitted to Daryl, which got Daryl going again about wanting to go to Woodbury to find his brother.

Rick shot the idea down.

Jo had been present when that interaction happened.

Well, not completely present. She had been up in the bridge over the courtyard, getting some fresh air when Daryl and Rick had been reentering from the yard and overheard them talking. And it wasn't like she was eavesdropping or anything. Had they been paying attention, they would've seen her standing up there, with her stomach even more noticeable than when they first arrived to the prison, and also their voices carried and echoed off the buildings.

"We've been here three weeks, and it's been about a month since Jo and Sophia got away from that place, since your brother helped them," Rick had been saying. "If your brother _had_ escaped, I'm sure he would've tracked them down and possibly been able to find them here as well. But if he never got out, we can assume he's still alive and well, or he's dead; which, in that case, there ain't nothing we can do for him."

Daryl scoffed and threw his hands up in the air. "You shittin' me right now?" He turned back, getting up in Rick's face. "That Governor kept Jo locked up like a gerbil in some basement. Who's to say that bastard ain't done the same thing to Merle?"

Rick placed his hands on his hips and looked down at the ground. "I suppose that's an option, too."

"You said we'd go to Woodbury, that we'd find Merle. Were you just lyin' to me?" Daryl smacked his lips. "I could've been there and back by now."

"Or you could've been caught for snoopin' around and shot dead."

Daryl snickered. "Un-fucking-likely." He jabbed himself in the chest to make a point. "I know how to get around unseen and unheard. I've done it all my life."

Rick sighed. "I wasn't lying about going to Woodbury. Eventually, we'll get there. Now's just not the time yet," he insisted. "We're still trying to get this place settled, and we—"

"We have more weapons now; we got enough people to take on a scouting mission to that place. We could do it, Rick."

The leader shook his head. "What if something happens here while we're away? If we bring all our muscle with us — that's you, me, Shane, T-Dog, possibly Glenn, and Andrea can hold her own — that leaves the rest exposed. Sure, they know how to handle weapons; they know how to kill walkers, but the living? We can't risk bringing a fight back here. They all got something going against them right now. Dale and Hershel ain't exactly spring chickens, and we can't risk Hershel because he's the closest thing we have to a regular doctor. Carol's first priority will be to protect Sophia before anyone else. Lori…" Rick shrugged. "She can go either way, if we're being honest. Maggie's still recovering and in no position to fight anything or anyone off just yet. Sophia is obviously just a child, and Jo's about to pop in a month's time."

Jo perked at the mention of her name.

"We need more people, we need more time." Rick held his hand out and placed it on Daryl's shoulder. "I said we'd get to Woodbury, eventually, and that when we do it can't be half-cocked. We'll need to know how to get there, the ins and outs, the weak spots and strong points, who's on watch and when, how many people we'd be up against. There's too much standing in our way right now and I know that might not sound ideal to you, and I understand you need to find your brother, whether he's still alive or not. I get that, I do. But we still need to just settle in here." Rick gestured wide at the prison, looking off to his right, and that's when he finally noticed Jo standing on the bridge and his train of thought momentarily went off track. He paused for a moment, holding her gaze and watching as she shyly waved her fingers at him, before returning said gaze to Daryl. "Where was I?"

"You were saying we're too busy playing house in this prison to care if my flesh and blood is still alive," Daryl retorted. "I _get_ it."

The archer stormed off, heading inside to C Block.

When he was gone, Rick looked back upward toward Jo and slowly walked over to the bridge until he was almost standing underneath it. Squinting from the sunlight, he held his hand over his eyes.

"Did you hear all that?"

"Pretty much, yeah."

Rick looked down, placing his hands on his hips once more. "Am I wrong?" he asked, referring to everything he'd just said to Daryl. "I just don't think we're at that place yet where we can go balls to the wall against an actual town."

"You're not wrong," she confirmed, looking down at him as her fingers curled around the chain-link. "From what I got to know of Merle, he's a tough sonofabitch and if anyone tried to fight him or even kill him, I'm sure he went down swinging and took a few people with him. I don't think he's the type to let himself get locked up like I did. He's either still there and he's bidding his time, or he changed his mind and chose to stay of his own volition. I don't think he's dead and I don't think he left, because if he had left, and if he really is an amazing tracker, he'd have found us by now. I'm sure of it."

Rick nodded his head, looking back up at her again. "That's what I'm thinking, too."

Jo smirked. "Great minds think alike?"

He chuckled slightly. "Yeah, I guess so."

By the end of the next week, the group had been at the prison a full month with little to no incident, other than walkers they found that had slipped into the yard through a faulty section of fence, which Rick and Shane had been able to fix over the course of a day, and a few heated arguments here and there among the group and with the two remaining prisoners who were having a difficult time cleaning out Cell Block D, where Rick told them they could live as long as they kept their distance from everyone else.

The prisoners' names were Axel and Oscar, and Jo almost thought it was kismet. With her husband's name also having been Oscar and the fact that the group did need more manpower if the plan to eventually go to Woodbury ever saw the light of day.

Within that first month in the prison with the group, Jo had finally felt like she was part of their family and not just an interloper. She felt at ease to wander around, strike up conversations and open up about herself a little more. Her friendship with Andrea grew, but the initial friendship that had been budding with Lori seemed to come to an impasse. It was not for the sake of trying, either. Jo didn't understand why Lori had cooled off toward her in the last week or so until Andrea had explained in confidence that she believed Lori harbored a jealousy against Jo because of how friendly Jo had become with Rick.

It was true that Rick and Jo had become friends, spending most nights playing card games in the communal area after everyone had retired to their cells. Sometimes they just sat up to talk or walk around the courtyard together; talking about the plans and ideas Rick had for the prison and the group's future there. And Jo had grown to enjoy their talks and his ideas. He even listened intently as she offered up suggestions, too. It was much different than when she had been talking about the future of Woodbury with The Governor. She was fairly certain anything she had said to that man had fallen on deaf ears. She knew now he probably never gave a shit about the school and was only eyeing her up for personal reasons. With Rick, though, she didn't feel uncomfortable and she knew he cared about what she said. Everything he had promised he would try and do, with the exception of going to Woodbury just yet, he had followed through on.

He and a few others had taken a brief run a few days before to gather up more food and some new clothes for everyone to wear. They'd even found a cache of baby supplies at an abandoned daycare. Among the clothing items was a pair of maternity jeans Rick had discovered for Jo to wear, as well as a pair of lace up boots that were her size.

Jo was so grateful for it all, that she had thrown her arms around Rick's shoulders and hugged him tight. She even began to cry happy tears at receiving these simple things — mostly because her pregnancy hormones were at an all-time high. Rick had hugged her back, wrapping his arms around her back because, with her stomach, it was near impossible get his arms around her waist.

That might've been the moment Lori's feelings toward Jo changed. She had been present when that hug happened. Everyone was. Rick and the others he'd gone off with had brought everything they found inside the prison to the communal area for everyone to sort through and collect or store away for later.

Jo couldn't understand what Lori had to be jealous of. There was nothing going on between her and Rick. They were merely good friends, but even if there was, who was Lori to get jealous in the first place? She wasn't with Rick anymore and hadn't been for more than half a year, nearly almost a full year. She had chosen Shane over Rick when her marriage to the latter no longer felt worth saving. She'd made her choice and stuck to it.

But, whatever. Jo wasn't going to be bogged down by some petty, unwarranted jealousy. She chose to go about her days looking on the upside as best as she could and if Rick happened to join her wherever she happened to be and spend his downtime with her, she wasn't going to push him away because his ex was giving her stank eye all of the sudden.

This wasn't high school anymore. This was a post-apocalyptic world.

About two days into their first full month, Rick had approached Jo in her cell asking to finally take her to the infirmary to show her how it looked all cleaned up. She had previously been to it three weeks earlier after Rick and a few others had taken care of the walker situation and secured the area. It had been a complete mess; dark, dusty, and the air was stale from the doors having been kept locked up tight and there no air circulation inside the room.

She could only imagine what it looked like now. She knew Carol and Hershel had taken the reins in bringing the infirmary up to snuff so Jo had high hopes it would look wonderful.

With her lower back aching more than usual, Jo spotted Maggie on the way out of her cell, up and around, talking with Glenn. The younger woman smiled at Jo and waved with her right hand. She didn't have anything attached to her amputated left limb yet, but she had been healing remarkably well and was starting to get the hang of doing things with just one hand.

"I don't feel bad that I cut her arm off. I feel bad that I _had_ to," Rick had said to Jo in the previous weeks. "I didn't think. I couldn't. It happened so quickly. We got her into the cafeteria and laid her down. I didn't even have time to tie my belt around her arm before I cut it off. She got bit just below her elbow and that walker took a bad chunk out. I had to cut the arm off higher because I didn't know how quickly the infection might've spread."

"You did the right thing," Jo had assured him. "It was either her arm or her life."

"That's pretty much what I said." He had looked at Jo then, appreciating that she understood his thought process.

That conversation had happened during Jo's first trip to the infirmary and now she was headed on her second.

Stepping out of C Block and into the communal area, the pair spotted Shane and Lori seated at one of the tables, finishing up some soup and, as usual, Lori didn't seem so happy to see Jo anymore, but Jo just didn't care. She was still polite. She still smiled a little hello, which Lori reciprocated as not to draw attention to herself and her unspoken issue.

"I'm gonna go take Jo to see the infirmary," Rick informed. "You got a handle on things here?"

Shane nodded, standing up. "Yeah, we're fine here. Ain't nothin' gonna go down we can't handle."

With a nod, Rick accepted this answer and patted Shane on the shoulder.

And that was something else that had changed.

Ever since Rick's friendship with Jo had blossomed, his anger over Shane and Lori seemed to dissipate a little more each day. Being resentful of them just didn't seem worth his time and effort anymore.

Placing a hand upon the small of Jo's back, he led her out of the communal area and through the barred door at the opposite end of the room. They were quiet for part of the trip through the dark corridors, but Rick was armed with a flashlight, as well as his gun and his machete because it was better to be safe than sorry. There were white arrows spray-painted on the walls that had been put there by Glenn on their first run through, the day Maggie lost her arm, as a way of helping direct them back to their block of the prison. The corridors seemed a bit cleaner as well. There were no more dead bodies strewn here and there, and most forms of bodily secretions seemed gone, too.

Reaching the double doors to the infirmary, Rick opened one of them and let Jo in first.

"Ooh, wow, it really does look nice in here," she commented, holding both her hands at the sides her stomach. "I mean, I could eat off these floors."

Rick chuckled. "Well, I would hope you wouldn't want to."

Without bothering to turn back to look at him, she lifted her hands away from herself and ran her fingers along the countertop on the far wall. "I ate off a floor for six months. This room is a definite step up."

Standing back and watching her, he wondered how she had the strength to put what happened to her during the bulk of her pregnancy behind her. The conditions she was left to while away in, the fear she must've faced and whatever else it was The Governor had put her through that she still refused to talk about — it angered him on her behalf. Rick could, more or less, figure some things out. He could safely assume the specifics and the thought of it all practically made the blood in his veins boil. But there she was now, walking around the infirmary with a smile in her eyes. It made Rick forget for a little while that this was a prison they were living in and that the world outside was a shell of what it used to be and, more importantly, that the dead walked.

Jo stopped her pacing around, taking in every detail, and placed one hand back on her stomach. She turned her face away from Rick and hunched forward for a few moments. Exhaling a breath, she straightened her posture.

He tilted his head and took a step closer to her. "You alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," she replied, throwing a brief look over her shoulder at him.

As she walked around one of the examination beds off to the side, she placed her hands on top of the firm mattress top and stared off into space while her fingers began to curl and dig into the material.

Rick wasn't convinced.

"You're not looking fine." He walked up to her side and placed a hand on her shoulder. "You got a month to go still. Maybe you shouldn't be walking around so much. Maybe you should be on bedrest or something. I had a cousin who spent the last three months of her pregnancy on bedrest. She hated it, but it was necessary."

"I feel like all I do is sit or lay around," Jo remarked, lifting her eyes to his face. "I want to be able to help out more. I wanted to be able to help clean up the place, to do my part, but you banned me from manual labor like I'm an invalid. Even Maggie's been able to start helping out again and she's down an arm."

"It's for your own good, you know. Manual labor isn't what your body needs to be going through right now." Rick watched her face; the way she was biting her lips very tightly together and how her brow was furrowing. His eyes wandered back down to her hands which were white knuckling the edge of the examination bed. Her entire body seemed suddenly rigid. "See, you say you're fine, but you look like someone just punched you in the back."

Releasing a shaky breath, Jo tried to laugh. "It's so ironic."

"What is?"

"You telling me manual labor isn't what my body needs right now, but that's exactly what it's going through."

"Wait—what?"

"I thought, like an idiot, that if I ignored it, it would go away." She looked down at the bed and arched her back. "It just keeps coming back, worse than the previous times."

"Contractions?" Rick reached out and took Jo's hands in his, turning her to face him. "Jo, are you in labor right now?"

She nodded, looking as if she was embarrassed by the fact. She opened her mouth to verbally respond but her voice was swallowed up by the searing pain between her legs and around her lower back. The tiniest mewl escaped her throat and her legs buckled slightly.

"Why didn't you say something earlier?" he continued to ask, just as her fingers began to dig into his hands. He winced from the pain she was inflicting on him as a result of the much worse pain that she was experiencing.

"I didn't want to bother anyone. And I'm early," she admitted, tears beginning to sting her eyes. "I still have three or four more weeks to go. I can't give birth now. How will my baby survive being born premature?"

"We'll go get Hershel and he can take care of this."

As Rick began to lead Jo away from the bed, holding one of her hands in his, he used the other to open the door but the second he stepped out into the corridor. He began to lead her in the direction that continued on toward the Tombs or turned right and returned them toward C Block. They didn't get to make that right turn though when they were cut off by a large group of walkers that had found their way out of the Tombs.

"Shit!" he hissed.

"What?" Jo wondered, holding her stomach. She noticed exactly what a moment later.

Having been noticed by the ambling, hungry corpses and not wanting to risk Jo's safety, Rick instinctively ushered her behind him with both hands so that her body was blocked by his. Then, quickly, he turned around to lead her back toward the infirmary.

Once the doors were closed shut behind them, he leaned back against them so they wouldn't open and let the walkers spill in. "Shit, shit, shit," he muttered, looking around the room for something to keep the door closed since it only locked from the outside. Pointing over to the counter on the far wall he said, "Grab that stethoscope."

Waddling as quickly as possible through her contractions, Jo picked up the stethoscope and then waddled over to Rick, but had to toss them the rest of the way when a sharp and ugly contraction ripped through her cervix. He looked worriedly at her as he caught the stethoscope and struggled to keep his back against the doors which were beginning to be pushed in a little by the walkers out in the corridor. His feet were slipping on the smooth surface of the floor and he hated himself for having to suggest it, but he was out of options. He needed help.

"I know it's hard, Jo, and the pain is hurting, but I need you to help me keep these doors pushed closed while I tie these things around the door handles."

Lifting her head, Jo bit back on the pain as best as she could and waddled once more over to him. Outstretching her arms, she pressed them against one door while Rick managed the other while at the same time looping the stethoscope in and around the door handles.

"This better hold." Stepping back a little, he looked the doors up and down, and while they budged slightly, they stethoscope didn't give. However, there was no way of knowing just how long they would last for, so he needed a backup plan and went with grabbing the one chair in the infirmary and dragging it over. Propping the back underneath the handles, he was satisfied enough. "There."

Rick and Jo looked at each other with short-lived relief from the walkers when gunshots being fired echoed off the walls of the buildings outside.

"Shit, no," Rick cried out.

He was stuck behind a rock and a hard place. He had no idea what the gunfire was about and couldn't leave to go find out, and he also couldn't leave Jo while she was in labor. There was more of the group, hopefully safe enough and with enough weapons to protect themselves. Rick's only choice was to stay put with Jo and help her through this until they could get out and get to the others or the others could find them.

The gunshots continued and Rick sauntered over toward the high windows, running his hands through his hair as frustration took root within him. "This don't make sense," he began to pace, hating that he couldn't go help the others and feeling at a lost at how to help Jo at the same time, as well as just confused over the walkers. "We closed off the Tombs and all the other exits. They shouldn't have a way in this far."

"Was a door left unlocked?" Jo asked, gripping her stomach more and suddenly almost dropping down to her feet.

Without thinking any further on the others at the moment, Rick was at Jo's side in an instant. He helped her sit down on the floor so that she didn't fall and held the back of her head with one hand while he placed another on her stomach.

"You're gonna be okay, you hear me? We're gonna get through this," he insisted.

Their worries were increased when a loud alarm began to wail away inside the room and could be heard coming from out in the corridors and outside in general, as well.

"What the hell is going on?" Rick shouted, looking over his shoulder as if someone would be standing there to explain. Bringing his focus back to Jo, he nodded. "How far apart are your contractions? Have you been able to keep track?"

Jo shook her head. "They just started getting more and more frequent."

"Can't you take a guess?"

"Every five minutes or so, maybe."

"Shit."

"There's another thing," Jo said as Rick focused his attention completely on her and not on the irritating alarm. "I think my water broke this morning."

"You think?"

"I was going to the bathroom as it was, and it just felt…off. Like, too much came out, you know?" She winced; not in pain but in embarrassment. "It sounds gross, I know."

"Trust me, that ain't gross," he assured, looking over her shoulder and around the room for something. "I've been through Lori in labor before; granted I was at work at the time. Her father drove her to the hospital and I met them there, but I was there in the moments before, during and after the birth where it counted. I saw it all. And everything we've seen and had to do in this world nowadays, a little bathroom talk is the least of my worries."

Jo responded by crying out in full pain this time. She reached her hands out and gripped his arms tightly. "I'm scared," she admitted, breathlessly.

"Don't be," Rick said, pressing his forehead to hers. "You're strong. You will be fine. The only thing to be scared about are those things getting in here and they're not gonna, because I won't let them. Just…hopefully we can wait this out long enough till we can get you to Hershel or till Hershel can get to you."

Jo shook her head against Rick's. "I won't make it that long. I'm gonna— _aahhh_!" Her fingers dug even more into his arm and she tilted her head back. "Oh my god I feel like I'm being torn in two."

Rick sat back on the heels of his boots and looked her over as she began to writhe around in pain. "Shit," he muttered. "We're gonna have to do this here."

" _Uhnnh_ …"

"I know," he muttered, licking his dry lips and looking around the room once more. "I'm sorry. This ain't exactly ideal."

"No, this just hurts like a bitch," she clarified as her body gave her a brief break in between contractions. She had one hand now keeping herself propped up while the other held onto her stomach and she was already tired from it all. "We'll need towels and water. I think we're good on something to cut the cord with." She gestured to his machete with a small chuckle.

"We ain't using that. I saw a pair of scissors on the counter." Holding his hands out to her, he waited a moment until she took them. "C'mere." Helping her up to her feet, he had her hold onto the exam bed and then stood back to assess the situation. "Uh, okay…I'm, um, gonna need to get your pants off and up on this bed."

Jo leaned her head down and began to laugh quite heartily despite everything going on; the contractions, the walkers, the gunfire, and that damned alarm. Everything.

"Shit, you're not even gonna buy me dinner first?" she teased.

Turning her head, she found he was smirking back at her. "You'll have to take a rain check."

"I'd say turn around while I do this, but you're about to see more of me than I was prepared for anyway, so what's the point, right?" she questioned, rhetorically, as she began to unbutton her maternity jeans. "Not to mention I just don't give a shit at this point."

As Jo shimmied out of her pants, Rick still felt the need to play the gentleman. He looked away and began to gather up the only towel he could find. The infirmary wasn't stocked enough with those sorts of things, which was unfortunate. There wasn't a bucket to fill with water but there was a bowl that seemed deep enough. The sink had water running to it, so he filled the bowl up; holding it in both hands with the towel draped over a shoulder as he turned back around to see Jo standing there naked from the waist down, but facing sideways to him so that all he really saw was the slight curve of her bare ass.

All things considered, it was a nice ass.

That wasn't what he needed to be focusing on at the moment, though.

Setting the bowl and the towel down on a metal pulley cart, he dragged it over to the bed and then stepped up behind Jo. "Can you get up on the bed?"

"Not by myself, sorry," she whined as another contraction began to claim her.

"Don't be sorry. This isn't your fault."

Wrapping an arm around her back, Rick bent at the knees and placed his other arm behind under her legs. With some effort, he picked her up, bridal-style and set her down on the exam bed; releasing a labored breath afterward. He then moved around to the end of the bed where she kept her legs closed tight. Gripping her calves in his hands, he looked over her stomach at her and how she was trying not to push, but really wanted to.

"You're gonna have to open your legs," he said sheepishly. They both knew it was meant genuinely so he could help her deliver her child, but he still somehow felt like a pervert.

Jo nodded. "Right." In doing so, she tilted her head back and closed her eyes, feeling just as awkward as he did, but knowing it was necessary.

Rick looked between her legs and then looked back up at her, panicking on the inside because he wasn't sure what exactly to do next. Unlike Carl's birth, which had been by C-section, Jo was about to deliver naturally and so he didn't even have a firsthand account of what had to happen, except what he knew from movies and TV shows. But even that wasn't much to go by.

"Alright…" he trailed, moving his hands up to her knees. "Uh…push."

And she did, with great pleasure. All that pent up pain and not doing anything about it until now was aggravating, both mentally and physically. She arched forward, leaning her chin down to her chest and gripping the sides of her stomach. Pushing was this wonderful release, albeit just as painful as the contractions. After all, she was trying to push a watermelon out of something the size of an orange. As she kept on at it, Rick remained there, keeping an eye on everything south of the border and coaxing her on; telling her she could do it, and reiterating how strong she was. After a few minutes, though, she had to stop.

Resting her head back against the incline of the bed's head rest, Jo looked up toward the ceiling as the alarms came to a stop. "Oh, thank god. That was annoying."

"I wish I knew what they meant and who set them off," Rick remarked, lifting his eyes away up toward her face.

"And how," she added.

"And why." Placing a hand on top of her stomach, he gave her a soothing rub to coax her onward again. "Alright, c'mon, you're just about there, I think. Push."

Leaning back up, Jo placed her hand over Rick's and the pair made eye contact as she strained and pushed. She got red in the face and she felt as if she was dying. She began to scream and cry out, partly in pain and partly in sheer determination.

But, again, she had to take a brief break.

"Rick?"

"Yeah?"

"I had asked Andrea to be my midwife and help Hershel with this originally," she began to say. "And I asked her that if I died or if the baby died, for her to put us down, either way it went. She agreed to it and I need you to do the same for me."

Rick shook his head. "No," he said, almost angrily. "No one is dying here today, you understand me?" When she didn't reply, he asked again, "You understand me?"

"Yes," she nodded, holding his eye; her voice shaky. "But I need you to promise me you will do what needs to be done if things don't go the way we want them to. Do _you_ understand _me_?"

Pursing his lips and his nostrils flaring a bit, he felt that by agreeing to her terms he was admitting some sort of defeat and allowing the idea of her dying and her baby dying to be a possibility. And something changed then for him. He didn't want her to die, and obviously not her child, and not just because she was his friend. He couldn't fully understand it yet, but there was more to their friendship and she was beginning to mean more and more to him each day. And he couldn't lose her.

"I understand," he caved.

"Good. Thank you."

"Now push like you mean it," he growled.

When she did, she screamed out in pain, but he kept his hand in place on her stomach, which she still held onto.

"Fucking push!" he shouted, wanting to motivate her so that the thought of giving up and dying on him was nothing more than a thought and not a reality.

"I _am_!" she shouted back at him.

"Not good enough," he informed. He needed her angry. He needed her to fight, because up until now, even though it had been painful for her and she had been pushing, it just seemed half-hearted to him. "You need to give it everything you got. You need to fight and bring this little ball of hope into the world, you hear me?" He looked down, seeing the child's head and smiled, but continued his coaching. "You can do this, because you're a fighter, and the best fighters win."

She made a face at him through the pain. "Oh, shut up already."

Reaching for her knees, she gripped onto them and pulled herself up a bit for support to help push harder. Rick's hands went between her legs and she watched how he smiled and began to reach for her child.

"Keep going, Jo. You're doing great."

"Oh, _fuck_ ," she groaned loudly.

"Careful now. You don't want the first thing your child hears is you swearing like a sailor," he teased.

"If that's the worst thing I have to worry about for my child, then I'm okay with that," she replied, trying not to squirm so much at the odd sensation of her baby being birthed. There was no way anyone could have prepared her for that feeling.

"One more push."

With one last go, Jo let out a strained cry and then lay back against the exam bed as Rick let out a laugh of success. Jo had felt her child completely leave her body and she released a sigh of relief. The hard part was over, more or less.

Peering down between her still opened legs, she watched as Rick maneuvered his hands around and then quickly held them up to reveal her baby, all red in the face and covered with her fluids, and adorable as all hell. He then lowered the baby and turned it over and rubbed its back to get it to breathe and they both waited with bated breath, no pun intended. And then, as the shock of coming into the world seemed to hit the child, it began to wail.

As tears of joy stung her eyes at such a beautiful sound, Jo lifted her gaze to Rick. "What is it?"

"It's a girl," he announced, smiling at her. Wrapping the baby up in the towel, he lifted her up and rested her down on Jo's chest while he busied himself with cutting the umbilical cord.

"She's beautiful," Jo remarked as tears spilled down her cheeks while smiling brightly.

"Just like her mama," Rick commented.

He pulled the pulley cart closer to the exam bed and then lifted off his T-shirt. He needed something to clean her baby off with since the towel was being used to swaddle the little girl. He placed his shirt into the water bowl and then wrung it out as much as possible before trying to clean the baby off as best as he could.

"If she'd been a boy I was gonna name her Rick," Jo said while pressing her lips to her daughter's head and just reveling in holding her in her arms.

"Bullshit."

"I'm serious," she insisted. "I hadn't had a definite name picked out until about ten minutes ago. With how much you've helped me since you found Sophia and me, everything you've done, including bringing my child into the world, it seemed only right."

Rick looked shy at her, as if he didn't know how to take a compliment. Ever. "Don't tell me you're still gonna call her Rick."

Jo laughed. "Well, I _did_ used to enjoy watching _Ricki Lake_."

"Don't you dare," he bemoaned with a smile.

When Jo began to wince in pain again, Rick's eyes widened and he hurried back to the end of the exam bed, leaving Jo to resume cleaning off her child.

"Are you having twins?" he wondered.

"No, she's too big for me to have been carrying two babies. It's just the afterbirth," she insisted, pushing once more.

It wasn't exactly a lovely situation, but it was a natural part of life and Rick was such a good sport in taking care of everything and cleaning her up after her baby was taken care of. He refilled the water in the bowl a few times and rinsed out his shirt as much as possible, but ended up chucking the shirt away in the end. There was no point in trying to save it.

After a while, he helped Jo into her underwear and jeans again, he helped her slowly off the exam table and looked at the duo with such adoration in his blue eyes for them. Standing close, he placed a hand on the small of Jo's back, giving a soothing rub to it because he knew she was still aching from everything. He was also admiring the little girl, sticking a finger into her tiny, clamped fist and smiling when her little eyes fluttered open and closed a few times at him.

"Why, I think this one is trying to flirt with me," he joked.

"Well, she's having a good, first day. The first person she saw is the handsome man who brought her into the world," Jo quipped, smiling some more.

"So, what're you gonna name her?"

Jo shrugged. "I dunno."

"She's a miracle," he stated. "All this death in the world and here's this new little life, bringing hope with her. Makes me feel like it doesn't have to be so bad out there, you know? Like, things can get better. I mean, they have to; for her and the others like her — the ones being raised in this world or who have yet to arrive."

Jo's smile began to grow so bright while she looked from Rick, down to her daughter and back again.

Sensing her eyes on her, Rick looked away from the baby girl and locked gazes with the new mother. "What?" he wondered with a curious smile of his own.

"Hope."

"I don't follow."

"Her name," Jo replied. "Her name is Hope."

"Hope," Rick repeated, looking down at the child. "It fits perfectly."

"Yeah," she agreed. "And now you can say you brought Hope into the world."


	11. Hope

_"I am prepared for the worst, but hope for the best."_ — Benjamin Disraeli

* * *

  
Before the alarm had been turned off, Shane had been outside with the rest of the group. Oscar and Axel had come out as well from their block to ask, once again, if they could be allowed to join the rest in C Block, but Shane had shot them down while T-Dog and Dale both argued on behalf of the two inmates. Daryl had sided with Shane, a man he always butted heads with. It was Rick who had kept those two from hauling off and fighting each other on every so often. But the current arguing took a backseat when walkers came wandering into the courtyard from one of the gates which had been locked up. Someone had cut the locks open with bolt cutters or an ax and the inmates took the blame initially. Everyone had taken out as many walkers as they could, or scattered back into the prison.

When the walkers in the courtyard had been put down, that was when the alarm had gone off and Oscar said it must've been the back-up generator kicking on in order for the alarm to work. T-Dog asked the inmate if he knew where the generator room was and if he knew how to turn it off.

"I _bet_ he knows how to shut it off. He's probably the one who set the damned thing to go off to begin with!" Shane accused.

"I didn't," Oscar insisted, and then gestured between himself and Axel. "We've been out here. The alarm had to have been turned on manually. It's someone else."

Not having the time to stand around and argue anymore about it, Shane, having shared the right-hand man position with Daryl since Hershel's farm, took over Rick's leadership role with the other man MIA at the moment.

Shane, Daryl and T-Dog followed Oscar toward D Block, which was apparently closer to the generator room. They got inside the building and wound their way through the dark corridors, and through the Tombs to where they needed to be. Once in the generator room, they found Andrew, the inmate Rick had tossed out to the walkers and everyone assumed had been dead for the last month. A scuffle between Andrew and Shane ensued, wherein Shane dropped his gun, which Oscar picked up and pointed at Shane. The former cop raised his hands, expecting to get shot in the head, but after some slight hesitation, Oscar shifted his aim to the left and killed his fellow inmate without breaking a sweat, choosing Shane over Andrew. Turning to look down at the dead inmate, Shane then looked back up at Oscar who was offering back his gun. Taking it with an appreciative nod, he walked over to the offending generator and let Oscar show him exactly what to do, while Daryl and T-Dog took down the walkers trying to get inside the room.

With the alarm off, the four men left the generator room; with Shane offering his machete to Oscar for his own protection as a show of good faith. As they wove through the halls again, they bumped into Glenn and Axel in the process. The latter pair saw that the foursome were okay and turned back to go check on the rest of their people in C Block while Shane led the others to the infirmary, remembering Rick had been taking Jo there to show her how cleaned up it was for when she gave birth.

Worried he might find them dead in the hall along the way or inside the infirmary when they reached it, Shane's determination was at an all-time high. They had to take down a few walkers on the way, but when they did get to the infirmary, they found it was swarmed by walkers on the outside, clamoring to get inside.

The four men took care of every walker at the double doors and then tried opening those doors, but they wouldn't budge. Shane kicked at them and shouted for Rick, to see if he was in there, but before he could even garner a possible response from his oldest friend, a baby began crying and the four men looked at each other with confusion.

Footsteps echoed from inside the infirmary, and then something heavy near the doors scraped across the floor. A slight clattering against the doors followed suit before they were pulled open to reveal a wary Rick standing there without a shirt on.

"Rick, you okay?" Shane asked, stepping forward and hugging his friend out of relief to see him alive.

Rick nodded and smiled as he patted Shane on the back. "We are. What happened?"

"Andrew wasn't dead. Took down a gate, led some walkers in, set off the alarm to draw more in."

Both men stood back from each other and Rick look upon the faces of the other three. "He dead now?" he asked.

Shane gestured to Oscar. "Yeah, thanks to him."

"I think it's time we reconsider letting him and Axel join us," T-Dog added.

Rick nodded again. "We will, but first…" He stepped aside, revealing Jo standing there with a baby in her arms, wrapped in the towel.

The other three men stepped more fully into the infirmary, their weapons finally lowered, as well as their guard.

"I knew we heard a baby," Daryl remarked, stepping past Rick and Shane with his crossbow slung over his shoulder. Being possibly the most seemingly aloof member of their overall group, Daryl was the last person anyone would assume to get mushy around a baby. Smiling, he stuck a finger out and rubbed the baby's chest a little. "Ain't you early?"

Whether he was asking Jo or the baby was unknown.

"Which is why we need to get Jo back to Hershel so he can give this little one a check-up and make sure she's okay," Rick informed.

"She? She's a girl?" Shane questioned, stepping forward more closely and peering at the baby. "She's adorable," he complimented, looking over at Rick next. "You delivered her?"

"I did."

"He did," Jo agreed.

"What's her name?" T-Dog wondered.

"If you don't have a name for her, I have suggestions; like, Lil' Badass or Lil' Ass-Kicker," Daryl joked.

Jo chuckled tiredly. "Her name's Hope."

The men all looked around at each other and smirked.

"Good name," Shane said, and then looked between Jo and Rick. "Good job."

"Hey," Rick shrugged, pointing at Jo. "She did all the work. I merely supervised."

"You did more than that. I couldn't have done it alone," she insisted, brushing her arm against his bare one. "My arms are a bit tired. You wanna take her for me?"

Rick nodded and scooped her daughter up into his arms, holding little Hope against his chest and watching as her eyes fluttered open. The pouty face she had worn at the sound of Shane shouting and kicking at the door disappeared when she focused her little eyes on him.

"Congratulations," Oscar said, directing his comment to both Jo _and_ Rick.

"Oh, she's not—" Rick began to correct.

"Thank you," Jo cut him off, placing a hand on his shoulder.

Rick shifted his hold on her daughter, doing so with just one hand as he pulled out his gun from its holster before they left the infirmary. Jo then reached between them and slipped his machete out of its sheath at his side and gripped the handle as firmly in her hand as possible. Since Rick's upper half was exposed and he was carrying Hope, the others flanked around him as they walked out to head back to C Block in case walkers approached them.

There were only three walkers that wandered around one of the corners and Jo was able to take care of one particular heavyset one by raising the machete and slicing diagonally through its head. The top half of its skull slid off to the ground before its entire body collapsed. Shane looked back at her with a nod of approval and Jo sighed out of relief. It felt good to contribute again, even if she did feel exhausted from labor. It was like before she and Sophia went to Woodbury but now she had a family at her side.

Once they made it back to the communal area, Rick locked the barred door behind them with his set of keys. Shane had the other set at the moment.

"Lori!" Shane shouted out.

"Hershel! Carol!" Daryl joined in.

They reached the entrance into their cell block and found the others standing or crouching around Dale who was lying on the ground and bleeding out from a wound in his right shoulder. Rick and Shane sauntered up first, distraught by the impending loss of their friend. Hershel, who had been kneeling beside Dale, got up to his feet.

"Walkers got in the cell block. Dale got bit getting the women into their cells to protect them." He gestured to the barred door on the opposite side of the cell block. "They all came in from that way and Andrea lured some back out, but she hasn't returned yet." The older man didn't look hopeful about Andrea's fate. When his tired eyes finally settled on what was in Rick's arms, he then looked between Rick and Jo. "Oh my god, you had the baby?"

The others took note, too; even Dale who was barely conscious.

"Is it a boy? Will you name him after me?" Dale inquired, trying to joke in his last moments.

Rick held tightly to Hope in his left arm but holstered his Colt Python before he looked around at the faces looking back at him. With a rueful smile, he walked over to Dale and crouched down beside him. "Jo had a girl. Her name's Hope." He angled the baby in such a way so that the dying man could see her.

"Oh, she's beautiful," Dale cooed. "Just like her mother."

Jo smiled, crouching down beside Rick and taking Dale's hand in hers. "She needs a middle name, though. I think Hope Dale works just fine, don't you think?"

"Oh god, no, I was just joking."

Jo shook her head. "I'm not."

Tears stung Dale's eyes and he nodded slightly. "Thank you."

Hershel walked up behind Rick and Jo and tapped Rick on the shoulder. "Let me see her and check how she's doing." He looked at Jo. "You, too."

Eyeing Jo first, Rick raised Hope up to Hershel to take the baby into his arms, cradling her gently as Jo stood up beside the older man after letting go of Dale's hand. She went with Hershel into her cell while Rick remained at Dale's side, taking his hand that Jo had been holding.

"You need to find Andrea," Dale said. "You need to make sure she's safe. My soul won't know peace until you find out where she is and if she's okay."

"And if she's not?" Daryl asked, a little callously, though it was obvious it was intended to come out sounding that way.

"Then I'll see her on the other side, won't I?" Turning his eyes from Daryl to Rick, he stared the former sheriff deputy down. "Don't let her turn if she's dead."

"We won't."

"Don't let me turn either."

Rick nodded. "I won't." He looked up at Daryl and T-Dog. "Will the two of you start looking for Andrea? I'll catch up as soon as I can."

"I'll go, too," Shane offered.

"Yeah." He looked over at his oldest friend. "Okay." Bringing his gaze back down to Dale, he smiled. "See? They're gonna go find her and she's gonna be al—"

Dale's eyes were staring upward, but glazed over. Rick cast his eyes along the man's body and saw no movement in his chest signaling breath coming in or out of his body.

The man was dead.

Propping one knee up, Rick rested an arm across it and sighed, dejected. Reaching at his side, he pulled his Colt Python back out of his holster and placed the end of the barrel upon Dale's forehead. "Everybody, look away," he said. "Give him some dignity in his death."

After waiting a moment, Rick took note of everyone gradually pulling their faces away or turning around and walking off to their cells altogether.

Inhaling and exhaling a single, steadying breath, Rick pulled the trigger.

He winced at the sound of the bullet bursting into Dale's skull and the sight of blood, bone and brain matter that splattered on the ground under his head. With his free, left hand, Rick reached over Dale's face and closed his eyelids and then brought the back of his right hand that was holding his gun to his forehead, looking down at his lap in grief.

Shane stepped over behind Rick and patted his shoulder and then gave it a squeeze. "He died saving people, brother. He died a good death, and I'm sure he'd do it over again if he had to."

"It shouldn't have _had_ to happen." Rick whipped his face upward and brought himself up to his feet. "This _day_ shouldn't have happened the way it did." He began pointing around the cell block with his gun. "Walkers shouldn't have gotten in, Dale shouldn't be dead, and Jo shouldn't have had her baby this early. We don't even know if Andrea is alive. It was all brought on because that asshole survived and he survived because _I_ didn't kill him with my own two hands when I had the chance. I should've put a bullet in his brain. I shouldn't have had to put one in _Dale's_."

"Rick, you can't blame yourself for this, man," Glenn insisted.

"How can I not? It all boils down to _me_ ," he gestured to himself with his gun. " _I_ let Andrew go. _I_ told him to run."

"You gave him a fighting chance to survive on his own rather than kill him outright. All that time he survived out there in the woods, lurking around the prison, he could've spent finding his own safety. Instead he chose to do what he did," Axel spoke up. "That was his choice, not your mistake."

Rick looked over at the blonde inmate and then just looked down at Dale's body. "We need to bury him. We should do it before we lose light."

Turning away, he walked a few feet and then ducked into Jo's cell where she was holding her daughter in her lap while Hershel sat beside her. Both looked up at Rick, knowing what had just happened with Dale. The gunshot was heard clear as day, echoing off the cell block walls and along with the conversation that followed.

"It's gonna get better, Rick," Hershel remarked.

"How do you know that?"

Hershel looked down at the infant, giving one of her feet a slight tickle. "We have Hope." His eyes returned to Rick and he smirked. "Pun intended."

 

* * *

 

Andrea was found, safe and sound, shut away in an upper level cell in D Block. She had been too quick and nimble for the walkers that had followed after her. She had run up the stairs, shut the barred door to the cell behind her and climbed up into the top bunk where she pulled the blanket over her to hide her body until the coast was clear. Since she didn't have a weapon on her, she was defenseless and had to stick it out; which is exactly what she did until T-Dog and Daryl showed up with Shane in tow.

By the time she returned to C Block, Andrea had already been told about Dale's demise and she took it hard, but the news that Jo had given birth eased the pain. Instead of focusing on the loss of her father figure, she chose to go straight to her friend, her fellow blonde, and fawn over her daughter while Rick and Shane brought T-Dog outside with them to help them dig Dale's grave. The others began dragging the dead walkers out, to build yet another bonfire to get rid of those bodies, and Carol and Lori went about cleaning up their cell block again while Sophia chose to huddle inside Jo's bunk, too, so she could fawn over Hope as well.

At sunset, everyone was gathered in the yard, around the freshly dug grave that Dale's body was lying in. He was wrapped in a bed sheet, so no one saw his face, which made it a little easier when the time came to throw dirt over him to fill the grave back up. Hershel said a few words and then everyone took turns throwing dirt into the grave with either the shovel or their hands. Jo, with her hands full with Hope, kicked some dirt in with the toe of her boot and then stepped back before looking across at Rick.

The setting sun was behind her head, giving her blonde hair more of a golden glow, but the light happened to be shining directly into Rick's eyes, causing him to squint so he could look back at Jo. She offered him a sympathetic look and then he took the shovel when it was passed lastly to him, taking it upon himself to finish filling the grave.

Glenn walked up with a cross he'd made of two old planks of wood and stuck it at the top of the grave after Rick was done. Everyone had more or less dispersed by then, except Rick, Glenn, Andrea and Jo.

The foursome remained, standing silent as they looked down at the fresh mound of soil at their feet.

The sun had officially gone down but the light from it was still in the sky, just now it was casting hues of pinks and purples across the gradually darkening blue.

And then Hope began to cry, breaking the silence and all four adults seemed to find amusement in it.

"We feel you, Hope," Glenn remarked with a smile. "We're gonna miss Dale, too."

"Is she hungry?" Andrea wondered.

"No, well, I don't think so," Jo shrugged, glancing at Andrea. "She shouldn't be. She's already fed twice. Carol had to help me both times 'cause this little one was being finicky with me and wouldn't latch on right away."

Glenn and Rick looked at each other.

"Are we really talking about your breasts right now?" Glenn wondered, raising an amused eyebrow.

Andrea gave him a playful push. "Oh, grow up. Breastfeeding is completely natural, and the fact that she can do it, means we don't have to worry so much about making sure we have formula."

Glenn nodded. "True." After a moment, he added, "I'm gonna head back up."

With one last look at Dale's grave, he turned and walked up the hill, toward the opened gate to the courtyard with his hands shoved in his pants.

"It's gonna be weird not having him around," Andrea commented while Hope continued to fuss. "Dale told me how he and his wife never had children, and when he found me and Amy after the outbreak, and with being able to assume our parents were dead back home in Florida, he kind of just stepped into that parental role Amy and I needed. He always looked out for us, and after Amy died he still looked out for me like I was his own daughter. He was always there for me, encouraging me to fight on and not let my grief get the better of me. He was even willing to stay by my side at the CDC and die with me when it blew up." She looked over at Rick who had been there during that time. Jo had only learned of some of those tidbits, secondhand, from Andrea over the last month, during their blossoming friendship. "It's like losing my own flesh and blood all over again."

"You just gotta keep fighting, then," Rick remarked. "Keep making him proud by continuing to survive. He died protecting our people. We can't let his sacrifice be in vain."

"No, we can't," Andrea agreed.

"And all of us need to survive so we can live long enough to tell Hope about part of her namesake," Jo offered up with a small smile.

Rick and Andrea both looked at her and chuckled.

Holding her hands out to Jo, Andrea stepped over to her and gestured to the still fussing infant. "Give her here. Maybe she just shit herself."

Jo hesitated, even though she trusted Andrea with her life and with her daughter's. She just had become so attached to her child and wanted to hold her in her arms at all times, whether or not she was physically and mentally exhausted. She did, however, pass her child off to Andrea, who cooed down at the baby girl once she was in her arms.

Walking off with Hope, Andrea headed back up to the courtyard, like Glenn before her, leaving Jo alone with Rick at Dale's gravesite.

The pair stood silent for a few moments, casting glances back at Andrea and Hope until they were out of sight, and then eventually looking at each other.

"I can't remember if I thanked you for earlier today," Jo said after a while. "For delivering Hope, for keeping us safe."

"I'm pretty sure you did."

"Well, just in case, thank you. I owe you so much."

Jo began to tear up; her emotions getting the better of her. Looking back down at the grave and bringing a hand up to her face, she wiped away the tears that had begun to fall and then blinked away the rest that threatened to follow. Rick's words of telling her she was strong echoed in her head, and she felt like crying made her appear weak and she didn't want to be weak.

"Hope Dale Moore doesn't sound terrible, does it?" she asked after a minute of further silence; chuckling slightly.

"Nah," Rick shook his head. "I think it's beautiful."

"I never had a mother," she admitted, out of the blue. "Well, that's obviously not _completely_ true. I mean, I had a birth mother who gave birth to me. She just didn't raise me. Her and my father had only been dating three months when she got pregnant with me and he stuck by her throughout her entire pregnancy, doting on her hand and foot, according to one of my aunts. After I was born, maybe about two months, she left us. Wasn't mother material or some shit. So, my dad became both mother and father to me, insisting on doing everything himself. And he never married anyone, to even provide me with a stepmother. I think, maybe, he felt worried that if the relationship didn't work out that I would be more distraught over losing another mother or something. I dunno," Jo shrugged. "But then, when I was eight, my mom returned again, with a baby boy. She had apparently gotten pregnant again by some guy she barely knew and couldn't bring herself to have an abortion or give the child up for adoption, so she brought him to my dad and asked him to take care of him. And my father did, no questions asked. Maybe it was out of pity, or maybe my father would always be pussy-whipped by that woman and do whatever she asked, whenever she asked. My father legally adopted my half-brother and raised him as his own and my brother never knew my dad wasn't his biological dad until he was a teenager."

"How'd he handle it?"

"Finn? He took it like a champ. Said our dad was his dad no matter what; that he loved him unconditionally without a second thought as his own and that was all that mattered." Jo shifted her weight from one leg to the other, while placing her hands subconsciously to her stomach out of habit, as if Hope was still in there. "I used to worry that when the day came that I would become a mother that I would look at my child and feel nothing like my own mother felt for me and my brother. Maybe she was suffering from postpartum depression, or maybe she really didn't have a maternal bone in her body. At least she had the sense to leave us with someone who cared. But then I did get pregnant once before with my husband, a few years ago. But I miscarried, and I remember feeling sad and I thought, if I had the same inability to love my own child like my mother, then I wouldn't have grieved the loss of a failed pregnancy like I did. And now, with Hope, she's my world. She is _literally_ my hope. I have loved her since I realized I was pregnant and her well-being mattered more to me than my own, and it always will." Jo looked at Rick again. "I've only been a mother — a _parent_ — less than half a day, but is this how it'll always be; this overwhelming love and worry and excitement and fear of the unknown?"

Rick nodded slowly. "It's exactly like that. Every day, every night. For years," he replied with a small smile. "It's a wild ride you never want to get off of. Even when you feel dizzy…and even after it ends."

Jo watched as his face fell. He held his hands in front of him and began to fiddle with his fingers. His own tears began to brim his eyelids but he wiped them away before they had a chance to fall.

"I'm sorry," Jo whispered. "You've gotta miss your son terribly."

"Every day, every night," he repeated. With a head tilt, he looked away from gravesite and beyond the fences to the trees on the other side. "Sometimes it's hard to remember what his face looked like before."

"Before he died?"

"Before he turned." Rick closed his eyes. "His hair was brown and straight like Lori's. He was fair like her, but he had my eyes, my nose. My stubbornness," he added with a smile and a laugh. Opening his eyes, he turned and looked back at Jo. "Sometimes I forget he's gone and I catch myself going to call for him. I look at Sophia and think, oh, Carl's gotta be nearby, too, but then I remember."

He held her gaze; his tears returning. Rick tried his best to smile through them and be strong; the same as Jo had been doing. Neither of them wanted to appear weak.

"Your daughter's name is the best name you could've chosen," Rick continued. "She really is what her name is. She gives all of us a sense of hope, of second chances; that maybe this world doesn't have to be so bad. We can make it work here. We can live our lives here."

"Yeah, I think we can, too."

With a nod of his head, Rick looked down at the grave and let out a sigh. His tears were still present, and he still was not done thinking of his own child. Jo sensed as much as she stepped around to Rick's side of Dale's grave and took his hand in hers. Looking down at her gesture of camaraderie, Rick closed his eyes and brought his free hand up to his face, pinching the bridge of his nose and doing his best to shield his eyes from her so she didn't see him starting to cry.

Her emotions the way they were, Jo teared up as well and got the better of her. Giving his hand a tug toward her, she turned her body so that they faced each other and she wrapped her free arm around his shoulder and snaked it up behind his neck. She let go of his hand and continued with giving him a tight hug and then just stood there as he eventually leaned into it. Rick rested his head against hers with his chin upon her shoulder and let his tears fall there.

"Thank you," he muttered.

"For what?" she asked.

"Being here."

Jo snickered through her own tears. "You brought me here, remember?"

"Oh yeah," he chuckled, his pent up grief giving way to some happiness again. Lifting his head up and taking half a step back from her, Rick left one of his hands on the small of her back. "I should be thanking myself then, shouldn't I?"

Nodding, Jo smiled back at him. "I suppose so."

Rick nodded as well, letting his eyes scan over her head to the darkening sky and then downward to the trees outside the fence again, but this time something caught his eye.

His face fell and he became somewhat guarded in his stance, stepping in such a way that his body covered Jo's even as he moved a couple of feet away from her as he peered through the fence.

It wasn't some _thing_ , per se, that actually held his attention.

It was some _one_.

"Well, I'll be damned."


	12. Understand

_"What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means, watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it."_  — Jiddu Krishnamurti

* * *

  
Rick peered into the growing darkness, through the chain-link fence surrounding the yard that kept the walkers out of the prison grounds. Beyond that, the overgrown trees of the woods that housed more of the occasional walker and a few varieties of animals, such as deer, rabbits and squirrels. And it had apparently been hiding something else for who knows how long since Rick had been standing at Dale's grave with Jo. But now he saw. Now he was aware.

"Well, I'll be damned," Rick had muttered, narrowing his eyes.

On the other side of the fence, with the fingers of his left hand curling around the chain-links and a metal cap with a blade over where his right hand once was, Merle Dixon stood, wearing dirty clothes and a shit-eating grin.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't Officer Friendly and my good friend Sugar Tits."

"Merle," Rick acknowledged with a nod. "I can honestly say you're one of the last people I was expecting to show up."

"Who _were_ you expecting? The Queen of England?" Merle chuckled at his own quip. "Is my brother alive? Is he here?"

"He is. Are you alone?"

"I am." Turning around, Merle looked upon a few walkers approaching him. "What say we make with the small talk later and let ol' Merle inside, alright?"

Rick gestured to the arm blade contraption. "You seem pretty capable," he remarked. "You made it this far."

"Oh, c'mon. You already left me for dead once. You really gonna do it again?"

Jo gave Rick a tug to his shirt, catching his eye when he looked down at her. "Let him in, Rick," she insisted. "He saved my life. He got me and Sophia out of Woodbury. I owe him."

Both of them looked over at Merle, who was getting antsy. Because Rick was taking too long, he had to turn his backs on them so he could see the walkers approaching and take them down with his arm blade. There were only four, yet Merle managed, just as Rick had expected he would. The former sheriff's deputy watched the way Merle held his own and took down each walker with a mix of brute force and finesse; having acclimated to his prosthetic bayonet-esque arm.

"You make that yourself?"

"Uh, yeah." Merle looked down at his right arm; the blade now covered in dark walker blood. "Took a while, but you'd be surprised what you can do when have a lot of downtime and desperation on your side."

Rick nodded, appreciating the handiwork of the prosthetic and recalling Jo's thoughts on them doing something similar for Maggie down the line. He continued to look back at Merle, who did the same, but more expectantly. As a few more walkers from along the one of the other fences sensed Merle was there, they began ambling over to him and the older man sighed heavily with a 'you have _got_ to be kidding me' tone to his sigh.

"Rick," Jo pressed. "Let him in."

She had spoken loud enough for Merle to hear her speak in his defense. "Yeah, Rick. C'mon. Let me in," he remarked, stabbing one walker in the eye.

When Rick continued to hesitate, Jo walked forward to the fence where Merle stood and pulled her pocket knife out from its safe-keeping in her bra. Flicking the blade open, she grabbed onto the chain-link fence and gave it a rattle as one of the walkers took notice of her and walked over. She waited for it to press his face against the fence so that it was close enough when she jammed her small blade into its skull. The walker wasn't as decayed as most so it took more effort to insert and remove the blade afterward. With a sigh of his own, Rick stalked forward and unsheathed his machete and whistled over another walker and impaled its head through the fence.

Jerking his arm backward, Rick pulled the machete out of and gave the blade a shake of excess blood. Removing the handkerchief he had stuffed in his back pocket, he wiped the rest of the blade as he gave Jo a side glance before casting his eyes back to Merle.

"You gotta let me in," Merle said, turning around to face Rick again once the immediate threat of walkers had been taken care of. "I saved Jo's life. I got her and Sophia out of Woodbury." He then pointed at Jo. "I assume she's told you about Woodbury and The Governor."

"She has," Rick confirmed. "And I know what you did for her and Sophia, and I appreciate it. I do. We _all_ do. But you're showing up here after the fact, a _month_ after. It makes me question things."

"Listen, I left when I could. The Governor isn't the man I thought he was," Merle began to explain. "He's become unhinged. He wants Jo, no matter the cost. He wants revenge on her for her taking his eye and his child away from him. Bastard's out for blood and it doesn't have to be just hers."

Rick put an arm out and pulled Jo back from the fence on instinct, as if The Governor himself was standing there and that simple gesture could protect her.

"You say The Governor's become unhinged. You know what he's done, what he's capable of doing. So, why did you stay? You're a tracker like Daryl. Why are you just reaching her and us now?"

"D'ya ever heard the saying 'keep your friends close and your enemies closer?' I was able to do more staying behind. He would've been on Jo and Sophia's trail within a day of them escaping if not for me, and every day since then." Merle gave a haughty nod. "So, you're welcome."

"Then why now?"

Merle shrugged. "I think he was starting to figure out I wasn't exactly his obedient little foot soldier anymore. I gave him the slip while we were out scouting for Sugar Tits, here." He gestured at Jo. "He'll find you soon enough without me there, but I couldn't stay no longer. So, c'mon; give ol' Merle a chance."

Jo looked between both men and rolled her eyes. "I'm going to get Daryl."

Without waiting for a response from Rick, she turned and walked back toward the prison. Rick looked after her and hesitated before looking back at Merle as both men began to square off with their eyes alone.

"You've come a long way since I last saw you, Officer Friendly," Merle quipped, a rakish smile upon his lips. "I mean, you're still a dick, but…" He laughed. "Heh, how about that? Rick the Dick."

Rick took a menacing step forward. "Listen, if you're gonna be here with us, you're gonna do as I say, _when_ I say." Another step forward and he practically growled. "Do we have an understanding?"

"Yeah, but I—"

"Do we have an _understanding_?"

Merle took a step back, and held his arms out at his sides. "Yes, sir."

 

* * *

 

Daryl was walking alongside Jo through the courtyard, and had just reached the gate leading to the yard when they both noticed Rick walking up the dirt roadway up to the inner fence. He eyed Daryl, who had been doubtful when Jo originally told him about Merle, but now that he saw him with his own two eyes, he couldn't get the gate open fast enough.

"Merle!" Daryl shouted.

"Little brother!" Merle called back with a smile.

Rick took his time, walking behind Merle, preferring not to have the other man behind him so he could keep an eye on him. Once the gate opened, Daryl barreled forward and both the Dixon brothers met in a tight hug.

"Good to see you're still alive and kicking, you little bitch," Merle teased.

"Right back atcha, asshole."

"How sweet," Jo jested, standing at the gate as she waited for the brothers and Rick to return inside of the courtyard.

Rick pulled the gate closed and locked it up with the two Magellan Carabiner clips, and the chain connecting them, once they were all in. He stood there watching as the Dixons talked among themselves, pretty much just enveloped with their little reunion, but eventually cleared his throat to get their attention.

"So you weren't gonna let my brother in?" Daryl questioned. It was hard to tell if he was pissed off or if he was okay with it after the fact.

"I needed to know where he stood beforehand. I have more than just myself and him to worry about," Rick confessed. " _We_ have more than just ourselves to consider in this and you know that."

Daryl waved his hand at Rick. "You let him in. That's all I care about."

"Jo went to get you and I knew once you knew, there'd be no way I could stop you from doing it yourself." Rick eyed Merle. "Better the devil you know, right?"

"I may be a bad boy, but I ain't a bad man," Merle contested, sending a wink at Jo, which she rolled her eyes at. He sized her up, regardless, and gestured to her. "Looks like you had your baby, Sugar Tits."

"I did," she confirmed, folding her arms across her chest.

Rick stepped forward, into Merle's line of sight. "You won't be calling her that, or any other female here, understand?"

Merle frowned and shrugged. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. I say it out of affection."

"Well, it's rude and the women here don't deserve your brand of affection."

Daryl placed a hand on his brother's chest and nodded at Rick. "It's alright. He'll curb his tongue, won't you, Merle?"

Merle grinned and threw an arm around Daryl's shoulders. "Anything for you, little brother." Craning to look around Rick and at Jo once more, he eyed her up again. "When'd you have the little one? Was it a boy or girl?"

"It was a girl."

"Was?"

"Is," Jo corrected. "I had her earlier today."

"And you're up and around? Damn, woman, you're a tough cookie, aren't you?"

"I have to be."

"Can I meet the lil' one?"

Rick stepped in again. "Maybe later. Tonight, and the days following, consider yourself on a probation of sorts. You may be Daryl's brother and you may have saved Jo's life from being ended at the hands of The Governor, but I still have my doubts and you need to prove yourself to me and our group. We all need to be able to trust you. For all we know you can be a plant for The Governor, here to break us down from within so we're easy pickings for some later assault."

"That ain't how it is," Merle insisted, his tone becoming serious. "I'm done with that man and his lackeys."

"Well, we don't know that for sure," Rick reiterated. "We just lost someone today, and now we have two children to keep safe. I ain't taking any risks, so you have to forgive me if I don't share in your brother's enthusiasm or the extent of Jo's gratitude, as appreciated as it is for all of us."

Daryl shifted his weight around and got a little fussy, but Merle held his hand up and gave his younger brother a look before eyeing Rick knowingly. "It's alright. I understand. I'll bid my time as long as you need me to so you can see I come in peace or whatever."

Rick pointed to Merle's prosthetic. "I'll need that for the time being."

"What? Rick, no," Daryl began to pipe up.

Merle and Rick both eyed each other. Rick wasn't backing down from his gaze or the stance he was taking. Merle wasn't stupid, either, so he relented. As he began to unstrap the contraption from his right arm, Rick's persona softened slightly.

"It's just a temporary thing," he assured. "If and when we bring you out on runs with us, or if we need you to help dispense with some walkers, I'll give it back. But inside there, with our women and children, it's not necessary for you to have right now."

"It's okay. I get it." Merle handed his prosthetic over without hesitation, revealing his since healed stump where his right hand once was. "Who died today?"

"You remember Dale?" Daryl questioned his brother.

"The old coot with the RV?"

"Yeah, him. He got bit by a walker this afternoon."

"What happened?"

"Prison got breached by some walkers that were let in by a former inmate with a grudge. Dale was trying to protect some of the ladies, get them into cells."

Merle snickered. His eyes wandered to Jo again. "You give birth before or after that all happened?"

"During."

"Shit."

"Yeah," she agreed.

The door from C Block opened and Shane stepped in the caged, outer entrance. Glenn and T-Dog were behind him, probably curious as to what was all happening and why it was taking so long for Rick to return and why Jo had discreetly pulled Daryl away from the group inside.

"Fuckin' Merle Dixon?" Shane remarked. It was more of a statement than a question.

"That's me," Merle smiled.

"I thought we were gonna wait to go look for this ass."

"You better watch your mouth, Barney Fife," Daryl bit out.

Jo looked down, stifling a smile and a giggle at the pop culture reference. Only Daryl seemed to notice her reaction, and it puffed him up a bit to get more on the defensive on his brother's behalf.

Rick held a hand up between Shane and Rick, like so many times before. "He came to us," Rick clarified. "He tracked Jo and the rest of us here on his own."

Merle finally noticed T-Dog and sneered. "Hey, there, Chocolate Drop."

T-Dog reacted negatively right off the bat and would've launched himself at Merle if Glenn and Shane hadn't pulled him back and if Rick, himself, hadn't chosen to get in between the pair.

"There'll be none of that, either," Rick growled over his shoulder.

Merle threw up his left hand and his right stump. "Fine, fine. But just so you know I ain't forgotten you dropping that damned key down the drain on purpose."

T-Dog sneered. "It was an accident, you bitch-ass redneck."

"Whoa, claws away, girls," Jo quipped, holding her hands out. "If we're all gonna live together, we gotta get over whatever went down between all of you in the past and focus on today, tomorrow and the days after. Okay?"

"Of course, Sugar—" Merle caught himself just as Rick whipped his head around and eyed him up. "I mean, of course, _Jo_."

Rick looked around at all the faces and then ushered everyone toward C Block's entrance. "Let's just get inside and get everyone squared away our new arrival, and get him situated somewhere. We can discuss this in further detail in the morning," he spoke, placing his hands on his hips. "It's been a long day, a lot has happened. Let's just get some rest and start fresh tomorrow, alright?"

The others nodded, one by one, in agreement and began to walk back to the caged entrance to C Block. Jo was allowed in first so she could make a beeline for her daughter, followed by T-Dog who wanted to get the hell away from Merle as soon as possible. Shane and Glenn were in the middle, and then the Dixon brothers, with Rick bringing up the rear so he could once again keep an eye on Merle.

Once inside, Rick locked the door behind them all and watched as the others came into the communal area, which they had all just come to refer as the Common Room. Those that remembered Merle from the base camp outside Atlanta, basically most of the women (Andrea, Lori, Carol and Sophia) seemed a little on edge, because they remembered all too well the type of man Merle had been beforehand; regardless of what they knew now of what he'd done for Jo and Sophia. Of course, Carol seemed a little less on edge, because Sophia was her daughter and she made it back to her with Merle's assistance; so, in that sense, she owed him a debt alongside Jo. Lori and Andrea were less trusting. Hershel and Maggie, who had only _heard_ of Merle before, and the inmates Oscar and Axel, who were plenty out of the loop because they had only just been brought into their group, officially, as of that afternoon, were a little more open to the new arrival. But that's not saying they were a little defensive either. Hell, they were a little defensive when they first laid eyes on Jo at that abandoned house with Sophia, and she had been pregnant and unconscious; no obvious threat at all.

"What's _he_ doing here?" Andrea demanded, pointing at Merle.

Jo walked past her to Carol who was holding Hope now; taking back her daughter.

"I think she might be hungry again," Carol informed. "While you were outside I threw together a sort of privacy blanket so you can feed Hope without worrying about anyone seeing anything you don't want them seeing."

Jo smiled. "Thank you." Carol ushered Jo back into C Block to show her the blanket in question, and gestured for her own daughter to follow.

Merle stepped over to Andrea, as if trying to throw his weight around and apparently forgetting his "probationary" status within the group for a minute as Daryl got on the defensive toward the other blonde. Rick held the hand out that was holding his ring of keys, so it jangled considerably, as he stepped between them all.

"He's here because he found us," Rick commented. "He said The Governor has become unhinged and that he poses an immediate threat to our group. If Merle hadn't shown up tonight, we might still be living blindly, thinking we are fine. But we clearly ain't."

"Why should we believe a word Merle says?" T-Dog questioned, a permanent scowl taking up residence on his face for apparently however long Merle would be with them.

"Because my brother wouldn't lie about something that concerns me, too," Daryl insisted.

"I ain't lying," Merle remarked. "The Governor just wants his child and will take it however he can. If he has to kill everyone to do it, he won't hesitate. If he finds this place and realizes Jo is here, he will tear this place apart."

"So, then we just hide Jo and Hope," Lori suggested.

"Easier said than done, princess," Merle quipped. "You have a son, don't you? You remember what it's like when he was a baby — cryin' all the time?"

"We _had_ a son," Lori said, sadly, looking down at the floor while crossing her arms over her chest.

Merle nodded his head a little sympathetically in condolence. "Well, either way, you ever try to quiet a baby when a shitstorm of noise is goin' down? The Governor will shoot first and ask questions later. He'll draw everyone out with gunfire, pick ya'll apart one by one if he has to. And since the baby is already here, with all that noise, he'll probably be able to hear it crying after a while and that'll be all he'll need to rip ya'll to shreds with bullets."

"Which is why we need to start preparing now," Rick pressed, gesturing at the ground as if making a point. "Merle, like Daryl, is a tracker by nature; can find a needle in a damned haystack if he has too, and up until this point The Governor had Merle as his Seeing Eye dog. Fortunately for us, Merle claims he's been leading The Governor astray on a wild goose chase while determining the real path Jo and the rest of us got off to."

"I ain't _claiming_ it's what I've been doing, it's _truth_."

"Whatever," Rick bit out and threw the older Dixon a stern look. "Point is, we need to start stock-piling our own weapons, fortify this prison, save bullets; any walkers we need to kill, we try and do with blades or other blunt weapons." He looked over at Oscar and Axel. "You two want to be part of our group so bad, this is your chance to prove yourselves for good and earn my trust. You stand with us against this oncoming storm that's most likely headed our way and you got it."

"What've we got to lose?" Oscar shrugged. He nodded. He was in.

"Our lives, for one," Axel remarked, but he was clearly in as well.

"I'd rather die fighting humans than get ripped apart by the undead."

Rick nodded in response to their decision to stand with his group. "That increases our numbers, which we'll need. It's late now, though. We'll head to bed, start early in the morning to make this place safer for us. We'll also need more people on watch tonight, just in case," he decided. "I'll take first, along with Shane. Oscar, you can come with me."

"Sure thing," Oscar nodded.

Looking between the Dixons, Rick pointed at Merle and then one of the cages along the wall in the Common Room. "You're in there tonight. Tomorrow we can decide if we can trust you enough to let you join us in there," he said, gesturing over his shoulder toward the C Block cell rooms.

Daryl looked as if he was going to protest but Merle nodded. "Fair enough."

Passing Merle's prosthetic off to Glenn, he ushered Merle into one of the cages and then locked him in. Merle held his gaze the entire time, rather impishly at that, which made Rick's thoughts run amuck with doubts as to whether or not the older man had any ulterior motives brewing. He really just prayed Merle wasn't some Trojan horse on behalf of The Governor.

Daryl stayed put, to keep his brother company, which Rick was fine with as Rick went into C Block and see to everyone heading off to their own cells for the night. He remained stalwart, his tired blue eyes scanning everyone, as Hershel stood beside him as if keeping vigil.

"Do you trust him as far as you can throw him, Rick?" Hershel asked, referring to Merle.

"I don't want to, but I also have no reason not to," Rick admitted quietly. "From everything Jo's told us, or just me, about The Governor — the kind of man he is, the things he's done or the things she's left unsaid about what's been done to her, I have no reason to doubt what Merle's said. If The Governor went to such extreme measures to keep Jo locked away until the baby was born, why wouldn't he have spent the last month searching for her?"

"Let's just hope it doesn't come to a war," Hershel said in his typical, calm voice. "We have too many lives at stake here."

"I know that, and that's why we need to do everything we can to protect this place."

"Maybe we can talk to this Governor; have a sit-down and come to terms."

Rick took a step back and eyed Hershel as if the old man had just shit himself. "You want to negotiate with that man?"

"We can lie to him; tell him Jo died giving birth and so did the child. We'll dig an extra grave and put a walker in it, then bury it and place a cross. We can tell him Jo and her baby are buried there."

"Who's to say he won't bust in here and dig the grave up to be sure, or that he'd even believe us?"

"He doesn't have to know Jo was ever here to begin with. Like Lori said: we just hide away Jo and Hope. The Governor doesn't know how many people we have here. We can put one or two people with her as protection, Glenn and Maggie maybe. I'd rather not have Maggie in a fight of any kind right now in her condition and Glenn wouldn't want to leave her side. We can prove that Sophia is here if need be, but that we found only her. We can lie and say Sophia told us she and Jo got overrun by walkers on the road and Jo sacrificed herself; that Sophia got away to safety which is when we found her."

Rick nodded, considering that option. "How do we just hide Jo and Hope? Merle's right, as much as I hate to admit it. If The Governor comes here and there's a commotion…sound carries in that courtyard. If Hope starts crying, and a baby's crying is pretty damn distinct, he'll know we're lying."

"So, we just do everything we can to keep things from escalating to that point. We keep our heads and wits about us. We don't let him get to us, physically and mentally. We don't really know that man, except what we've been told. We don't know what kind of mind games he could be capable of. We know enough that he is physically capable of." Hershel gestured toward Jo's cell where the blonde woman was sitting on the bottom bunk with a blanket of some sort draped over her chest; discreetly nursing her daughter. "He's clearly someone who thinks nothing of violating a woman and harming her after the fact. And he's apparently willing to kill innocent people to get to her and his child."

"Hope ain't his child," Rick insisted, venom in his voice. "Bastard like that may have helped create that girl, but he ain't her father. As far as anyone is concerned, Hope has a mother and that's it."

"Well, she has us, too."

"Yeah." Letting his eyes linger on Jo for a minute longer, Rick cast his eyes back to Hershel and placed his hand onto the older man's shoulder. "I gave Glenn the prosthetic Merle was wearing. It's like what Jo was suggesting we make for Maggie. Maybe a few of you can study it and find something to create something similar for your daughter. Maybe we can even get Merle to help us with it."

Hershel nodded. "I'll take a look at it," he spoke. "I was pretty good at shop class once upon a time."

Rick smirked. "Alright." Without saying anything else, he parted ways as the older man went to Glenn and Maggie's cell. Rick walked over to Jo's cell instead, placing his hands on the barred cell door and she looked up at him instantly, as if she had already sensed him coming her way. "She doing okay?" he asked, in regard to Hope.

"Yeah, thankfully." Jo winced at what was going on under the blanket. "She has no teeth, but she'd a biter already."

Rick laughed slightly under his breath. "Carl was, too. Lori didn't get to nurse very long though. She got that, uh, mastitis about two months in and had to switch to formula exclusively from there on out. Hopefully you're more fortunate."

"Well, I have been so far," Jo remarked, then winced again and looked down at the bulge that was her baby under the blanket. "Fingers crossed."

Boldly, Rick stepped into her cell and placed a hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "If you need anything…"

Jo looked up at him. "I know where to find you," she smirked.

"I was actually gonna say Hershel or Carol will be happy to help with the baby," he said, gesturing to the blanket draped over her. "But, yeah…you can come to me to with anything if you need."

Blushing slightly, Jo looked down. "Right, yeah."

Rick lingered for a moment and then nodded at her before stepping out of her cell. He stepped past Shane, who had just come from the upper level where he shared a bunk with Lori and both men nodded to each other.

"Jo and the baby okay?"

Rick confirmed with a bob of his head. "She's feeding right now."

"Damn kid's been alive half a day and she's eating like a parasite," Shane joked.

"Babies do that."

"Yeah, I guess you'd know that firsthand experience, wouldn't you?" Shane gave Rick a playful shove as they both stepped into the Common Room. "I remember how overtired you were after Carl was born; complaining about getting no sleep at night because he kept waking up every two hours to eat."

"Yeah, he was consistent like that."

As they eyed the Dixons and then gestured for Oscar to follow them outside, Rick and Shane stepped out into the courtyard, locking the door behind them. They looked around, eyeing the yard specifically and the woods beyond the outer fences.

"I'll take one of the two towers down there," Shane offered, pointing. "You and Oscar take this one here. I'll wait till you get up there and you watch my back in case anything or anyone is out there and tries getting me before I get where I'm going."

Rick nodded. "Sure."

Shane walked over to the gate separating the courtyard from the yard and removed the two Magellan Carabiner clips and opened the gate, stepping to the other side and waited as he pulled the gate closed. Rick and Oscar opened the door to the tower nearest the prison and ascended the staircase swiftly. When they reached the observance deck, they stepped out and Rick nodded down at Shane who locked the gate up behind him and hustled down to the front gates, unlock and relock the inner front gate and then hurry up into nearest tower. The entire time, Rick had his rifle, which he had left up there from a previous watch, and used the scope to keep a better eye on Shane and the surrounding area. He passed his Colt and a few extra bullets from his shirt pocket to Oscar so the other man had something to use for defense.

Rick watched as Shane waved at him, to let him know things were okay at his tower once he reached its observance deck. In response, Rick held up a hand and nodded, whether or not his oldest friend saw the nod.

"So, how long we doing this watch for?" Oscar inquired, holding the Colt at his side.

Rick shot him a sideways glance and shrugged. "A few hours, maybe all night if need be," he replied. "Hope you caught up on your beauty sleep."

 

* * *

 

Every two hours or less, throughout the night, Hope woke up fussing or crying; needing to be fed, have her diaper changed or just wanting to be held and it was exhausting for Jo. Once her head had finally touched down to her pillow, and she knew that Hope asleep inside the pack-n-play crib Rick and the other guys had found previously at that abandoned daycare, Jo had fallen asleep. She had surprised herself by lasting as long as she had throughout the day; what with giving birth a month early in such chaotic circumstances, rushing back to C Block, Dale dying and holding his funeral, and then Merle arriving. It was such a roller coaster of a day and Jo was just impressed with herself that she had managed so well throughout it.

Waking up so frequently was rough, but she was thankful for Carol hurrying to her aid. When Hope didn't need to be fed and just needed a diaper change or to be held, Carol was there as eager as a beaver. By the time the sun began to rise again and her cell was getting brighter, Jo had woken to a fussy Hope once more and just knew it was feeding time. Her breasts were sore and her top was soaked at the nipple area, which she was mildly embarrassed by. This time, however, it wasn't Carol who appeared to help. It was Lori.

"Morning," Lori greeted, crouching over the pack-n-play to lift Hope up and cradle her.

"Morning," Jo replied tiredly, while failing miserably to hide the leaking.

Lori looked over to her and smirked. "Don't be embarrassed. That happens." She passed Hope to Jo and took a step back.

Not caring if Lori saw anything, Jo lifted her shirt up and finagled Hope in a way so that she latched onto one breast before she could reach for the privacy blanket Carol and thrown together for her and drape it over Hope. "Where's Carol?"

"Asleep. She was about to get up again to help you, but I insisted she take a break. I'm plenty capable," she informed. "Been there, done that, too."

"True."

"You've made it through your first day as a mother. How are you finding it?"

"Well, not quite a full twenty-four hours yet, but it's been okay, I guess," Jo replied. "It's just…a lot has happened and I'm still trying to process it and there are so many things I have to worry about, and not just in regard to Hope. I mean—ow." She looked down, winced and cupped Hope's face. "Ow, stop, with those gums, little girl."

Lori chuckled. "Yeah, there's no getting used to that."

"I guess so," Jo remarked, and continued. "But, yeah…I mean, now I'm worrying about my own safety because I want to be around to see Hope grow up, even if it is in this kind of world, and everyone else's safety because of The Governor. I feel like I've put everyone in this horrible position and I didn't ask for any of this."

Looking down at the bump in the blanket that was her daughter, Jo teared up and began to cry; her post-natal hormones getting the better of her and knocking down the wall she had built up as not to bother anyone with the terrible things she'd been through, when she knew they'd been through their own terrible things. Lori frowned, sympathetically, and sat down beside Jo on the bed, placing an arm around her shoulder.

"I didn't ask to get roofied. I didn't ask to get pregnant," Jo cried, letting her tears fall down her face upon Lori's gesture. "I didn't ask to get locked away for six months in some cellar, chained to a wall at the ankle. I didn't ask to be threatened with death upon the birth of my child. I didn't ask for that fucking monster to come to me every fucking night for my last two weeks in that fucking cellar and force himself on me. I didn't ask to have all of you find me and take me in without a second thought and then have me scared for all of you _because_ of that fucking monster." Jo turned her face to Lori, ugly crying at its best. "Walkers I can handle. But they're supposed to be the monsters I fear at night, not the father of my child."

Lori placed her free hand on the opposite side of Jo's face and pulled the blonde woman's head down onto her shoulder and kissed the top of her head. "Shh," she whispered into the fair tresses. "That man is not your child's father. You are Hope's mother _and_ father. We are _all_ her father and we are _all_ here for the both of you no matter what, do you understand me?" Tears were falling down Lori's face by this point. She felt that if someone had done to her what had been done to Jo that people would be there for her as well, through thick and thin. "Rick, Shane, Daryl, T-Dog, Glenn, Maggie, Hershel, Andrea, Carol, me, and even Sophia: we are your family and we will help protect you and Hope. We won't let that fucking monster hurt or kill you and we sure as hell won't let him take Hope."

As Jo simultaneously cried on Lori's shoulder and nursed her daughter, Rick and Shane had been standing in the Common Room with Oscar behind them, having come off watch after switching places with Daryl, Glenn and T-Dog who had already gotten up for the day. Oscar had gone straight through C Block and continued on to the door at the opposite side to head to D Block where he and Axel's cells were so he could get some sleep. Merle was asleep in his cage, and everyone else seemed to be as well, except for Lori and Jo, who Rick and Shane had heard talking.

The two longtime friends stood there, listening carefully to every word being spoken, occasionally exchanging a look with each other.

Rick couldn't help but feel personally attacked, as if what Jo was finally admitting about her past experiences with The Governor had happened to him and it filled him with an anguish he hadn't felt since the loss of Carl.

His jaw clenched, his fingers curled and he balled his fists up tight until his knuckles turned white like alabaster. Breathing heavily through his nostrils to keep his anger in check, he almost didn't notice Shane touching his shoulder and gesturing to him to step a little more away from the cell block door.

"What she just said was done to her, Rick, we gotta make that right," Shane whispered.

"I know," Rick agreed as his nostrils flared.

"That shit ain't right. No one deserves that."

Shane shook his head and ran a hand through his thick brown hair which had long since grown back since he'd shaved it all off on Herhsel's farm. He winced and felt a pang of guilt, remembering that one time at the CDC when he'd drunkenly come onto Lori and had almost forced himself on her before she scratched him and he checked himself. He had come so close to turning into the same kind of monster that had repeatedly attacked Jo and he'd never forgive himself for his temporary slip-up. He couldn't imagine how a man like The Governor could live with himself after going through with it, not once but multiple times. Sure, Lori had obviously forgiven him since then, but he thanked God every day she had given him a second chance and that she chose him after everything that had happened. However, he could never forget it and he didn't want to. It made him strive to be a better man for the woman he loved every day.

"No, no one deserves that," Rick once more agreed. "Least of all Jo."

As Rick stalked over to Merle's cage, Shane looked after him.

_Least of all Jo?_

Shane let that roll around in his head and slowly he began to realize something that he was sure Rick didn't even know.

 _Fuck_ , Shane thought. _Is Rick falling in love with—_

His thought process was cut off by Rick banging his hand on Merle's cage door.

"Wake the fuck up," Rick growled.

Merle woke with a startle and literally sat up swinging before he remembered where he was. Turning to face Rick and Shane, who was slowly approaching, the older man looked the former sheriff's deputy up and down and scowled, though not out of ill-contempt, per se. Mostly because he was probably having a good dream that had been disturbed by such an abrupt wake-up call.

"What can I do you for, officers?" Merle asked, eyeing both men.

Rick stepped backward and sank down upon one of the seats at the nearest table, all the while never breaking eye contact. "You're gonna tell me every detail about Woodbury and The Governor your ugly fucking head can remember."

"Well, not with manners like that," Merle quipped, chuckling at his own humor.

"Tell me every _fucking_ detail or I will cut your _fucking_ throat with your own _fucking_ prosthetic and then let you turn," Rick growled out with such venom dripping from his voice and with such a severe glare that Merle sat up straight and wiped the smirk from his face. "Do you _understand_ me?"

Shane looked away from Merle and to Rick, studying his friend's expression and nodding as he remembered something he had told him during an argument on Hershel's farm after the barn incident.

_Rick, you can't just be the good guy and expect to live, okay? Not anymore._

A moment like this and Shane knew Rick was fed up with striving to always be the good guy; at least, for now. Acting like the bad guy sometimes seemed like the only way to get shit done anymore.

Pulling his Colt from its holster and laying it down on the table behind him, but aiming it in Merle's direction, Rick then leaned forward and folded his hands between his knees as he maintained his gaze with the caged Dixon.

"Did I fucking stutter?"

Merle shook his head in response.

"Good," Rick remarked. "Start talkin'."


	13. Maybe

_"Go to your bosom; knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know."_  
— William Shakespeare, 'Measure For Measure'

* * *

  
The rain was coming down in buckets with thunder booming in the dark clouds overhead; clouds which had rolled in during the night. The rain began in the morning, starting out as a slight drizzle, but my noontime the clouds opened up and all hell broke loose. Everything the group had been doing outside to secure the prison had been scrapped for the time being. Initially they attempted to work through the pouring rain but when lightning began to strike, Rick rallied everyone back into C Block.

There was too much metal in the courtyard and surrounding them. With everything going on, getting electrocuted by Mother Nature was not something they needed to add to the list.

It had been exactly one week since Merle had arrived to the prison and forked over his knowledge of Woodbury and other, finer details about its Governor. Rick knew a little about Woodbury from things Jo and Sophia had told him, but only Merle would be aware of its inner workings, having "worked" alongside The Governor. For one, Jo had known a different Woodbury, having arrived before Merle and being imprisoned in that cellar. A lot had to have changed. Sophia would've only known certain aspects, being a child. Merle was there after Jo and Sophia escaped and would know the security measures and other changes that would've occurred which Jo and Sophia would've never been privy to.

Rick was also at a loss for what the next move would be, aside from just barricading the group in the prison and improving their own safeguards. Part of the group just wanted to sit tight; to wait and see if The Governor would find them and make the first move. Another part of the group thought Hershel's idea of approaching The Governor on civil terms and see if bygones couldn't just be bygones. Then there was the suggestion thrown out of sneaking into Woodbury in a sort of clandestine mission to assassinate The Governor now that Merle had explained the layout of the town and whereabouts the important locations were. That latter suggestion got everyone worked up, because there were more innocent people in that town than bad and no one in the prison group wanted collateral damage on their hands. And, also, if the "mission" went south, no one wanted to risk their own getting killed or bringing The Governor and his goons back to the prison for retaliation, whether their walls were strong enough to keep outsiders out.

Of course, in the end, it would all come down to Rick to make the final decision, just like always. The group might complain if it wasn't something they would've chosen, but they would fall in line like good, little ducks following their mama duck.

The only problem was, still, Rick hadn't decided what their next move would be.

In the meantime, he was going with the simple "wait and see" method.

If it happened that The Governor found them and attacked first, they hold down the fort and they would fight back. But while they waited for that day to possibly come, they weren't going to go about life in the prison as nonchalantly as before.

No runs were going to be taken anytime soon, as a precaution. They were stockpiled with enough food and other necessary supplies to survive a couple of weeks if they used everything sparingly. Also, absolutely no one was allowed in the yard, but if you went into the courtyard, you had to have a gun on you at all times. The bladed weapons were good enough for taking care of walkers, if and when they got close enough, but if anyone approached the fences and tried to attack from a distance, only a gun would prove useful, and even then no one was allowed to use those guns unless they were being shot at. The last main thing that had changed at the prison during the last week was no one was allowed to go outside the cell block alone. Everyone had to take a partner, even if it was just to take a piss. Rick, himself, also adhered to this rule.

There were more grumblings, a few comments spoken under the breath about how all the new rules made them feel like they had become actual prisoners in a prison, which irked Rick. Fortunately, those who had _actually_ been prisoners before the world went to hell, namely Oscar, Axel and Merle— came to the defense of the rules; making it known that there was a huge difference between being a prisoner in the old world's prison system and the rules that had been laid out to keep them all safe and, most importantly, alive. Even Jo, who had been kept a prisoner in this _new_ world, had something to say to the same effect.

"If this is what being a prisoner is like, I'd gladly serve ten consecutive life sentences than relive Woodbury for one more day."

But now it was a torrential downpour outside, which forced everyone to remain inside, trying desperately to find things to do with themselves around C Block.

Merle had assisted Hershel and Glenn with scouring parts of the prison for items to build a prosthetic for Maggie that was similar to his own, but on a larger scale since Maggie had lost more of her arm than Merle had. Carol and Lori resorted to the old-fashioned gender roles of cleaning and cooking for everyone while Jo simultaneously cared for her own daughter and kept Sophia busy with some semblance of schoolwork for the thirteen-year-old. It was mostly just reading books that had been found in the prison's library that Jo had Sophia read and give her verbal summaries of since they didn't exactly have spiral notebooks lying around. When she wasn't reading, Sophia was making flowers out of some construction paper and old magazines she found. It was just something to spruce up the cell block a bit. Others cleaned their weapons a few times, card games were played, and a few even read some of the books or magazines from the library as well.

As the day progressed into evening and the rolling thunder continued to ebb and flow, Rick did something he rarely got the chance to do.

Kick back and relax.

Lying on the bottom bunk of his cell with one hand under his head and the other resting upon his chest, he started out his cell door in the direction of the large windows; watching as the occasional flash of lightning lit up the entire cell block. The sound of thunder and rain was rhythmic and soothing and enough to put him right to sleep if he allowed it. It also allowed him to just stop thinking of every little thing at the moment and focus on nothing in particular.

It was a wonderful reprieve.

Daring to be bold, Rick went as far as to close his eyes and contemplate just going to sleep right then and getting himself a solid twelve hours instead of his usual four and five.

Just as his eyelids drooped, however, a terribly loud crack of thunder echoed around the prison grounds and was followed by Hope's wailing.

Rick's eyes were opened wide and he looked sideways at the grey, brick wall parallel to him as if he could expect to find the infant right there beside him. He knitted his brow together and listened intently to the cries and couldn't help but smile at it.

It made him think about Carl.

Carl had been his pride and joy, his reason for getting up every morning. He used to dream about the kind of man his son would grow up to be; what kind of career he'd have, if he'd get married and have kids of his own someday. Rick had been looking forward to those milestones, and when that future was taken away from him, he'd lost hope that there was a point to anything in this world anymore.

And, then, there was Jo, coming into his life, walking around and looking like she'd swallowed some sort of melon, and brought Sophia back to the group. Because of Jo, he had hope for the world again. Hope, the child, was what her name was. She was like the olive branch from God to Noah after the flood. She was a promise that the world could be better. Having that little baby around, wailing up a storm at all hours of the day or night for any given reason was a reminder that life could go on, and having her around helped Rick put to rest his grief over losing Carl.

Of course he would never forget his son or be one hundred percent over his loss, but Hope felt like he had a second chance at being a father figure. Rick knew all too well that was a bold assumption to make — that Jo would even let him be that kind of person to her child — but it was worth a shot. He delivered that little girl and cared about her as much as anyone in their right mind should about a child, but he also felt love for the child as well. It was hard not to. She was so adorable.

As Hope continued to wail, a louder crack of thunder ripped through the prison grounds, along with another flash of lightning, and shook the building; the rumble of it being felt deep in the chests of every inhabitant. It was very likely that a bolt of lightning had struck something nearby and it was definitely a good thing everyone was inside.

Forgoing the opportunity to sleep, partially because the thunder and lightning was too distracting, Rick sat up in his bed and swung his legs over the edge to plant his feet firmly on the ground. He hunched forward slightly and turned his head to the left, out his cell door, looking at nothing in particular before standing up. Flexing his shoulder blades and arching his back, he made a face as it cracked. He then did the same with his neck; tilting it from side to side until he felt that popping release of pressure. Limbering up, Rick walked out of his cell and nodded to Hershel who was in the following cell, reading some undisclosed book.

When he came to a stop, it was outside Jo's cell.

He peered inside and smirked at how she was trying to rock her daughter in her arms and comfort her throughout the storm. A solitary candle, perched on the small table protruding from the wall opposite Jo's bed, flickered slightly, and offered the only other light in the cell aside from the lightning.

"Not a fan of thunder, is she?" Rick quipped, leaning somewhat against the doorframe.

Jo looked up at Rick, as usual seeming to have sensed he was approaching before he appeared, and not at all surprised to see him there. She shook her head and then looked back down at Hope. "She just won't stop," she answered. "What if it's something more than just the thunder, though? What if she's sick? She _was_ early, after all. Maybe there was some complication we don't know about…"

Rick shook his head. "Don't psych yourself out," he insisted, stepping into her cell. "I'm fairly certain the thunder is just too loud and it's scaring her."

"I suppose." Jo didn't seem so convinced.

Even without the glow from the candlelight, Rick could see Hope was beet red from crying so much. Moving to take a seat beside Jo, he held his hands out. "Let me see her," he said.

Glancing at his hands and then meeting his eyes with her own, Jo relented and handed her child over and watched how her little bundle of howling joy seemed to fit so easily in Rick's arms as he cradled her expertly.

"Hey, there, sweetheart; hush now," he cooed. "Shh, it's okay. That thunder ain't gonna hurt you. It's all bark and no bite. Now, the walkers outside those fences, on the other hand, they're the exact opposite. Either way, ain't nothing gonna get to you because I won't let it, okay?" Rick began to rock her gently from side to side. "C'mon, shh, everything is fine. You don't want to give your mama a headache with those vocal cords of yours, do you? All that pain she went through so you could get here. You owe her one, I reckon."

Jo let out a laugh, still so mesmerized by how easy Rick was with Hope. It was a pleasant sight to her and something strange began to stir inside of her. The look on his face as he looked down at her daughter was, if she wasn't mistaken, one of love. It wasn't adoration like the looks everyone else gave Hope, mostly because she was just an adorable little baby. Who didn't love babies, after all? But, Rick, though…

As he continued to comfort her little one, Jo noticed how Hope gradually began to calm down, even with the thunder sporadically booming, the flashes of lightning, the howling wind and constant splatter of rain against the cell block's windows.

"She really likes you," Jo commented with a smile.

"I really like her, too." One corner of Rick's mouth lifted in a half-smile as he leaned his face down slightly and then lifted Hope up slightly so he could press his lips to her forehead. "Whenever I'm feeling stressed, which is most of the time these days, this little one's face pops into my head and I feel a little better."

"I know the feeling."

Jo was looking at Rick when she'd spoken, and quickly she looked away, toward her candle and folding her hands in her lap.

 _Do you mean Hope, as well, or Rick?_ She questioned herself, because even _she_ wasn't completely sure.

She did feel Rick turn and look at her then, but she maintained her gaze ahead of her. She was unable to shake the strange feeling in her; something akin to butterflies in her stomach that made her internally chastise herself.

"So, uh, how long do you think this storm's gonna to last?" she asked, trying to make conversation.

Jo could see him shrug out the corner of her eye.

"I dunno," Rick replied. He leaned back against the wall and pulled Hope with him, resting her upon his chest. "I think the brunt of it is rolling through right now. It'll probably ease up by morning. We still might get some rain throughout the day, but how hard I'm not sure. Maybe steady, maybe a drizzle."

"Or maybe not at all."

Rick nodded. "Maybe." He leaned his chin to his chest, pressing his lips to the top of Hope's head as she fell completely silent against him.

Jo turned and looked at the pair again and her heart swelled at the sight without her warranting it. "You're like a baby whisperer," she joked. "Maybe you should be the one to calm her in the middle of the night when she's not hungry or needing a diaper change, and just needs to cry."

"Maybe I will," Rick commented, turning his head slightly and looking upon Jo to find her looking at him with a gaze he couldn't interpret. "Do I have something on my face? Drool, maybe? I was trying to catnap earlier."

"What—oh. No, I, uh…just admiring how well you are with her," Jo fumbled, gesturing to her daughter before shoving her hands under her legs to sit on them. She hunched forward a bit on the mattress and kicked her feet back and forth, letting them drag against the concrete floor. "I think I'm just jealous at your mad skills."

Rick snickered. "You'll get there. No parent knows what they're doing right away," he assured. "Honestly, I don't think parents ever really know what they're doing. It's all about learning as you go. You'll make mistakes and learn from them, but you don't have to worry about making those mistakes alone. You got me—uh, all of us." Rick looked away from Jo and back down at Hope, trying to ignore his Freudian slip which surprised him a little.

"I appreciate it more than you know."

Rick shrugged again. "It ain't nothing."

"No," Jo shook her head. "It's everything."

The two of them turned and faced each other, locking eyes. His blue and her green softened and both mirrored the flickering of the candle's small flame.

But, suddenly, it seemed as if that the candle flame wasn't the only flame in their eyes, and as they both became increasingly aware of the change in the air between them, they clammed up and looked away. Rick sat back up and off the wall, but continued to hold Hope against his chest while Jo pulled one of her hands out from under her leg to run a hand through her hair.

"Have you, uh, had anything to eat for dinner yet?" Rick asked, changing the subject.

"No, um, not yet," she answered. "I've fed and changed Hope not that long ago and have just been trying to keep her calm."

"Why don't you go get something to eat then? I'll take care of her for now," he said, referring to the infant in his arms. When Jo hesitated to move, he nodded at her. "Go ahead. I got her."

Catching his eye once more, Jo nodded back at him. "Okay," she muttered. "Thank you."

Rick stood up with her but let her walk past him first out of her cell. He watched as she brushed her hands along her backside and he couldn't help himself but recall seeing it completely bare, a mere week earlier, when she had to disrobe her lower half so she could give birth. He also couldn't help himself and recall what a lovely ass she had and then he winced, feeling like a dirty old man or something. Not that he was an actual old man compared to her. They were only about six years apart in age. Some days, though, he felt a few decades older.

As Jo slipped into the Common Room to find food, Rick began to pace along C Block, continuing to cradle Hope against his chest; letting his lips linger against the peach fuzz that was the hair atop her little head. He could tell that Hope had managed to fall asleep amid the storm, and he felt a slight swell of pride in being responsible for that feat. Either that or Hope had been too overtired and her little body just couldn't stay awake any longer, thunder be damned. Rick preferred to think it was the former explanation.

As he continued to pace, Rick caught sight of Hershel looking up from his book. The two men locked eyes for a moment; the older man flashing a grin at the sight of Rick with Hope. When Rick looked away, he cast his eyes upward and spotted Lori sitting on the floor with her legs dangling over the edge of the upper level and resting her arms on the railing. He realized she was looking back at him with a sad look upon her face, but when he locked eyes with her, she smiled a little at him.

Rick couldn't help but think that maybe she was remembering Carl as she watched him with Hope, and how he used to pace with their son as an infant when it was his turn to get up with him in the middle of the night. Or, maybe, she was thinking about the child she had aborted and would've been about a month or so older than Hope right now. Rick had long been able to safely assume that that child wouldn't have been his; not biologically. The timeframe didn't add up, and he knew it had to have been conceived before he awoke from his coma and not when he and Lori made love in their tent at the Atlanta camp. He knew that child was Shane's. But, had things had worked out between him and Lori, Rick knew he would've loved that child, boy or girl, as if it were his own, the same way he loved Hope as if she were his flesh and blood.

Looking away from Lori, he brought his eyes back down to the top of Hope's head and gave her another little kiss as a thought popped into his head.

He wished he was Hope's father.

Jo had green eyes, but Hope had blue, which Rick knew meant The Governor must be blue-eyed. He wondered if Jo found it difficult to look into her own daughter's eyes sometimes, being reminded of the man who raped her and unfortunately fathered the child. Though, Rick also had blue eyes, which made a part of him feel like it could be easy to think of Hope as his own. He had been there when she was born and would continue to be there for her as she grew, if this world and Jo allowed him, God willing. He could be killed tomorrow. He didn't know. But he was determined to be here for the little girl no matter what and keep her and her mother safe.

Stepping through the door into the Common Room, he took noticed of Jo making some Ramen noodles at the portable stovetop as Merle and Daryl were joking with her about something.

Merle, who had been let out of his cage two days after Rick locked him in it during the nighttime, had been allowed to join the others in C Block, claiming one of the empty cells on the upper level at the very end, beside Andrea's cell. There had been only one instance where Merle tried his hand at trying to flirt with the other blonde but she shot him down without missing a beat and was then warned to keep it in his pants by Shane, unless he wanted to end up back in his cage.

Now, Merle was socializing with the group as if no time between the Atlanta camp to now had passed. T-Dog still avoided him, and vice versa. There was no love lost there.

Axel and Oscar were also in the Common Room, eating some dinner as well. The two former inmates had also been allowed to move into C Block, sharing a cell at the opposite end of the upper level from Merle. Rick had felt they'd earned their place with the group and they no longer posed a threat. Perhaps, in time, they could be considered like family along with the others.

"Oh, yeah, right," Jo laughed at whatever Merle had just said to her.

Rick hadn't been paying attention. He'd been too lost in thought.

"I swear on my right hand. Oh, wait," he muttered, letting a sly grin take up residence on his face.

Rick watched as Jo shook her head and smiled brightly. She seemed oblivious to the fact that he was looking at her at the moment, which was fine. It allowed him to admire her from afar without feeling embarrassed to do so.

He liked the way the smile on her lips reached her eyes and how the corners of her eyes crinkled, creating crow's feet. He liked how she tried to downplay her smile as if she wasn't that amused, when she really was. He liked the way her hair fell around her face and sometimes in her eyes. He liked how strong she was determined to be and how he could tell when she was simply pretending she was fine even when she was having a particularly bad day. He liked that he was getting to know her more and more, and found nothing about her he didn't like.

Mostly, Rick liked how she made him feel when they were together, or even when he merely looked at her from a distance as he was now, or even just thinking about her.

Basically, Rick just liked her.

Quite a bit, actually; to the point where these strange feelings stirred in his gut, making him feel flush and as his skinned tingled.

Watching discreetly as Jo stirred in the packet of flavoring into her bowl of hot noodles, Rick was hit with a realization that excited him and terrified him at the same time.

However, instead of facing it, Rick turned out of the Common Room and returned into C Block to pace with Hope some more; thinking that maybe walking back and forth, away from Jo, could help clarify what was going through his mind all of a sudden.

_Could I be—?_

 

* * *

 

The following day, as Rick had expected, the storm had more or less passed, but a slight sprinkle of rain still remained, along with the grey clouds. The brunt was over, though, until the next storm decided to roll through.

The morning was spent cleaning up the courtyard of all the debris the winds had whipped around throughout the previous day and night and getting a little rained on in the process. Almost everyone was outside helping, mostly just as an excuse to be outside in general after being so cooped up the day before.

By afternoon, when the rain all but subsided, Jo had left Hope inside for a little bit with Carol and Sophia so she could go outside and help out as well. Half of the group had come back inside by that point to grab something to eat, having skipped breakfast earlier.

She stepped out into the caged entrance, taking the steps one at a time and smiling at the cool, misty breeze on her face. It was refreshing and a nice change from the somewhat stale air inside C Block. As she pushed the caged entrance's door open and stepped fully into the courtyard, Jo took sight of Rick hunching forward to pick up a wooden crate and she couldn't help herself but admire the way his dampened T-shirt clung to his skin, outlining every contour of the muscles in his back and shoulder area.

Biting her lips together, Jo's mind wandered for a few seconds before Shane turned toward her and acknowledged her presence.

"Hey, Jo. Lookin' for something other than nursing to do?" he quipped.

Jo smirked and nodded. "Something like that."

Rick stood up straight and turned around to face her. His eyes lingered on hers for a moment until she glanced away, and then his eyes dropped subconsciously to her chest before he chastised himself and looked over at Shane instead. "I think we got most of area cleaned up already," Rick remarked, speaking to Jo although he wasn't looking directly at her. "We had all hands on deck this morning. There's not much left to do."

Jo shrugged and smiled. "Then I'll just find a place to sit and enjoy the fresh air."

Rick paused for a moment, looked down at the crate in his hands and then stepped over to Jo and offered it to her. "Here. It's sturdy enough. Tip it upside down and you can sit on this."

Jo followed his gaze to the crate and smirked. As she reached out to take it from him with both hands, their fingers brushed against each other and it felt like a shock of electricity sparked between them. Jo could feel her face and ears beginning to flush with warmth. It didn't help any when Rick caught her eye and placed a hand briefly to her arm while they stood so close to each other. As her stomach somersaulted slightly, she managed an appreciative smile, though it came out a little lopsided from how awkward she suddenly felt around him. Rick, too, seemed slightly flustered and quickly looked away to return to the remaining debris several feet away where he was originally standing.

As Jo set the crate upside down on the ground and sat upon it, she folded her arms on her lap and began to watch the others milling around and feeling a little weird to just sit there and not doing anything. She brought her face skyward, looking up at the clouds that were different shades of grey, but none looked threatening. Though it wasn't exactly raining anymore, the mist continued and it still felt wonderful and the air smelled clean, which wasn't always the case in the courtyard from the latent stench of dead walkers.

Her eyes wandered back to Rick a few times, watching the flex of his muscles through his shirt and how his damp curls clung around his face. She couldn't help but smirk at the thought that popped into her head; how her and her friends, from before the apocalypse, used to talk among themselves about men and how they always looked so sexy when they were dripping wet.

When the thought of what Rick looked like stepping naked out of a shower appeared in her mind, Jo blinked it away and felt embarrassed, as if her thoughts could be broadcast over a PA system for everyone to hear or worrying that maybe someone had telepathy and could read her thoughts and would judge her accordingly.

Rick couldn't help stealing a few glances at Jo, either. Fortunately, each time, she happened to be looking away or up at the sky. The mist was slicking her hair down and creating a sheen of moisture on her skin, which already added to the glow she had about her since giving birth. She probably looked as haggard as the others on a day to day basis, but maybe Rick was just biased because of how he had realized he felt about her the night before.

She could probably be covered from head to toe in blood and walker entrails and she would still be beautiful to him.

However, he tried not to focus on that at the moment, because it distracted him and slowed him down and he didn't want anyone else asking him what was on his mind because he felt as if he would stumble over his words and look like an idiot.

The fact that he was feeling this way about another woman again felt like new territory. The only woman who had ever held his heart no longer wanted it and, over the last several months, he came to realize, more and more, that he didn't want her to have it anymore. But Rick was nervous, too, because he doubted Jo felt the same way. After everything that had been done to her by The Governor and having just given birth, she more than likely wasn't even thinking of any possibility of a romance with _anyone_ anytime soon. As far as he knew, her dead husband was the one who still held her heart and he wasn't going to try and steal hers if she wasn't ready.

Sure, he liked Jo — he really, _really_ liked Jo. The idea of being in love with her had only just recently reared its head. But he wasn't sure he if this was the right time for such things. With so much going on to worry about, was there a point to pursuing new relationships outside friendship? Sure, okay, Maggie and Glenn were an exception, and perhaps even Shane and Lori were, too.

Where was Rick trying to go with this line of thinking?

He didn't know if he was even making any valid points to himself or if his mind was just rambling in thought.

When he stood up straight and tried to set aside reason and logic and turned the volume down in his head, he was able to listen to the sound of his beating heart and the blood coursing in his veins. It resonated into his ears like drums. He turned around and noticed the others had more or less finished and were making their way back inside of the prison with the exception of Merle and Andrea, who were headed up to the inner tower to take the first watch since the storm descended and, of course, Jo, who still remained seated on the crate.

"Aren't you gonna head back inside, too?"

"I just got out here a few minutes ago," she replied. "Are you trying to get rid of me?"

He stood stock still, thinking she was serious in her question, but when a smile gave way on her face, his shoulders slouched and he smiled back, shaking his head. "No, I just figured…actually, I don't know what I figured." Rick shrugged and placed his hands on his hips.

Jo pulled herself up to her feet and subconsciously mirrored his stance as she looked upward toward the tower where Merle and Andrea were leaning against the observance deck's railing, talking as they looked off toward the main gates at a few walkers aimlessly walking along. Rick was watching her at that moment, unaware that he was still smiling. He just stood there, wondering if she knew how pretty she was and just thanking his stars that he and the others had happened upon her and Sophia in that house about a month and a half before.

As Jo looked away from the tower, she found Rick's soft gaze upon her and she could feel warmth rising to her cheeks. When she looked him in the eye, she noted the color reminded her of the color she and her husband Oscar had painted their living room a few years earlier. 'Chicago Blues' the swatch had said, and Rick's eyes were a perfect match.

It almost felt like foreshadowing in a way.

"Thank you again for helping to take care of Hope last night," she remarked before pulling her bottom lip inward to bite it. "I don't know how I would've managed to do it if you hadn't found Sophia and me. We'd both probably be dead right now."

"Well, technically, T-dog found you two first. Shane, Daryl and I just sort of followed after," Rick downplayed.

"Tomato, to _mah_ to." She smirked.

In a bold move, Jo closed the gap between them by wrapping her arms around his shoulders and hugging him. She laid her head on his shoulder and, for a moment, Rick was stunned. However, he quickly reciprocated the gesture, releasing a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding in. His grip around her back with his own arms was firm yet soft and he rested his own head upon her shoulder as well, subtly inhaling the scent of her hair.

When they slowly pulled apart, Rick's nose brushed against her cheek and they stared at each other for a moment before he leaned back in. Without really thinking on it, he placed his lips briefly upon her cheek, but close to the corner of her mouth. And it wasn't just a quick, platonic peck either shared between two lifelong friends. It was slow, deliberate and loving; the kind of kiss you give to someone who has taken your breath away.

Rick then pulled away quickly, realizing the move he'd made and clammed up a little, but the blush in Jo's cheeks and the small smile on her lips lessened his anxiety over it all. He released another breath he had inhaled and forgot he'd been holding.

"I–I'm sorry," he muttered sheepishly, regardless of her smile which had eased his mind a little.

Jo cupped her right hand over his left wrist. "Don't be."

Rick looked down at her hand as it slipped away. Taking a few steps backward, Jo turned around as he looked up to watch her retreat back into the prison, leaving him alone in the courtyard.

Breathing in and out a few times as his thoughts whirled around like a cyclone of self-chastising and wonderment, he cast his eyes upward toward the tower where Merle and Andrea were facing away from him and he just prayed they hadn't seen that awkward interaction between him and Jo. And if they had, he hoped they kept it to themselves. He didn't even want them to mention it in passing to him only.

Rick suddenly felt like a teenager who kissed a girl for the first time and was worried about what she really thought about what had happened.

Was she okay with it?

Did she like it?

Did she _not_ like it?

Did she like _him_?

 _Oh my god_ , he thought. _What are you, Rick—fifteen years old?_

Maybe she didn't mind the kiss after all. Maybe she _did_ like him, as he liked her. And, after all, it was only a kiss to the cheek. It wasn't a full on, unwarranted make-out session. But, still…

How did he even go about facing her after that?

Would the two of them pass each other awkwardly from there on out? What if the kiss put a wedge between them? Though, assuming she _did_ like the kiss and she _did_ like him, where did they go from there? Should he talk to her about it? Maybe he should just let it pass like water under the bridge and let her approach him next in her own time, if she felt the desire to.

Raising a hand and running it through his hair, Rick looked down at the ground and couldn't help but smirk a little to himself.

All things considered, it felt like it would be a good day.

 

* * *

 

Within the thick of the trees along the edge of the woods, two men stood and, for some time, had been staring at the prison through the branches keeping them veiled from view. They watched the walkers that roamed idly along the fences, and they studied the overall property and its fortifications. One of the men, the taller one, held up a pair of binoculars to his face, spying a man and a woman in one of the guard towers closer to the buildings. A smirk played upon his lips before he brought the binoculars down a little and saw another man and woman embracing followed by what looked to be a kiss. When they pulled apart, the man with the binoculars got a good look at that particular duo's faces.

Dropping the binoculars down and passing them to the shorter man, the taller man's nostrils flared and he grinned victoriously.

"Who is it? Who's in there?" the shorter man asked, turning to his left, to look upon the profile of none other than The Governor.

The shorter man in question was Martinez.

Bedecked in a black eyepatch over his right eye, The Governor glanced over at Martinez and simply smirked.

"Is that Merle?" Martinez wondered aloud once he'd brought the binoculars up to his own eyes.

"Yes."

"There's a woman up in that tower with him. She's blonde. Is that—?"

"No."

"The other guy…a different blonde is walking away from him. Is that —?"

The Governor grinned. He knew what the other man was going to ask and he knew the answer was in the affirmative. However, he felt amused by this discovery, turning his body to face Martinez.

"Maybe."


	14. Blood

_"It will have blood, they say; blood will have blood."_ — William Shakespeare, 'Macbeth'

* * *

  
The grey clouds had given way to considerable sunshine the following morning. At dawn, Rick was up and outside placing wooden pallets upright against the chain-link fencing of the bridge. Aside from the shuffling of his own footsteps and the clattering of wood against metal, the only sound Rick could hear were birds chirping. He couldn't even hear the groans of walkers outside the fences. If he closed his eyes, he could easily pretend it was the world before.

On the subject of before, Rick hadn't spoken one on one to Jo since the day before when he'd briefly kissed her cheek. A centimeter closer and it would've been her lips but he hadn't been that daring just yet. It wasn't that he really avoided her at all or vice versa, they were just pulled in different directions by the others. Hope needed her mother and Sophia had found the last Harry Potter book to read because apparently she had never read the books and only saw the movies, but the last two movies based on the last book were never released because the world ended. Jo had asked Sophia to read the book aloud to her, so they would both have some entertainment. Rick, on the other hand, had cleaned his Colt Python, grabbed some food and eventually relieved Andrea and Merle of watch tower duty; taking over with Carol, who wanted to contribute more than just cleaning and cooking.

But now it was a new day and Rick went about finding more things to use to help fortify the prison or items that could be used to possibly turn into makeshift weapons in case their bullets ran out or they lost the blades.

Glenn and Maggie were up in the main tower. They'd relieved Rick and Carol in the middle of the night and were still up there. However, they were unseen at the moment and Rick easily assumed they were doing something other than keeping guard, but Rick was fine with it. There were no immediate threats in the area and he was outside in case he noticed anything and could call out to the couple or the others inside the prison, if they weren't still asleep. The young couple deserved some alone time, away from the others in their cells once in a while, to do what young couples did best.

Standing straight, he hooked his fingers into the chain-link fencing of the bridge and looked down at the courtyard as a whole, just admiring this home he and the others had created for themselves and how he felt it could last for them for a long time. The sun was warm on the back of his neck and not shining directly in his eyes so he didn't have to squint to look ahead of him. The gentle breeze navigated through the buildings, flicking at a few of his errant brown curls; one or two tickling at his temples.

Rick smiled.

There was no way this wouldn't be a good day.

The familiar creaking of a door brought his eyes to the right, where he saw Hershel stepped out of the caged entrance from C Block. His heartbeat quickened and his smile became brighter at the sight of Jo following behind the old man, with Carol and Axel in tow as well. Sophia joined, also, closing the cage door behind the others, and then took her copy of _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows_ over to one of the bleachers; clearly wanting to enjoy her book in the warm sunlight.

Rick's gaze was biased, however; focusing primarily on Jo.

She had her back to Rick and was talking to Hershel about something, pointing to the area just in front of them and then over to the right, past the bleachers where they had several of their vehicles parked. Rick was curious what they were discussing. He was happy to see them going about their lives as usual, but grew concerned when he didn't immediately see any weapons upon them when they knew full well the rules they had agreed upon about when being outside the cell block.

_Always carry a gun and a blade of some sort. You never know._

Walking off the bridge at his left, he descended a set of stairs and then out a door that led directly into the courtyard. Wiping his hands on the sides of his black jeans, Rick approached Carol and Axel first, since they were closer.

"You two got your weapons on you?"

Carol looked down at her side and it was obvious she was mentally chastising herself. "Shit, sorry, Rick. I forgot. I was distracted with cleaning up some breakfast dishes and Sophia wanted to come outside to read."

Rick nodded. "Well, you don't have to go get it right now, but just try not to forget again. I know it's a nice day and that, in itself is distracting, but you never know when something might happen." He placed a hand on the woman's shoulder and then cast a glance at Axel. "What about you?"

"I've got a knife," the blonde former inmate remarked, patting his front pocket. "I've never actually fired a gun before, which is ironic."

"Why's that?" Carol wondered.

"I was arrested for robbing a gas station with a plastic toy gun." Rick narrowed his eyes and Axel elaborated. "When they came to arrest me they found my brother's gun in his house where I was, and they assumed that was the gun I used." He shrugged with a laugh. "Life's a bitch and then you die, right?"

Rick smirked and moved over toward Sophia, placing a hand on her back. "Sweetheart, why don't you move to that set of bleachers over there so you're not directly in the open?"

Sophia looked up at him and nodded obediently, getting up and walking to the other bleachers with her book.

Last, was Hershel and Jo; the former was standing at such a way that he could see Rick approaching while Jo couldn't. "Morning, Rick."

"Morning, Hershel. You got your weapons on you, right?"

Hershel nodded and pulled a small handgun out of his pocket. "I don't much like having to carry it on me at all times, though. It makes me feel a little uneasy," the older man admitted.

"Well, you only need it on you outside. You know it's a necessity right now."

"Unfortunately, I do."

Rick looked next to Jo, who was looking back at him already with a slightly guilty smile. "I have my pocket knife," she offered before he could ask what she had on her. "I left my gun in my cell. Hope needed to be fed and afterward Lori offered to look after her for a while and I completely walked right by my cell and started to talk to Hershel and then the others were coming outside…"

"I take responsibility for distracting her," Hershel remarked with a smile and a wink at the blonde.

Jo smiled back at him and then returned her gaze to Rick who was trying his best to look serious, but failing at it. With his hands on his narrow hips, he shrugged and looked between the pair on either side of him.

"I suppose just this once I can let it slide," Rick said with a hint of a smile creeping onto his lips, and focusing on her. "When you go inside next, can you grab your gun, though?"

She nodded. "Aye, aye, captain." Bringing a hand to her head, she mock saluted him.

Placing his own hand on Rick's arm, Hershel took his leave from the younger pair and walked over to talk to Carol and Axel about something. Rick then took that moment to finally breach the subject of the day before with Jo, despite how anxious it made him.

"Listen, I need to talk to you about, uh, yesterday; about what happened, about what I _did_."

Jo held in a chuckle and briefly pressed a hand to the same spot on his arm that Hershel had. "You make it sound like you hit me or something."

"N-no, I just," Rick looked down at his feet. "I feel like I owe you an apology. I didn't mean to catch you off guard or create any awkwardness between us."

With a lighthearted roll of the eyes and her smile, which didn't seem to be fading away anytime soon, Jo shook her head. "It was just a kiss, Rick, and on the cheek to boot. I said yesterday it was okay, and today I am reaffirming it was okay," she insisted. "Yes, you _did_ catch me off guard, but no, there is no awkwardness, at least not on my part."

Rick released a noticeable sigh of relief and allowed a less anxious smile to take up residence on his lips. "That's good to know."

Jo sucked her bottom lip inward and chewed on it for a moment. Upon leaning forward, she didn't look directly at him as she uttered, "For what it's worth, it was a very nice kiss on the cheek and, for future reference, if you're worried about asking my permission to do it again, and _not_ on the cheek, I would not be adverse to it." When she finally did meet his eye, that familiar change in the air from two nights prior seemed to return; like a match that was quickly dragged across its striker and coming alight with a flame.

Rick had to take a second to realize what she'd said, and even Jo had to come to terms with what she had admitted without wavering. She had more or less just admitted to him that she liked him, and it was obvious now to her that he felt something for her, and that he knew she knew. And now he knew she was open to a future kiss, which meant he knew she liked him, too. And, for the love of God, this was all very junior high.

Rick couldn't even seem to form words right away. He looked quietly down at the ground and nodded his initial response. "Um…also, uh, good to know," he remarked. He was positive he was blushing like a teenage girl, so he chose to look away from her and distract himself by looking toward the sky and focusing on the warmth of the morning sun beating down on their heads. "I should, uh…I should…"

 _For the love of Christ, Grimes, get your shit together_ , he chastised himself.

"I'm gonna check and see how Sophia's doing with her book," Jo spoke, saving him from trying to think up and excuse to step away from her to avoid further embarrassing himself.

"Yeah." Rick lowered his gaze and locked eyes with Jo long enough for him to catch the impish smile on her lips before she turned and walked over to the thirteen year old girl on the bleachers. He continued to stand there for a few more moments when he heard Glenn calling for him up in the guard tower.

"Rick! The fence!"

Immediately, his senses were alerted and Rick ran to the gate and peered in the direction Glenn was pointing. Maggie was sidling up beside him, struggling to adjust her shirt with just one hand, which Rick had no time to find amusing; not the one-handed part, but the disheveled clothing part.

Thinking the worst, Rick was relieved to see it wasn't as bad as it could be.

The main, outer fence closer to footbridge that led to the woods was amassing quite a herd of walkers and it looked as if the fence was weakening under the weight of them all pressing upon it.

"Take out as many as you can from there!" Rick called up to Glenn and Maggie. Turning to Sophia and Jo, gestured at them. "Sophia, go inside the cell block and get the others. We need all hands on deck to take care of the fence issue, but then I want you stay inside with Lori and Hope, alright?"

"You want me to help with the fence, too?" Jo asked, impressed.

"Uh," he was momentarily distracted. "I'd rather you stay here in the courtyard or inside the cell block with Lori and the kids. If something happens, you should be close to your daughter, anyway."

Jo nodded compliantly. She couldn't deny the logic in his words. "Sophia, ask Andrea to bring out my gun, will ya?" she said to the girl before she disappeared into the building. "Tell her it should be on the top bunk in my cell."

"Okay," Sophia said, and off she ran into C Block.

Jo glanced over at Rick, but he was already over at the gate and opening it up. Carol was running up beside him and when he sensed her presence, he turned around and held his hand up.

"No, you don't have your gun on you. Just stay up here with Axel and Hershel."

"She can use my gun," Hershel offered.

"No," Rick insisted. "I had Sophia go get the others and she's going to stay inside, so Carol," he looked at her, "like, I told Jo, you should stay here or go inside, too. Be close to your daughter in case things go south."

"If you insist."

Rick nodded. "I do."

Closing the gate behind him, but not locking it, he unsheathed his machete and began to run over to the main fence. Several gunshots from the tower Glenn and Maggie were in rang out, followed by a few walkers at the outer fence dropping like flies. Jo ran over to the gate with Carol, making sure it stayed closed until the others came out and, when they did, there was a flurry of questions about what exactly happened.

"Too many walkers on the outer fence," Carol informed. "Looks like they could pull it down and get into the yard. Rick went ahead."

Shane cursed under his breath, and yanked the gate open, causing Carol and Jo to both back away rather abruptly as if they'd get whiplash otherwise. Daryl came up behind Carol, placing gentle hand briefly on her shoulder before tearing out into the yard with his crossbow strung up on his back. Merle, Oscar, T-Dog and Andrea followed suit; each brandishing blades, crowbars or poles sharpened explicitly for occasions such as this.

Jo stepped forward and closed the gate after them, but just stood there watching with her fingers curled around the chain-link. Carol stepped back and hesitated on what to do next before making a beeline for their cell block to check on Lori and the kids. Hershel and Axel came up behind Jo and just watched with her.

"There are enough of them to take care of that herd size and keep the fence from caving in," Hershel assured. "This will be just a hiccup, but it will be an incentive to continue keeping our fortifications up to par. We should probably cut down some smaller tree trunks and use them as posts to maintain the fences."

Jo was listening, but her visual focus was on the group, popping walkers in the heads through the fence and watching them drop one and two at a time.

There were a few shouts among those at the outer fence, asking for assistance in certain spots, but everyone was incredibly quick and precise with their kills; wasting no time, because they really couldn't afford to go slow. The fence began to bow in an area where the most walkers were condensing, which brought the majority of the others to that same area.

"We gotta draw some of them away. They're sandwiching on top of each other because they see us in the same spot. Spread out and make them follow you along the fence!" Rick called out. He tapped Oscar on the shoulder, as the large man was closest to him at the moment. "I need you to come outside the fence and help me draw some away. We can pull the downed ones away from the fence afterward."

Oscar nodded, although he seemed a bit apprehensive. "I wish I'd grabbed some of that riot gear, or that it fit me."

Rick smirked despite the situation. He patted Oscar's gut briefly and then gestured for Oscar to follow. They ran across the grassy yard, with Andrea following to open and close the gates for them. Once the duo were outside the fences and free of the prison ground's security, they began to call out to the walkers and head toward the footbridge. If they could get the walkers to slip into the small waterway and lose their footing, it would make things a lot easier to get the upper hand.

It took about another five or ten minutes after that, but the group eventually dispatched with the last walker. The buildup outside the outer fence was somewhat tiresome to even think about moving. They would need to bring the truck down and load up the bed, so there'd be fewer trips removing the bodies to be burned.

Rick looked at Oscar and placed a hand on his shoulder in thanks for the help as he watched the others head back up toward the courtyard after he'd mentioned getting the truck and bringing it outside the fence to them.

Everything seemed calm and quiet at this point and they had just successfully maneuvered over a slightly difficult situation. But they proved they were more than capable of doing what had to be done in to ensure their primary defenses against walkers.

However, the calm didn't last.

It was merely the calm before the storm.

A solitary gunshot rang out and, for a moment, Rick thought maybe another walker was approaching and one of his people took it out.

But then he heard the scream.

The bullet had whizzed by Jo, barely missing her from where she remained at the gate to the courtyard. Blood splatter sprayed onto her neck and face and into her hair and, for a half a second she wondered if it was her own blood. The sound of someone falling behind her made her turn around and look down at the ground to find Hershel bleeding out from a gunshot wound to the left of his neck.

"Oh my god!" she screamed.

Before she or anyone else could properly react, a barrage of gunfire was opened upon the prison.

Those in the courtyard scattered in a frantic attempt to find cover. Jo had dropped to her hands and knees beside Hershel, holding a hand to his neck; desperate to keep him from bleeding out too much. She winced as more bullets flew by her. One nicked her arm and she yelped. She needed to get to safety, too, but she couldn't leave Hershel. She looked up slightly and saw Axel was dead from multiple gunshots to the head and chest and Carol was taking cover behind his body. The others were shooting through the fences at whoever was shooting at them.

From what Jo could figure out, it was all coming from within the woods and seemingly from all directions.

"My…gun…" Hershel managed to say in between the gurgling of blood in his throat that was still seeping out his wound and now coming up out of his mouth. With one hand, Jo watched the old man withdraw his gun and push it over to her on the ground. "Take…"

Jo looked down at the gun and picked it up, nodding at him and then lifting his hand up and forcing him to hold it against his wound. "Don't die, please."

He risked a smile. "Go."

Jo hesitated but then jumped up to her feet, dodging a few bullets as she was called over by Shane to take cover with him and T-Dog behind one of the bleachers that had been tipped upright as a barricade of sorts.

"You hit?" Shane questioned, noticing blood running down her left arm.

"Just a graze, I think."

Content with her answer, Shane returned all his attention to aiming between the bleacher seating and firing and the figures that had stepped slightly out of the woods. "Motherfuckers," he growled under his breath as he began to angrily rattle off his vendetta against their assailants. "You come to _my_ home and you fire upon _my_ people. I swear on fuckin' baby Jesus I will fuckin' end you sons of bitches."

"Ditto," T-Dog remarked in agreement, firing off a few shots of his own.

Jo removed the safety from Hershel's gun and focused on where she was going to shoot. She just hoped she didn't hit one of their own, like Rick and Oscar who were still outside the outer fence or Andrea who was caught behind the overturned, grey prison bus.

"Rick," she muttered.

"D'you see him?" Shane asked.

"I don't see him at all." Fear began to wash over her as she thought the worst; that Rick had taken a fatal bullet to the head or chest and was lying dead in the grass. When she saw Shane catch her eye, she knew the same thought had entered his mind and it made them both equally scared and angry. "Sons of _bitches_ ," Jo repeated, as she continued to fire the remaining rounds left in Hershel's gun.

But then, the firing stopped and the prison group stopped when they realized they were no longer being shot at.

Taking a chance, several of them stepped out from behind whatever had been protecting them and were able to get a good look at the outskirts of the woods and take notice of the white truck with flood lights parked beside the road that lead into the prison which seemed to have been purposely hidden by some overgrowth.

One large black man and one tall white man with an eyepatch stood on either side with automatic rifles in their hands.

_A man with an eyepatch?_

Jo's heart leapt into her throat and her stomach somersaulted with fear.

"The Governor."

Shane and T-Dog glanced at her as the sound of a vehicle approaching at breakneck speed wafted through the air.

Moments later, what appeared to be a white and orange bread truck rammed right into both gates at the entrance to the yard. Andrea barely had enough time to get out of the way so that she wasn't run down. The bread truck drove halfway up the roadway in the yard and turned around slightly and then came to a stop. Everyone was so confused and curious about what was going on that they just stopped and stared.

Then, the back door lowered down abruptly, looking like a ramp, as walkers streamed out of the bread truck, with the fully-armored driver fleeing the prison's yard, and firing off a few shots with their own gun at whoever began firing back at him or her.

As gunshots began to ring out again, everyone took cover once more.

"Andrea! Get the hell out of there!" a voice screamed.

It was Rick, taking cover in the tall grass with his own gun which was out of bullets.

The Governor and his fellow assailants returned to their truck and pulled away as the prison group was left to deal with the new onslaught of walkers; those delivered to them in the yard and those outside the fences that were drawn out of the woods from the gunfire and shouting.

When Jo was certain they were safe from being shot, she dropped Hershel's gun. There were no bullets left in it anyway. Her first instinct was to run inside to check on Hope, but she knew her daughter was safe with Lori and Sophia inside the prison. Hershel, on the other hand…

Running over to him and dropping down beside him, she scanned her eyes over his face and tears stung her eyes when she saw how lifeless his own eyes were, staring blankly up at the sky; the last thing he would've seen. He was still bleeding out from his neck, though at a considerably slower pace. From all the blood loss, his body had grown too weak for him to keep the hand Jo had placed upon his neck stationary. Both his hands were resting flat on the ground, pooling in his blood. But the neck wound wasn't the only wound anymore. A few ricocheted bullets had struck him at random places on his body, which probably expedited his death. There were no shots to his head though, which meant it was only a matter of time before he reanimated.

"Maggie!" Jo cried out, knowing the brunette was nearby in the main tower.

Upon hearing her name called, the younger woman looked in the direction it came from and immediately screamed in grief when she saw her father lying on the ground in his own blood. "No! Daddy!"

Tearing out from the observance deck and down the tower's stairwell, Maggie quick busted through the door and pulled open the inner gate with her only hand. Running up to her father's body, she dropped to her knees as tears flooded her face.

Jo did all she could think to do and place a comforting hand on the small of her fellow female's back.

"He's gonna come back soon," Merle remarked, sauntering up with Daryl at his side, and sweating like a sinner in church. He wiped his brow with the back of his left hand and then gestured down at Hershel. "We're gonna have to take care of him."

"Don't you touch him!" Maggie barked. Then, after a sobering moment, she added, "I'll do it myself."

"Maggie, you don't have to do that," Shane insisted.

" _Yes_ , I do. He's my father. He's _my_ responsibility."

Pulling her pocket knife out, Jo flicked it open and handed it over to Maggie. With a grateful nod, Maggie accepted the small blade and gripped it tightly in her right hand and held it over her father's forehead for a moment, shaking slightly. She had such a determined look on her face but her resolve was crumbling. Without warning, Maggie sank back onto the heels of her feet and her shoulders slouched in defeat.

"I can't," she admitted. With an overwhelmed look of sadness, Maggie caught Jo's eye and handed the pocket knife back. "I can't do it."

"It's okay," Jo assured. She suddenly sensed all eyes were on her and it was like everyone was holding their breaths. Holding tight to the knife with her right hand, she used her left to smooth back Hershel's hair at the top of his head and then hold his head still. She could see Maggie staring at her father's face out the corner of her eye. "Maggie, look away," she said adamantly.

As Maggie slowly relented and turned her face, Jo released a breath and sank the blade of her pocket knife directly into Hershel's temple. The moment she pulled the blade back out, the inner gate creaked and rolled open as Glenn sauntered into the courtyard and dropped down beside Maggie, taking her in his arms as her sobs began to rack her body. Moments later, Andrea and Rick followed, quickly locking the gate behind them.

"Where's Oscar?" Jo heard Carol ask.

There was no verbal response from Rick, but Jo could hear him shaking his head, signifying that Oscar, too, had died this day.

"Aw, no…Hershel," Rick groaned, realizing who everyone was huddled around.

He stepped forward and crouched down on the other side of the older man's corpse, across from Jo, Maggie and Glenn. His eyes focused briefly on Hershel's face, the gunshot wound to his neck and then over at Jo's hands, holding her pocket knife and covered in Hershel's blood. Lifting his own sad gaze upon her face, he could see she was considerably unnerved by everything, the same as the others. But, now she also had the weight of having been the one to put Hershel down before he reanimated on her shoulders. Reaching a hand up to Hershel's face, Rick closed the dead man's unseeing eyes and then, with the same hand, he reached across to Jo and took her pocket knife from her. She didn't seem to mind the gesture. It was almost as if she was thankful to be free of it.

"Is everyone else accounted for? Anyone hurt?" he wondered.

"Axel's dead," Carol offered up.

Rick nodded and scanned the group. In minutes, their numbers had dropped from sixteen to thirteen. Losing the former inmates wasn't hard to accept, but Hershel had been like father to everyone, not just literally to Maggie. He had been their father, or grandfather in Sophia's case, their brother, their friend, their doctor and the moral center of their group.

"One of the bullets that struck Axel as I used him for cover went through and got my thigh," Carol continued. The others looked up and noticed she was holding her leg.

Daryl was at her side in a heartbeat, throwing an arm around her back. "C'mon, let's get you inside and that bullet taken out."

Carol nodded and allowed him to cart her off.

"What just happened here?" Andrea demanded, completely flustered; her nerves shot.

"The Governor," Jo and Merle said at the same time. They even looked at each other afterward, too.

"I recognized that truck the moment I saw it. That was The Governor and one of his other goons, Shumpert," the older Dixon added. "No doubt Martinez was nearby; probably hiding in the woods like a little bitch. I don't know who was driving the bread truck, though. They looked small; possibly a female. Could be Haley. She always seemed eager to prove her worth."

"So, The Governor's found us and he just decided to attack us without warning?" T-Dog questioned rhetorically. "What a great guy," he added with a pound of sarcasm mixed with indignation. "Remind me to send him a thank you card."

Glenn had pulled Maggie up to her feet, continuing to embrace her as she cried. Andrea offered a hand, giving the younger woman the same kind of comforting rub to her back that Jo had.

"What do we do next?" Shane asked, looking down at Rick. "What's our next move now?"

"This was strategic," Rick stated, still crouched, with his arms draped over his legs. His eyes were looking down at Hershel's torso, but he wasn't necessarily focused on the torso. He was dazed off in thought. "This was planned. He had to have been watching us, _waiting_ for us. For all we know that herd of walkers on the fence was brought here by him before the sun rose."

Glenn mentally kicked himself. "We should've kept better watch," he said, referring to him and Maggie.

"No, don't blame this on yourselves," Rick insisted. "This is on that bastard. _He_ did this."

"He's sending a message," Jo finally spoke up. "He knows we're here. He's probably seen Merle and me." She began to clam up at her own words. Her brow knitted together and her hands began to shake.

Noticing as much, Rick stood up and walked around Hershel's body to grab her up to her feet as well. He noticed the blood on her arm and the slight gash across her skin. He hadn't realized she'd been shot; even it _was_ just a graze that she had received. There was a lot of blood on her arms, hands and clothes and some splatter on her face, neck and in her hair, but he knew it was all primarily from Hershel. She must've been standing right next to the older man when he'd been shot.

"Hey, I made you a promise," Rick spoke, staring into her eyes which were cast down and away from his face as he gripped her shoulders. "I won't let him get to you or Hope. I won't let him get that far."

Jo lifted her eyes and looked back at him, making a face. "He found us _all_. Oscar, Axel and _Hershel_ are dead because he got that far," she reminded. "Merle said it himself that The Governor's become unhinged. He's out for blood. He wants mine, and probably Merle's, too, for proving to be a turncoat, and he'll take down whoever gets in his way." Jo pulled herself out of Rick's grasp and shook her head. "This is far from over. He's not finished yet."

Rick stared back at her and pursed his lips, scowling, but not at her — at the situation. Glancing upon the other faces of his people, he gave a slight nod of his head. "Then we'll _finish_ it."

Shane scoffed. "How exactly?

"We'll bring the fight to _his_ door and see how _he_ likes it."

"We should just leave here, find someplace new and far away where he can't find us," T-Dog commented.

Rick tilted his head and narrowed his gaze at the man. "Where do you recommend?" he asked but didn't actually expect or need an answer of any kind. "We've put too much of our blood, sweat and tears into making this place safe to just walk away from it."

"Well, it ain't exactly as safe as it was, now is it?" Merle quipped. "That asshole took down those gates like a warm knife cutting into butter."

"Gates can be fixed," Glenn stated, still holding onto Maggie.

"That's right," Rick agreed. He nodded again and looked around at everyone present. "This is our _home_. We will fight to keep it safe and protect our loved ones, and if that means we go to war with that sonofabitch, then that's exactly what's gonna happen." He pointed his finger around, to accentuate the point he was making. "If we don't fight, we die; and I'll be _damned_ if I let any more of us die because of that man."

"If we're taking the fight to Woodbury, I'm going with you," Jo announced.

Rick turned to face her and shook his head. "No, you need to stay here with Hope, and you said yourself you couldn't go back there, and you shouldn't; not after everything he did to you."

Jo shrugged. "That was before he killed Hershel, and Axel and Oscar. That was before he attacked us without warning. Because of everything he did to me is why I need to go back. I can't live in fear of him anymore. I need to face him once and for all so I can kill him."

"That doesn't need to be on your hands," Andrea assured, placing a hand on her fellow blonde's arm.

"Yes, it does." She practically glared at Andrea and jerked away. "Whether it's my fault in the grander scheme of things or not, he came here because of me and what I took from him — his eye, his dead daughter and his unborn daughter, who he may or may not know has been born by now." She turned her eyes upon Rick and, with a steely gaze, added, "I'm not asking for permission to go; I'm telling you that I'm going."

"Can we discuss all of this later?" Maggie asked. "My father's dead and we need to bury him."

"We can't do any of that until we clear out the yard of those walkers and do something about blocking those broken gates," Shane said, gesturing to the walkers that had ambled over to the courtyard's inner gate and were snarling at them from the other side.

"We put down these ones right here and then we can drive the RV down and park it along the opening like we did at that storage facility over the winter," T-Dog spoke, pointing at the walkers along the inner gate with his empty gun. "Then we get to burying. It's still early enough; not even noon, I bet. We got all day to get this shit taken care of, and then we can sit down and talk about our next move now that our hand's been forced."

Rick nodded. "Alright. Let's get some shovels and some sheets to cover our people with."

"I'll get the sheets," Maggie offered, storming off away from the others to head into C Block.

Glenn looked back at them, and chose to follow his girlfriend, leaving the task of taking out walkers and blocking the yard off on Rick, Shane, T-Dog, Merle and Jo.

"Oscar's outside the outer fence," Rick mentioned, lifting his machete and walking up to the inner gate.

"I'll go out there with you to get him," Shane offered, joining his longtime friend at the gate, pulling out his own knife.

As the pair began to pop a few of the walkers in the head through the chain-link, Merle and T-Dog seemed to put aside their own differences at the moment and lift Hershel up and moved him closer to the side of the other cell block, and then do the same with Axel's body so they all had room later to get the RV through the gate.

Daryl came back out shortly after to assist with taking care of the walkers in the yard once T-Dog had gotten behind the wheel of the RV. They opened up the inner gate and down the dirt road he drove, with the others hurrying out after him. Andrea stayed behind in the courtyard, maintaining the inner gate, needing a break from the excitement after having been stuck in the yard when the bread truck barreled in and all those walkers were released. Jo had swapped knives with Andrea, though; handing over her little pocket knife in exchange for Andrea's larger, hunting knife which would do more damage in the yard full of walkers.

Blades sliced through skulls and, even though it wasn't her short sword, which she had only had for a short time but had gotten so keen on using, Jo almost felt as if she was in her element. She was finally contributing the way she felt she should be. It was also therapeutic, and not just for her. Everyone was able to get a lot of their aggression out the walkers; pretending it was The Governor they were killing instead.

At least, that's who Jo envisioned with each stab and slice.

While T-Dog drove the RV outside of the fence, he remained seated, blocking the outer gate while he waited for Rick and Shane to find Oscar's body, which was being gnawed on by other walkers. Luckily, Oscar had been shot at least once in the head so there was no worry of him reanimating. When they began to carry his large body, which was now much heavier from dead weight, T-Dog reversed the RV to give them enough room to get back inside the fences and then he parked it again, completely blocking the entrance.

Merle and Daryl brought the shovels, and Maggie and Glenn had the sheets, having taken the ones from the beds the deceased had been sleeping in. It just seemed like the fitting place to retrieve them from. Maggie took it upon herself to wrap her father's body while Daryl took care of Axel. Hershel and Axel's bodies were loaded up into the bed of the truck they had used earlier in the morning for the walkers that had been gathering on the outer fence and had yet to burn.

Three new graves commenced being dug beside Dale's and when it was time for burial, Lori and Carol came outside with the children, though Jo asked if Lori would hold Hope for her until she cleaned up from all the dirt, sweat and blood that was covering her.

Hershel had been the religious one among them all, despite everything that had happened up to that point. The world had tried and tried, but it hadn't been able to break his faith. But now, with him gone, there wasn't really anyone left knowing what to say over the graves.

So, Glenn did.

The words he spoke were short, but sweet, and they summed up Hershel to a T. A few words were said about Oscar and Axel, too, as not to leave them out, but the focus really was on the retired veterinarian. Maggie, broken from her loss, along with her own faith, had placed her father's bible in his grave with him. When Glenn tried to convince her otherwise, that it was something of her father's that she should keep, she shrugged him off.

"It's just a book," she muttered, and walked away back toward the prison.

One by one, everyone returned to the courtyard, saddened and weary-eyed. They tried to ignore the coagulated blood stains on the concrete left behind by Hershel and Oscar as they reentered C Block and more or less all went their separate ways. Most went to their cells to try and clean up.

Jo, on the other hand, asked Andrea if it was okay if she kept the hunting knife a little longer. When Andrea said it was more than alright, Jo exited C Block with an armful of clean clothes and headed to D Block; cutting through to the shower room they had rigged up just before Hope was born.

Carol had actually been responsible for that. She was just crafty in that way.

Thinking she was alone when she slipped behind the opaque curtain, Jo set down Andrea's hunting knife and began to peel off her shirt. She dropped it unceremoniously to the floor and then slowly stepped out of her jeans and boots, kicking them off in the same pile her clothes were in. Standing there in no more than her bra and underwear, she was about to reach for the lever to get the water pouring out when someone cleared their throat.

Turning around, Jo stuck her head out from behind the curtain and saw Rick standing there in the doorway, looking a little sheepish.

"Sorry," he apologized. "I didn't mean to interrupt you. I thought I'd catch you in time."

Jo shrugged and stepped out, folding her arms under her chest. "It's okay. What did you need?"

Without missing a beat, Rick looked away and stared off at the wall as if it were really interesting. "I just thought maybe you needed some help cleaning up that wound on your arm."

Narrowing her eyes, Jo shifted her weight from one leg to the other. "Are you mad at me because I said I'm going to Woodbury?"

"What? No, I'm not…well, I'm not happy about it, but no. Why?"

"Because you're avoiding eye contact with me like the plague."

Rick lifted a hand and gestured at her. "I'm trying to be a gentleman," he answered. "You're standing there in your underwear."

Jo raised an eyebrow. "You've seen me naked from the waist down," she said, deadpan. "My own husband didn't get to see that much of me until we'd been together almost two years."

"Two years? He held out that long?"

"We were juniors in high school. I wasn't ready till we got to college."

"Oh," Rick nodded, but still couldn't bring himself to give in and look right at her just yet.

"If your delicate sensibilities are still all ruffled, just pretend I'm wearing a bikini. That's less taboo, right?"

Rick finally dragged his eyes over at her, giving her a look that was withering mixed with amusement. "Funny."

Despite everything, Jo smirked back at him. She didn't care that she was standing there in her underwear. She was covered where it counted. She also didn't care that her stomach was still swollen from giving birth a week and a half before. Jo was slowly working on getting that down, but it wasn't a priority and it wasn't something that bothered her much, like it might have in the world before. There were just too many other important things that mattered more.

"I don't need my wound taken care of right now, but thank you," she finally commented. "It'll get cleaned up once I'm showered, but afterward I think I might need a couple of stitches or, at the very least, a bandage. So, if your offer still stands on helping to take care of it…"

"It does," he replied a little too quickly. He was looking directly at her now; there was no shying away like before. "Wound aside — are you doing okay?"

He took a step forward, his hands on his hips.

Jo nodded. "As good as I can be. I mean, we just lost three people today and one of them was Hershel. I felt like he was gonna be the one to outlive all of us in some sort of ironic twist of fate, you know? It doesn't seem right that he's gone."

"Yeah, I know," Rick agreed, glumly.

He took another step forward. Whether it was a subconscious move or not was unknown.

"I'm sorry you got hurt today," he continued, pointing at her arm. "But thank you for helping as much as you did."

"I had to."

"You could've made a run for it back inside here and hid with your daughter."

"I knew she was safe with Lori," Jo said. "And, if I had tried running away, out from behind that bleacher that was keeping me protected, I probably would've been shot and killed, either by a direct bullet or one that ricocheted."

"In that case, I'm glad you didn't run."

Jo smiled. "I'm glad you weren't shot or killed either."

Rick looked down guiltily at the floor. "I kinda _was_ shot."

"What?" Jo's eyes went wide and alert as she closed the gap between them and placed her hands on his arms and tried giving him a once over. "Where? Are you okay?"

Chuckling a little, Rick nodded. "My right leg, but it was just a graze like yours."

Scowling, Jo slapped him hard enough on the chest, causing him to stumble back an inch or two. "You dick," she remarked. "Don't scare me like that." She was looking seriously at him. There was no amusement in her eyes, only concern. "If you'd been killed, too…"

Rick watched as she pursed her lips together and she got that sad, puppy dog look about her. The general concern she had for his well-being made his heart flutter, but he felt bad that he had momentarily given her worry. So, in response, Rick reached his arms out and pulled her into a hug; letting his considerable stubble brush against the smoothness of her cheek.

"I'm sorry. I didn't intend to give you a scare."

Jo returned the embrace, leaning easily into it, and it felt so nice. It was like she was made for his arms. Letting out a sigh, she dug her fingers gently into his upper back. "Don't do it again."

"I'll try my best."

When she lifted her head, they both pulled back slightly at the same time and looked each other in the eye. Rick was smirking somewhat as her own gaze wandered to his lips, and how his bottom lip was fuller than the upper lip, and how soft it looked. Since his eyes had been on hers, he had taken note of the dip her gaze took and knew where she was looking, even if only briefly.

_"For what it's worth, it was a very nice kiss on the cheek and, for future reference, if you're worried about asking my permission to do it again, and not on the cheek, I would not be adverse to it."_

Those had been the exact words she'd spoken to him just that morning.

Lifting his hands to either side of her face, Rick watched as her eyes immediately returned to his. After a moment, he leaned in and kissed her lips, and let it linger as she quickly reciprocated the gesture. Jo leaned her body in a bit more so she could wrap her arms a back again, so that the kiss was pretty much an all or nothing move. Their tongues began seeking access to the other's mouth and their teeth soon clanked against each other the more heated the kiss became.

But that's as far as it went.

After what felt like an eternity, and the need for air became prominent, Rick pulled away first and couldn't help but admire the way Jo's eyes were closed and how her lips were so full and flush from dueling with his own. But he had to stop. If he didn't then, he didn't think he'd be able to at all and he knew she wasn't in that place just yet, even if her kiss said otherwise. Whether she said it or not, Rick knew she was still mentally hung up on what was done to her by The Governor and it hadn't even been two weeks since giving birth. Her mind and her body weren't ready for anything more, and a small fraction of Rick wasn't either.

"That was _no_ cheek kiss," Jo muttered with a lazy smile.

Dropping his hands, he let them linger down to her hips, gripping them slightly as he nodded. "Nope," he agreed. "I'll, uh, leave you alone to freshen up." He began to turn around to leave, running a hand through his hair at how flustered he was feeling in the wake of that kiss.

Jo nodded. "I'll come find you afterward."

Rick stopped and threw her a look over his shoulder. "Oh?"

"My arm's gonna need some attention," she replied. "And with Hershel gone, I'd rather it was you who took care of it. Plus, you're gentle."

He smirked. "Alright," he nodded. "I'll either be in the Common Room or my cell. I won't be far."

"I know."

Jo watched as Rick slipped out of the shower room with what looked to be more of a skip in his usual swagger, and it turned her smirk into more of a smile. After everything they had just been put through that morning, and all the anger, rage and grief they were feeling from their mutual loss, it was always a welcome change of pace to feel something happy. She loved each member of the prison group in different ways, as family or, at the very least, as a friend. However, she was beginning to realize, more and more, that as long as she had her daughter and as long as Rick was around, she could always find happiness. She could always find a light in the darkness.

The red she saw didn't always have to be that of rage or danger. It could be that of love and joy and, maybe, at some point in the future, that of passion.

As Jo stepped once more behind the shower curtain, she slipped out of her bra and her underwear and set them aside with the rest of her stained clothes and boots were. Reaching a hand up, she pulled the lever to the make-shift shower and cold water began to spray down over her head. It gave her a bit of a chill initially, but she did her best to ignore it and, eventually, her body temperature acclimated to the water's temperature to a certain extent.

Watching the water run down her body, Jo rinsing her clean. As she stared down at her feet, she took note of a different kind of red that swirled clockwise down the drain.

Blood.

And it only a tiny fraction of it belonged to her.

And that made her see the angry side of red again.


	15. Live

_"Once I knew only darkness and stillness...my life was without past or future...but a little word from the fingers of another fell into my hand that clutched at emptiness, and my heart leaped to the rapture of living."_  — Helen Keller

* * *

  
That night, following the triple funeral, and after everyone had cleaned up and tended to any wounds, everyone sat or stood around the Common Room to eat something for dinner. The overall mood was somber and no one spoke as they ate and thought about the day's turn of events in silence. Considering how well the day had started, it was heartbreaking the way it ended. Granted, of course, the day wasn't exactly over, but it might as well have been.

Jo went to her cell afterward to nurse Hope in privacy while Andrea assisted Carol with cleaning up the dinner dishes, a task the older blonde usually lamented but, at the moment, cleaning was a nice distraction. Glenn and Maggie took solace with each other in their cell, mourning the loss of Hershel, while Lori and Shane did the same together in their own cell. Daryl had always respected and admired Hershel, and took mourning in his own way, by going off into the depths of the prison to be alone and possibly kill some walkers. Merle, sensing what his brother was about, chose to follow after him, partly to keep an eye on him so he didn't do anything reckless in his grief, while giving the younger man some distance. Sophia cried for a little while, but found comfort in letting the real world disappear for a while by returning to her Harry Potter book. T-Dog had gone to take watch, alone, ignoring Rick's claim that someone should go with him, but T-Dog just scoffed at the notion and said he doubted The Governor would come back for another firefight so soon after the other and, if he did, so be it.

Rick had frowned at T-Dog's response, but there was an air of truth to it. The Governor had clearly made his presence known and gotten his message out; that he knew where they lived and that they were harboring Jo. No one could deny that she was the one he was after, since there was no inclination The Governor was aware Hope had even been born. Jo's stomach was still quite swollen and would take time and exercise to decrease and tone up. From a distance, even if he used binoculars to glimpse her, The Governor would more than likely assume Jo was still pregnant. After all, she had given birth early.

Rick took some comfort in knowing that The Governor wouldn't want Jo dead as long as he still assumed she was pregnant, so if it came to actually having to sit down with that man to negotiate some sort of truce or ceasefire, Rick could keep that guise going. The Governor wouldn't try to harm Jo, but anyone else would more than likely be fair game. He would obviously declare he wanted Jo in exchange for the lives of everyone else in the prison, and a part of Rick felt like maybe some of his group might be okay with that; sacrifice one for the good of many. However, Rick could never agree to such a thing. He would find a way around it and, to be honest, he had no desire to sit down and negotiate with The Governor. Maybe before the attack he might've given it some consideration, especially with Hershel in his ear about it, but Hershel was dead now because of The Governor, and with him went that courtesy.

All bets were off now in Rick's mind.

Sauntering into the cell block, Rick leaned against the wall opposite the cells and slid down it to sit on the ground. He propped his legs up, bent at the knee and stared straight ahead at Hershel's empty cell. He draped his left arm over his left leg as he used his teeth to pick at the dirt under the fingernails of his right hand, all the while lost in some sort of daydream that had nothing to do with Hershel, if he was being honest.

It _did_ have everything to do with the woman in the cell next door, though.

Out the corner of his eye, Rick could see Jo rustling around with Hope; lifting her daughter up to her chest to illicit a burp after the little one had been fed. He couldn't help but smirk when he heard quite the adult-sounding belch come out of such a tiny thing moments later.

Dropping his fingers from his mouth, he turned his tilted his head slightly and then made the decision to get back up to his feet. Slowly, he made his way over to Jo's cell and walked right in, but Jo didn't seem to mind one bit. She rather expected and preferred it. There was no unnecessary pretense between them. Not anymore. At least, not since he'd delivered Hope.

Jo had been right in alluding to how there was no need for him to be shy around her considering all he'd seen during the moments of the little girl's birth. Whether they liked it or not, they were bonded together because of it.

"I thought that sound came from a grown man," Rick tried to joke, in reference to Hope's burp.

Jo chuckled. "I know, right? My little peanut has a healthy appetite and shits like dock worker."

It was Rick's turn to chuckle. He hadn't heard that turn of raise in a long while. He was sure his father was the last person he remembered saying that.

He remained standing there, looking down at the baby girl in her mother's arms, smiling at how that little face made all the bad images in his head disappear for a little while. He was so distracted by Hope's face, though, that he barely noticed the change in Jo's.

"She has his eyes," Jo commented.

Rick brought his attention back to her and furrowed his brow. He immediately knew what and _who_ she meant. It was something he'd been mulling over in his mind a few nights before. "Nah, they're your eyes. They just happen to be a different color," he insisted, to make her feel better.

"I appreciate that, but there's no denying it." Jo pouted down at her daughter. "I feel like such a terrible person for worrying about how I'll feel about my own child when she gets older. When she starts to come into her looks, and if she takes after him, will I resent her? Will I be able to love her wholeheartedly without being reminded of The Governor every time I look at her?"

Frowning sympathetically, Rick knelt down in front of her and placed one hand on her knee and one hand on one of her arms that cradled Hope. "Of course not," he assured. "You had something terrible happen to you, but you can't let it get the better of you. You can't let that bastard win, you understand me? What he did to you was wrong and unforgivable, but try to focus on the fact that, despite what was done to you, you got this amazing little person out of it." Rick moved his hand off her arm to cup the back of Hope's head. "She's one of the good things to come out of what happened."

Jo looked right at him and raised a quizzical eyebrow at him. "What other good thing could've come out of what happened?"

"You survived," Rick replied without hesitation, holding her gaze. "It's made you stronger, more resilient. A weaker person would've given up by now." Watching as she untucked one of her hands from under Hope and curl her fingers around his hand that was on her knee, Rick continued. "You're that dandelion that found a way to grow from between the cracks in the sidewalk."

Jo gave him a small smirk. "I always _did_ admire those dandelions. A lot of people think of them as weeds."

"But they aren't. They're just flowers fighting to live in a cruel world."

"That's rather poetic."

Rick chuckled. "You should hear me reciting Shakespeare."

Jo knitted her brow together and looked impressed. "You can recite Shakespeare?"

"Nope," Rick replied, without missing a beat. "Nothing more than what I can just barely remember from high school English class. Something along the lines of 'shall I compare thee to a summer's day, something, something, the darling buds of May.'"

With a small laugh bubbling forth from her lips, Jo's smirk reached her eyes. "Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly how Shakespeare wrote it," she joked.

Rick gave her knee a squeeze. "See? You're smiling, you're laughing at my lame attempts at poetry and you got a beautiful daughter, regardless of who helped create her." He gave his usual head tilt. "I'd say you're gonna be just fine."

"I hope so."

Standing up, Rick smiled down at her as her fingers slid off his hand in the process. "I know so," he insisted, and then leaned down to place a kiss atop her forehead.

It was just a small gesture of caring, nothing like the kiss they'd shared in the Shower Room, which was still very fresh on both of their minds, but it meant just as much to her. Then, without another word, Rick just sort of nodded at her and took his leave from her cell while she remained with a small smile upon her lips, which she then looked down upon her daughter with.

 

* * *

 

A few hours later, once Sophia had gone to sleep, the adults congregated in the Common Room, either sitting at the tables or standing around them. Jo was seated beside Carol at one of the tables, holding a very awake Hope, who wouldn't go to sleep for anything at the moment. Rick, either subconsciously or on purpose, stood on the other side of Jo, with one hand on his hip and the other balled up into a fist and pressed against the tabletop.

They were all gathered there to discuss their next plan of attack after the events that had transpired that morning.

"As it stands right now, Shane, Daryl, Merle, Andrea, Jo and I are going to Woodbury. Glenn and Tyreese will stay behind to keep watch and keep Carol, Lori and the kids safe," Rick explained. "If something happens while we're gone and those of you staying behind need to leave the prison — if the gates fall or the cell blocks get overrun with walkers and being here any longer puts your lives at risk — you take the RV and you get out of here."

"Where would we go?" Carol asked.

Rick looked to Carol and then to Shane. After a moment, Rick decided. "The house where we found Jo and Sophia," he replied. "If we don't find any of you here, we'll assume that's where you've gone and we'll meet up there. And when we _do_ leave for Woodbury, make sure the RV is already packed with your belongings — anything all of us would need. We should be prepared for the worst, and ready to go at the drop of a hat, just in case."

Everyone seemed to nod in agreement.

"We still need more weapons," Andrea commented. "We used up most of what ammo we have left this morning."

Rick nodded. "We're gonna need to make a run to get more guns, ammo and other essentials, and I know just the place, but it's a little ways out; at least an hour away." He looked directly at Shane again, who caught on and knew exactly where Rick was talking about.

"Count me in." Shane fiddled with his fingers in front of him and shot Lori a side glance before letting his gaze linger back to Rick.

Rick nodded again. He knew Shane would be most helpful. They both knew the place in question like the backs of their hands.

"Why so far though?" Lori asked, reaching her hand up and giving Shane's a squeeze.

Rick noticed the gesture but it didn't bother him in the slightest. He'd be a hypocrite now even if it did, considering his feelings now lied elsewhere in the form of the blonde beside him. "Last time I was there, this place was fully stocked with guns and ammunition and I have a good feeling it's been left untouched."

"And what if it _has_ been touched?" Merle questioned, half sitting on one of the tabletops, with one leg planted firmly on the ground and the other propped up on the seat while he leaned forward on the latter leg. "What then?"

"We can't exactly afford to waste all that gas for you to drive an hour out, both ways, only to come back empty-handed," T-Dog agreed. Both adversaries looked at each other with a slight sense of respect which probably surprised them as much as it surprised everyone else.

"It's a risk we need to take," Rick stated.

"I'd like to come, too," Jo offered, cutting into the conversation.

Rick looked down at her and shook his head. "No. You should be—"

"Actually, Rick, I think it's a good idea if she comes along," Shane interrupted. Off Rick's almost betrayed look and Jo's look of surprise that he agreed with her, Shane shrugged. "If The Governor has 'feelers' out there, if he's watching us still from a distance, bringing Jo with us can be a way of luring him away from the prison, and keep everyone safe while we're gone. And, if he still thinks she's pregnant, it'll be more of a reason for him to leave everyone else here alone. His beef is with her when it comes down to it."

"We're not bringing Jo with us as Governor bait," Rick said adamantly.

"I'm not saying we're gonna dangle her in front of him and put her in danger. You and I will be there," Shane insisted. "We'll just give her some extra padding under her shirt to make it look like she's about nine months pregnant and ready to pop." He looked over at Jo and gestured to her stomach which was primarily hidden by the way she was holding Hope. "No offense or anything but you haven't lost that baby weight yet, and we can use that to our advantage. From a distance, even with binoculars, she still looks pregnant, just not as far along as she was when she actually _was_ pregnant. That extra padding will help give the illusion she is, and _that's_ what The Governor is after."

"And what happens if and when The Governor or his men _do_ follow you three away from here and he catches up to you and finds out she's not actually pregnant anymore?" Lori asked. "Who's to say he doesn't attack and kill the three of you and then come back here and attack us in retaliation for being deceived?"

"It won't come to that," Rick assured.

"You don't know that," Lori pressed, giving him a firm gaze.

"And you don't know that it _will_. Listen, we can go around in circles with all these what ifs, but we can't live like that. We gotta believe that things can work out for us, for the better," he said, looking upon everyone's faces, one by one. "I sure as hell would prefer to believe things will work out. After everything that's happened to all of us within this last year, it's easy to be pessimistic and think the worst is gonna happen. But we're survivors and we've come out stronger after everything this new world has thrown at us. We haven't given up yet, so why start now? Why _not_ believe in something better being possible? You wanna live your life, however long any of us got, constantly fearing what's around the corner or having to always look over your shoulder? Sure, we need to be on our toes and be prepared to fight, but we don't have to do it with our noses to the ground. There's a big difference between living and just surviving, and I'd rather live."

Andrea smirked, folding her arms under her chest. "My sister was an eternal optimist, and so was Dale and Hershel," she spoke. "I think we owe it to their memories to be a little optimistic ourselves."

Maggie frowned. "My sister was an optimist, too, but this world took her spirit away and she took her life. Every optimist from our group is dead. What does that tell you?" she snipped at Andrea.

"You're grieving right now," Andrea remarked, "and I'm not trying to condescend to you, but being an optimist does not correlate to being dead. All of our numbers will be up eventually, but Rick is absolutely right. We shouldn't waste the time we have left living as if we're already dead. If that's the case, we might as well all just stick a gun in our mouths right now and pull the damned trigger."

"Let's just get this conversation back on track to the gun and ammo run, shall we?" Glenn suggested, stepping forward and more central among the group. He looked between both Andrea and Maggie, who easily backed down from any further debate or argument.

Shane agreed, clearing his throat. "If ya'll wanna have your philosophical discussions about life and death later, that's up to you. Right now is about tactics."

Rick nodded, thankful for Shane getting them back on topic. "We're going on our run tomorrow morning. If we're lucky, we can get back here before suppertime."

"What if you get killed leaving the prison? Or, what if you get killed while on your run? What do we do then?" Carol wondered. "What if The Governor attacks us again while you're gone?"

"If Jo is with us and if The Governor _is_ watching, and sees her looking nine months pregnant, then Shane's right. The Governor will have no reason to attack any of you here." Rick looked at Carol and then down toward the ground. "If we don't come back right away tomorrow night, it could just as easily mean we got stuck and had to take shelter from a herd of walkers that crossed our path; that we're just waiting it out until it's safe to leave."

"We'll come lookin' for you," Daryl informed. "We ain't leavin' you high an' dry."

"I appreciate that, I do," Rick insisted. "But if we _don't_ come back, if it's been _days_ , then you can go ahead and assume we're dead, and you go on without us. You keep each other safe. You protect Sophia and Hope no matter what. Make their survival your first priority. If that means abandoning this place and finding shelter somewhere else, then so be it. You do what you need to do."

"There are too many hands in the pot," Jo remarked, referring to the conversation at hand and everyone talking over each other about this and that. She cradled her daughter closer to her chest as the infant gurgled a little; having some sort of little conversation with herself. "We're going on this run tomorrow, we'll be _back_ tomorrow. When we _get_ back, we'll take stock of the weapons and ammo we found and then we can talk more about the plan for going to Woodbury. Right now, though, we need to go to get some rest and we'll see what tomorrow brings."

As the conversation petered off, everyone seemed to agree to leave the conversation where it was, head off to their respective cells and call it a night.

Jo stood up, pulling Hope up to rest upon her chest and waited purposely until she was semi-alone with Rick in the Common Room. There was still Daryl who was puttering around near the cooking stand, grabbing some crackers to snack on. Whether or not anyone realized Jo was hanging back to talk quietly with Rick, she didn't much think on it and nor would she have cared.

Rick had walked over to the door to head outside and take watch alone when he realized she was still there. He stopped halfway up the steps and turned around in time to find her standing at the base of those steps, looking up at him. He took in the sight of her and her daughter and smirked a little before coming back down the steps and nodding at her.

"What's up?"

"You're going to take watch the night before the run?"

Rick gave a slight tilt of his head and shrugged. "That was the plan."

"You'll be exhausted in the morning."

"I've done more on less sleep."

"Rick," she admonished.

"I'll be fine," he insisted, placing a hand on her shoulder that sent what felt like an electrical current through both their bodies.

"Well, then, I'll join you," Jo offered, gesturing with her head down at Hope. "Let me put her down in her crib and ask Carol to look in on her."

As she made the move to walk off toward the cell block, Rick reached out and grabbed her shoulder again, giving it a gentle squeeze as he shook his head at her. When she glanced back at him and up into his eyes, he leaned in closer to her face and spoke quietly. "If something bad really _does_ happen tomorrow, you're gonna wish you had tonight with your daughter."

"Talk about guilt trips," Jo quipped, a smile dangling off her lips.

Rick shrugged, trying to hide his own smile, but failing miserably. But, his face grew serious enough a moment later. "If my son were alive, I'd be spending tonight at his side. That's where I would be, 'cause you never know."

"Prepare for the worst and hope for the best?"

Rick nodded. "Basically."

Looking down at her daughter, Jo hesitated for a moment. She could feel Rick's eyes on her still and she could also feel Daryl's eyes had shifted toward them, but was trying his best to pretend he was engrossed in those crackers in his hands.

"You're the most important father figure Hope has," she finally spoke, bringing her gaze back up to Rick's face. "I know you love her like your own, so if something happens tomorrow, won't you have wished you hadn't spent your last night away from her, too?"

A heavy feeling took up residence in Rick's heart and he frowned. "Now who's guilt-tripping whom?"

Jo smirked. "I'm just saying," she shrugged. "I have a top bunk that's not being used and you're welcome to it tonight."

"Hey, Rick," Daryl called out. He stepped forward, licking some cracker crumbs off his fingers, lifting his crossbow up and throwing it over his shoulder. "Why don't I take watch tonight? You two and Shane need your beauty sleep if you got a long day ahead of you tomorrow."

Jo was now certain Daryl had been discreetly eavesdropping, and his polite way of cutting in and offering to take Rick's place in watch didn't go unnoticed by her. In fact, she appreciated it and gave him a look to express it. Daryl looked back at her and nodded his head before looking back at Rick, who couldn't really argue any of the points that had been made. And, honestly, the idea of sleeping in the same cell as Jo, even if it was only in a different bunk, was very appealing.

After a long pause of consideration, Rick nodded. "Yeah, okay." He patted Daryl on the back as the archer walked past him on the steps to head outside. "Thanks, brother."

"No problem."

Without another word, Daryl pushed the door open and exited out into the caged entrance that led into the courtyard. A slight breeze escaped inside the Common Room as the door opened and closed behind Daryl, fluttering the strands of Jo's hair that she kept tied back in a ponytail, as well as the bottom curls of Rick's own hair, which had grown a little longer since he'd first woken from his coma.

"Alright," Rick said, looking directly at Jo. "You twisted my arm."

Raising an eyebrow, Jo smiled. "Somehow I doubt that."

They were officially alone in the Common Room now, save for Hope who didn't exactly count, and it left them leeway to be more open with their conversation between each other. However, conversation was no longer necessary. With silent looks and the faintest touches, they leaned closer toward each other until their lips chastely met. It was a very different kiss than the one in the Shower Room and definitely much different than the small one Rick had placed upon her forehead earlier. This kiss was sweeter, gentler and more loving.

When their lips parted, they looked upon each other with heavy-laden eyes and small smiles. Rick then scooped up Hope away from Jo and into his own arms, cradling the little girl against his own chest. Jo didn't hesitate in letting him do so. She simply looked on with admiration and then silently led the way out of the Common Room and toward her cell.

Rick followed quietly behind her, listening carefully to the sounds of the rest of their group talking among themselves in their own cells, puttering around or already snoring from yet another draining day.

Having stepped inside first, Jo gave Rick enough space to come in as well and set a sleepy-eyed Hope down into her pack-n-play crib. Once the little girl was quietly nestled in her bed and soon to fall into her own little slumber, Rick looked over at Jo and stepped forward into the needed space to close the gap between their bodies. He brought his hands up to either side of her face and kissed her again, only this time is was once more like in the Shower Room. It was deep and hungry, with a hint of lust.

The sensation of her soft lips upon his own was enough to set his skin on fire. He curled his fingers around the back of her head as she encircled her arms around his shoulders and moaned quietly into his mouth. When he realized he was letting himself get too aroused by the situation, and not wanting to place her in that position just yet, Rick pulled away and held her at arm's length while looking her over. He admired how flustered she looked, even in the darkness of her cell and how the force of their kiss had caused her normal somewhat thin lips to plump up slightly, and he was sure his looked the same.

As Jo brought a hand up to her chin where his stubble had pleasantly scratched her skin, Jo bit her bottom lip to contain her smile.

"One of these days," she began to say, but then stopped herself.

Rick tilted his head and leaned in a little more. "One of these days what?"

Jo simply shook her head. "We should go to bed," she whispered.

Moving between his body and the bunks, Jo sank down onto the bottom mattress where she always slept and just stared up at Rick, watching as he nodded back at her and stepped over to the small ladder. With little effort, he ascended to the top bunk and Jo lay back, staring up at the underside of it, watching as his weight caused the top bunk to sink slightly.

As Rick pulled his legs up and lay completely back upon the upper mattress, he stared up at the ceiling and just listened to the silence around them. After a few moments of getting comfortable, he rested his left hand upon his chest but then he let his right arm dangle down over the edge of the bunk. He wiggled his fingers a few times and then waited.

A moment later, Rick felt Jo's fingers reaching for his.

Briefly, their hands managed to entwine before they mutually pulled away.

Rick brought his arm back up and rested his hand with the other upon his chest. "Goodnight," he whispered down to her.

"Goodnight," she replied.

 

* * *

 

Sleep hadn't exactly been consistent for either Jo or Rick during the night.

At one point, probably only an hour after they both would've fallen asleep in their separate bunks, Rick began to snore. At first, Jo didn't even register what she was hearing. She'd heard plenty of people snoring throughout the cell block most nights, but they weren't as near as this. Her eyes darted open in the darkness and she looked at the underside of the top bunk and frowned. Biting her lips together, Jo shifted around and tried ignoring the sound at first, but after a minute or two it didn't seem like there'd be an end in sight. So, lying flat on her back, Jo lifted her right leg up and kicked up at the underside of the top bed, giving the mattress a quick jolt.

It was enough to stir Rick awake slightly. He grunted and cleared his throat and then seemed to move around a bit. "Wuh," he muttered incoherently.

"Rick, you're snoring. You'll wake Hope up," she whispered up at him. "Roll on your side."

"Nnnhh—okay."

Jo continued to stare at the underside of the top bunk and smirked as it creaked with his weight when he turned over. Whether it was onto his left or right, she didn't know. What she _did_ know, though, was that the snoring stopped.

Another hour or two later, Hope woke up. It began as whimpering and fussing at first, and then turned into crying. With droopy eyes, Jo sighed as she sat up.

"Shh," she tried hushing her daughter to no avail. Getting up to her feet, she leaned down over the pack-n-play crib and lifted Hope out and then cradled her in her arms. "You hungry?" Jo almost laughed at the 'O' gesture Hope began making with her mouth.

Yup, she was hungry.

Sitting back down on her bunk with her daughter and lifting her shirt, Jo thanked her stars for the front-clasping bra she wore and then proceeded to nurse. The entire feeding process was already old hat for her and she could practically do it in her sleep. In fact, Jo just let Hope go to town while she kept her eyes closed.

When all was said and done, Jo pulled her shirt down, not bothering with her bra just yet, as she grabbed the spit up rag and draped it over her shoulder so she could rest her daughter upon her chest and try and burp her.

After one tiny belch, Jo smirked and kissed Hope's little face, watching how her blue eyes fluttered and drooped. Her stomach full and feeling content, Hope easily slipped back into dreamland and Jo was able to put her daughter back to bed in her pack-n-play crib.

She remained standing, though, with her back to the bunk beds, so she could latch her bra back together and so she could adjust her shirt a little better before lying back down to sleep. As she attempted to get comfortable again, she heard Rick's body shift a little on the top bunk and she didn't think much of it.

What Jo didn't know was that Rick he woken as soon as Hope began to cry, but he laid there with his eyes closed, just listening.

It was such a comforting sound, oddly enough; the sound of a mother tending to her child in the still of the night and it brought back memories of those times he had to be up in the morning for an early shift, so it was on Lori's shoulders to take care of Carl when he needed to be fed or changed. Rick would lie there in bed, trying to sleep while Lori paced back and forth in Carl's bedroom, trying to get him to eat or just go back to bed so she could sleep as well. Some nights Rick would hear Lori reading to him, but it wasn't really any sort of children's book, it was usually whatever trashy romance novel du jour that Lori had been interested in at the moment. It was fine, though. Carl didn't understand what she was reading because he was too young. He had simply found comfort in the sound of his mother's voice and she was able to pass the time until he fell back to sleep. It was a win-win.

Rick smiled at the memories, and then, for a moment, he was sad. His smiled faded; thinking about Carl being gone again. However, he had this second chance of sorts to do a better job at protecting the children in his life. As the smiling face of Sophia and the small, gurgling face of Hope entered his mind, Rick allowed his smile to return.

He had turned his head just in time to see Jo placing Hope back down in her pack-n-play crib and mess around with her bra. He couldn't see anything with her back to him, but he had enough imagination. Turning away just in time as she returned to the bottom bunk, Rick held his breath and waited until he could sense she had gotten comfortable again to release the air from his lungs.

When he did, he rolled onto his right side, staring at the far wall of the cell and slowly closed his eyes.

What seemed like mere minutes later, an abrupt tug at Rick's foot jerked him awake. Pushing himself up, he looked toward the entrance of the cell to see Shane standing there in the doorway with a raised eyebrow and curious grin.

"Rise an' shine, Sleeping Beauty," Shane quipped. He leaned forward, more into the cell, and reached out to pat Jo's leg. "Hey, time to get up."

"Is the sun even up?" Rick questioned with a groggy voice from not having spoken in hours.

Shane smirked. "It is, and it looks like it might be a scorcher out there today."

Rick looked down at the watch on his wrist and fought to adjust his eyes to see the time. It was either six or seven in the morning, the usual time he woke up most days, but the interruptions to his sleep made it feel like he hadn't slept long at all.

The bottom bunk creaked and Jo stood up, finding herself looking up at Rick who was reaching his legs out for the ladder. Stepping out of the way, she let him climb down and then stretch his arms up above his head while cracking his neck.

"I already loaded up the car," Shane informed. "I figure we could take mine."

The green, Hyundai Tucson had been deemed his vehicle ever since he found it and replaced the battery on that highway just after they'd lost Sophia.

Rick nodded and looked over his shoulder at Jo. "I'll let you get ready."

Shane let Rick slip out of the cell and then looked over at Jo, as well. "Lori's up. She'll look in on Hope for you once we leave."

"Thanks," Jo replied.

Once she was alone in her cell with just her daughter, she spent roughly ten minutes changing into a different shirt, but settling on the same pair of jeans she had thrown on after her cold shower the night before. Even before the world went to hell in a handbag, she would wear a single pair of jeans multiple times before washing them. She knew she wasn't alone in that; that a lot of people had the same feeling about jeans. They were just more durable and never seemed to get as dirty, as quickly. And, these days, there wasn't the luxury of having innumerable clothing items. She pulled her hair out of its ponytail, which had become a little mussed from tossing and turning in her sleep, and brushed through the few snarls she had with the comb Andrea had found on a run with the guys weeks ago. After putting her hair back into a new ponytail and applying some deodorant (a rarity that had been found in a supply closet near the infirmary, which everyone had benefited from), Jo slipped her boots back on; zipping them up to the tops of her calves.

Leaning over Hope's pack-n-play crib, she smiled at how the little girl still slept so peacefully, but wondered why she couldn't sleep like that during the night instead of during the day.

As she stepped out of her cell, Lori was just approaching with a small smile.

"Is Hope still asleep?" she asked.

Jo nodded. "She is, yeah."

Lori placed her hands on her hips and let her eyes wander over toward the Common Room. "I'll go prepare a bottle for her then," she commented. "Hopefully she takes to it."

"Yeah," Jo agreed. "I guess if I had one of those pump machines it would be easier to keep her fed on my own supply, but then again we don't exactly have the luxury of refrigeration anymore to keep it fresh."

"Well, it's better at room temperature anyway," Lori said with a shrug. "Everyone loves a warm meal."

Jo snickered and walked ahead of Lori to join Shane and Rick in the Common Room where they gathering up a few last minute supplies. Shane was even delving into a box of Pop-Tarts that had a questionable expiration date on them. He tossed one silver package from inside the box over to Rick, who dropped it because he hadn't realized it was being thrown at him. When he glanced down at the package on the ground, he looked over at Shane and then picked it up and set it down on the table with a nod of appreciation. Shane then threw a second package over to Jo. She caught it, but just barely, and was understandably wary about opening it up.

"Are these even good anymore?" she asked with a smirk.

"Beggars can't be choosers," was his only answer as he popped one of the two Pop-Tarts in his own package into his mouth. As Jo watched him bite down and chew, he made a face and shrugged. "Well, it's better than nothing," he added with a mouthful.

"Alright, let's head out," Rick announced, tossing the small bag of extra supplies over his shoulder. He looked over at Jo, completely blocking out the image of Lori approaching Shane to kiss him goodbye because Rick was more engrossed with Jo sauntering over toward him as she opened her package of Pop-Tarts. "What flavor are these anyway?" he asked her as they headed out the door to the courtyard.

"Stale frosted strawberry," she answered after taking a small bite.

Rick smirked at her reaction and then glanced at Shane who was finally joining them as they went outside. "Breakfast of champions," he quipped.

Shane nodded and smiled. "Most important meal of the day."

The three of them chuckled a little as they stepped out into the sunshine and headed for the car. Daryl, who had been in the main tower, was waiting at the gate to let them out and, apparently, Merle was up as well, and waiting at the main gates to move the RV out of the way and then back in place after the trio left. After tossing the extra bag of supplies into the back of the car, Rick walked over to the driver's side and hopped in and Jo moved to take the back, passenger side seat. Shane stopped her once she had the door opened and gestured to the front seat.

"You go ahead; take shotgun," he offered.

Shane wasn't stupid. He had already figured out something was brewing between Rick and Jo. He just wasn't sure if anything had actually happened between them yet or not but, considering he had, in a sense, taken Lori from Rick, in a way Shane felt like he owed it to his oldest friend to make up for it somehow by assisting a new love to blossom for him. He just needed to fan the flames he could tell were already there.

Sliding into the backseat, Shane glanced at Rick's reflection in the rearview mirror as Jo climbed in. Both men made eye contact and Shane just grinned in response. In that moment, Rick could put two and two together that Shane was aware that he had serious feelings for Jo.

Letting out a muted sigh, Rick turned the car on and waited as Daryl began to pull the gate open before driving out of the courtyard and down the curved, gravel road. He slowed down long enough to give Merle time to move the RV forward enough for the Tucson to slip through the decimated main gate. Briefly bringing his eyes back to the rearview mirror, Rick watched as the RV returned to blocking the opening into the prison yard and then returned his focus to the road before them.

And just hoping everything remained uneventful for the others they were temporarily leaving behind.

 

* * *

 

Fifteen minutes into their trip, which had been silent thus far, the trio was traveling down an abandoned country road, scattered with dead leaves as well as the occasional dead body. It would never be a sight to get completely used to, but it was a sight they had come to accept. It was the way of the world these days, after all, and there was no end to it in sight. There was only the hope that they could make it a little better; that they could live their lives and not just survive.

A little ways up the road, a figure appeared along the side of the road. It was a young man, somewhere in his late twenties or early thirties, wearing an orange, canvas backpack and waving them down to stop. The hum of the tires coasting along the leaf-littered pavement and the windows of the Tucson being rolled up muffled the shouts and cries of the man as Rick kept his eyes glued ahead of him as they drove on by without hesitation.

Rick had not been blind to the man's plight, but he had his own people to worry about and a specific task at hand. He could not think of an outsider's issues at the moment. He might have reconsidered stopping if it was just a regular run for supplies and there was not a threat of further attack from The Governor at hand.

 _You can't save them all_ , Rick thought to himself as he looked at Jo briefly.

She seemed to be biting her tongue, as if she wanted to say something, but she held her head high and eyes forward on the road, saying nothing. Rick wondered if she would've stopped the car if she were the one behind the wheel. He chanced looking back at the man on the road in the rearview to see the man was running toward them as if he could somehow catch up, waving his hands in hopes they would change their mind and turn around. But it was to no avail, of course.

Rick wouldn't stop. He _couldn't_ stop.

He did catch Shane's eye in the rearview, though, and his oldest friend's nod let Rick know his motives to not stop were understood and supported one hundred percent.

There was an ounce of guilt building in Rick's gut, though, but he would push it down to that place he pushed all the other terrible things he'd had to do since he woke up from his coma. He would push it down and move on. It was all he could do right now. There wasn't time to be weak and wallow.

"How would you rather die?" Shane's voice cut into the silence of the drive.

Rick and Jo both turned their heads slightly to acknowledge his question, while waiting to see where he was going with it.

Leaning forward, Shane placed a hand on the backs of both their seats. "Shot in the head by another person or bitten by a walker?" he asked, looking between the pair.

"Is this really a topic of conversation to have after what we just went through yesterday?" Rick wondered, a little cynical.

"What, like we don't live in a world where this shit don't happen on a semi-regular basis?" Shane looked at Rick's profile and then over to Jo, giving her shoulder a nudge with his right hand. "You have an opinion on this?"

"On how I'd rather die?" she inquired.

Shane nodded. "Yeah."

"And those are my only two options; shot to the head by a living person or walker bite?"

"Yeah."

Jo sat silent for a moment, feeling Rick look at her as he waited to see what she would say, along with Shane who was just as curious. "Would there be a chance of surviving if the spot where I was bitten could be cut off, like an arm or a leg, like Maggie?"

Shane shook his head and sat a little more forward. "No, it'd be like your neck or shoulder."

"So, either way, death would be imminent."

"Yeah," he confirmed.

"Huh, well," Jo began, "people killed each other on a daily basis before the outbreak, so it would be like the good ol' days in that sense." She kept her eyes forward but could see Shane smirk in her peripheral vision. "Plus, it would be quick; no pain. _However_ …"

"However?" Rick was intrigued.

"There would be no time to say goodbye to anyone. A walker bite would hurt, sure, and it would be a slower death, but there would be some time to say things that you've always wanted to say before it's too late. Goodbyes, I love you's. Things like that," she rattled. "It's not exactly the deathbed vigil I would've wanted to have happen when I was in my eighties, but it's better than no goodbyes or I love you's at all."

"So is that your answer?" Shane asked.

"Yeah," Jo nodded. "Death by walker bite, but the moment I took my last breath I would expect someone to put a bullet or a blade in my head so I didn't come back."

Shane smacked her shoulder gently with his hand. "If I'm still kicking, if that ever happens, you can count on me."

Jo chuckled. "Gee, thanks."

Rick took his eyes off the road long enough to look at her. "Me, too."

Looking back at him, Jo held his gaze long enough before he had to look back at the road. "Thank you."

Shane looked between the pair again and then smacked Rick's shoulder as he sat back in his seat again. "What about you, Rick? Death by the living or death by a walker?"

Rick narrowed his eyes. "Neither," he answered and then smiled. "I plan to live forever."

Shane laughed and kicked at Rick's seat. "Asshole, that's now how this game goes."

"None of this is really a game, though, is it?" Jo asked more seriously.

Shane smacked his lips and shook his head, looking out the window to his right. "Alright, Debbie Downer; fair enough."

After a moment, Jo turned and looked at Rick and then turned around to look back at Shane. "Okay, then, how would _you_ prefer to die?"

Lifting a hand to his head, Shane made a gun gesture and the sound of a gunshot with his mouth. "Bullet to the brainpan. Kapow," he answered. "I don't want to see or know it's coming. This world is bullshit enough. A quick death is a courtesy."

Turning back around in her seat, Jo looked forward at the road at the few cars on the road ahead of them, blocking them a little, causing Rick to have to go around them on the shoulder.

"On our way back we should check those cars for supplies or if there's any gas we can syphon," Shane suggested.

Rick just nodded his response as they continued on without any other major detours or delays.

Another forty to fifty minutes later, they came upon the beginnings of a small town, with a small road sign announcing a simple greeting.

 

_**Welcome To King County, Georgia.** _

 


	16. Clear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A good portion of what is in this chapter is taken from the episode "Clear", though adapted for this story, which is always why I chose to name this chapter after the episode as well. Sort of as an homage, I suppose.

_"The hard things in life, the things you really learn from, happen with a clear mind."_  — Caroline Knapp

* * *

 

Rick pulled the Tucson over to the side of the road a few minutes later, a few yards away from the King County Sheriff's Department, and put it in park. After a moment or two of pause, he turned and looked at both Jo and Shane before he opened his door and climbed out of the car. The other two followed suit.

"Home sweet home," Shane quipped, placing his hands on top of the vehicle and looking across at his fellow, former officer.

Catching his friend's eye, Rick shook his head. "Nah, this ain't home anymore," he replied and shut the door quietly as not to draw the unwanted attention of walkers.

Jo looked from one man to the other and frowned at the air of sadness that fell between them.

From previous conversations about each other's lives, Jo had known that King County had been the place where Rick, Lori and Shane all hailed from before the outbreak and that Rick and Shane had been sheriff deputies, "the law 'round these parts." The home that Rick lived in and raised his son with Lori in was here in King County and the hospital where he awoke from his coma was also here in King County.

This was where Rick's story began, and Jo was a little excited to see it for herself, firsthand, and not just by what Rick had told her. It didn't matter that what little she'd seen so far was in immense disarray and overgrowth. Windows to other buildings were smashed, a few places even looked as if they'd been hollowed out by fire, and there were spray-painted arrows and messages to loved ones or of warnings on the buildings' facades.

As Rick secured his gun belt and holster, he moved around to the back of the Tucson and opened the back hatch to remove one of the extra belt and holsters he'd brought, knowing Jo would need one. As she rounded the back of the vehicle with Shane, Rick handed it off to her and she just looked at it at first before determining how to put it on. It really was simple enough. It went on like a regular belt, except this one didn't go through the loops of her jeans and instead hung lower on her hips. When she leaned forward to Velcro the strap around her leg, she looked up through her eyebrows at Rick to find him watching her. She wondered if he was doing so to make sure she got the belt and holster secured properly or if he was just watching her for other reasons. Either way she didn't mind it.

Shane checked the cartridge to his handgun and then passed Jo a Glock 42 for her to place in her holster.

"Here," Rick said, handing her an extra machete he'd brought as well. "It's not the short sword you lost to The Governor, but I know you're more comfortable with a longer blade."

Jo took the machete with appreciation and hooked it into the loop on the opposite side of the gun belt. "Thanks."

With a nod to both of them, Rick looked around at the immediate vicinity before leading them across the road and up the sidewalk toward the station.

With apprehension, he opened the front entrance; his Colt Python raised and ready for action. Shane brought up the rear to keep on point and to keep Jo protected as well. She had her right arm draped across her stomach, holding onto the handle of the machete; prepared to pull it out at a moment's notice as she followed closely behind Rick.

The station was quiet and a considerable mess.

"Someone was here after I was," Rick deduced. "It didn't look this bad when I left."

There were desks and chairs overturned, papers scattered everywhere as if someone had thrown them all up into the air and watched them rain down like confetti, and there was also some old, dried blood on the linoleum floor.

With a nod of his head, Rick continued to lead them toward the back, toward the weapons locker. The room wasn't exactly dark, but the charcoal grey stone of the walls and floor gave it an overall dank feeling. As they stepped more completely into the room, Jo watched as Rick's shoulders drooped at the sight of the emptied out lockers. The gated door was left wide open and a little bit of light from an overhead window filtered in like some sort of tease.

Lifting his Colt to beside his head to rub his forehead, Rick let out a discouraged sigh and then stepped forward into the caged locker and kicked hard at a gun rack. Shane sidled up beside Jo as they entered into the caged locker beside her, mirroring Rick's sigh of frustration and shaking his head. All three of them seemed to share the same feeling of dejection. This was supposed to be their only hope for weapons. Everywhere closer by had been cleared out either by them or others.

"Do we drive further out and try to find someplace else? Is there a military store nearby?" Jo offered.

"No," Rick growled out in anger, but it wasn't directed at her and she knew that.

"No other police stations here in town, I assume?" she asked, bending down to pick up a single, solitary bullet off the floor.

Shane ran his hands through his hair and turned toward her. "We _were_ the police here."

"The two of us and a few other guys," Rick clarified, scratching at his forehead. "It ain't a big town." Considering their options, he added, "There's other places we can check. May not have as many guns as were in here, but—"

"We _need_ as many guns as were in here," Shane interrupted, eyeing his friend. "Ammo, too. What we need to do, what _needs_ to be _done_ , is gonna require what was here. We're fucked otherwise."

"Yeah, we do," Rick agreed sternly. "But right now, I only got a line on a couple. There's a few places out on the main street: bars, a liquor store. Owners had a gun or two behind the counter that people didn't know about. _I_ did. _I_ signed the permits. They might still be there."

"Well, then that's where we'll check," Jo shrugged, passing that single, solitary bullet to Rick.

He looked her in the eye, holding her gaze, silently appreciating the fact that she was there with him and backing the decisions he made, no matter how big or small they seemed. Letting his eyes wander down to the bullet, he took it from her, their fingers brushing briefly in the process. Rick turned the smooth, gold-colored item around in the palm of his fingers before tucking it into his shirt pocket.

"Alright, let's head back out."

As the trio exited the weapons locker and made their way out of the station altogether, Rick took lead again as they walked along the sidewalk to head toward the "downtown" area of King County, which would be nothing more than a single strip of road with one or two, small municipal buildings and several mom and pop-type businesses on it. They walked single file in the meantime, alongside the derelict shell of some brick building that had too much overgrowth in the center of the property to have fallen after the outbreak. The building was clearly one that had been in its current state for a decade or two. The only difference now was the pile of charred bodies inside the property and the words **'AWAY WITH YOU'** spray-painted read on the side of the building.

At least, they hoped it was just red spray paint and not blood.

That would not have boded well.

They stopped long enough to stare at the sight with grim expressions on their faces before silently moving on.

Underfoot, on the sidewalk, were more arrows, like the ones on the buildings they'd seen earlier on and they were probably all thinking the same thing.

Did someone want them to follow the arrows?

Were they being led toward something that could be a trap?

Eventually turning the corner, they finally came to the main drag of town and slowed their pace at the sight before them.

The street was filled with boob traps made of wooden pallets, vehicles and cable spools with wooden and metal spikes sticking out of them, shopping carts, and wires and ropes…amongst many other things. Off to one side, a yellow ladder was propped up against a building and leading up to a window which was closed. There was a large, white tarp with the words **'JUST LISTEN'** spray-painted in neon pink. More arrows littered the ground and across the white crosswalk more words were spray-painted.

**TURN AROUND AND LIVE**

"Well, that's not foreboding at all," Jo remarked as Rick led them slowly and carefully around the sharp objects. She then pointed out a few cages filled with either pigeons or rats. "Not sure I even wanna know."

"Looks like someone's already taken the town and made it theirs," Shane commented.

"Doesn't mean they found what we're looking for," Rick insisted, ducking under a rope. "Couple of the places are just up ahead. Let's get in and get the hell out of here."

The three of them had to duck farther under another line of rope. It was turning into some sort of an obstacle course for them.

"There," Rick pointed with his gun at a building up ahead. "Tyrell's. A shotgun and two handguns. License issued to Tyrell Debbs."

The sound of snarling behind them caused them to turn around, spotting a female walker stumbling forward. Shane raised his gun but Jo reached her hand up to his arm to reel him back in.

"Wait. She'll get caught." Rick seemed to be on the same wavelength as Jo.

As the female walker became buoyed by the lower rope the trio had just ducked under, a single shotgun blast rang out and the back of the female walker's head exploded before her body dropped to the ground. The trio's eyes darted upward immediately toward where the shot came from.

On top of the roof of one of the taller buildings, stood a man pointing a rifle with a scope at them and wearing a helmet and some sort of mask to cover his face.

 _"Hands!"_ the man growled, his voice garbled slightly by the mask over his face. _"You drop what you got and you go!"_

The trio threw their hands up without hesitation. Jo stood closest to Rick and Shane a few extra feet away from them as they all stared back at the masked man with unease.

 _"Your guns, your shoes, and those machetes!"_ the man continued. _"All of it! Ten seconds!"_

"Run for the car," Rick whispered to Jo.

_"Ten!"_

"Rick."

"We need that rifle," Shane contended.

_"Nine! Eight!"_

"I think I can get up there."

Rick eyed Shane and nodded.

_"Seven! Six!"_

"Jo, go," Rick spoke and, without hesitation, dropped his arms and placed himself in front of her as he fired his Colt off at the man on the roof.

Jo ducked down and wove her body around a truck as the man alternated shooting at them and at Shane who was making a beeline for the building. Fortunately, not one of them was hit by any bullets. Rick found protection at the front of the truck, leaning against the grill while he reloaded his Colt with the only bullet he had left — the one Jo had found at the station and given him. He listened to the gunfire going off near him, but he didn't see where Jo had gone, which worried him. The fact that he hadn't heard her scream out in pain was somewhat comforting. However, if that man had given her a clean headshot, there wouldn't have been a scream. There wouldn't have been time for Jo to react. Her death would've been instant and suddenly all Rick could think of was that damned conversation Shane had started in the car.

Just as he curled his fingers into the grill and braced himself against an onslaught of gunfire, Rick stood up slightly and aimed the Colt at the top of the building, prepared to pull the trigger, only to find the man was no longer there. On the neighboring roof, Shane appeared and shrugged, looking down at Rick, just as confused about where the man had gotten off to.

Lowering his gaze, Rick scoured the booby traps for Jo and didn't see her anywhere either, which alerted all his senses as he thought up every possible negative idea of where she'd gone and what might've happened to her.

A moment later, gunfire rang out again, directed at Rick and the truck he was still standing in front of. Ducking, he darted behind a blue barrel before making a run for it to another set of barrels. He had only one shot with his gun and if he was going to fire back he would have to be sure as hell he made it count but, until then, he would have to take cover for as long as possible and wherever possible. Although by the sound of footsteps, as well as continuing gunfire, the man from the roof was quickly approaching him.

Just as Rick braved standing up to aim his gun, Jo darted out from between two of the buildings and fired her gun at the masked man's chest. The man went down and Shane came running out with his own gun drawn.

The three of them gathered around the man, looking down at him; each breathing heavy from the physical exertion they'd just exuded.

Bringing his gaze to Jo, Rick nudged her arm as she holstered her gun with a somewhat shaky hand. "You okay?" he asked.

She nodded. "Yeah."

"I told you to run for the car," he continued with concern. "I didn't want you to get hurt."

"Well, I didn't and you're welcome for saving your ass," Jo replied with a knowing look, and pointing down at the man. "He would've taken your head clean off with one shot."

Rick looked at Shane who was, in turn, smirking at Jo's response. With a begrudging nod of appreciation, Rick silently thanked her as he crouched down beside the man's body. With a balled up fist, he pounded on the man's chest, creating a hard thumping sound.

"He's wearing body armor," he deduced upon ripping the man's shirt open to reveal a police-issued Kevlar vest with the bullet from Jo's gun lodged in it. Peeling back the Velcro and pulling up the vest, Rick lifted the man's undershirt to reveal a reddish bruise forming on dark skin. "He's alive."

"Do we care?" Shane asked.

Rick removed the helmet off the man's head and then peeled off the mask covering his face, revealing the unconscious face of their attacker. Sitting back on the heels of his feet, Rick looked as if he'd seen a ghost.

"Yeah," he answered.

"Do you know him?" Jo wondered.

"Yeah." Rick wiped his brow with the back of his hand. "This is Morgan."

"The guy you were talking to on the walkie-talkie outside Atlanta back at the camp?" Shane pried.

"Morgan took me in; changed my bandage from my wound, fed and clothed me, and told me about everything that happened in the world. I showed him the weapons locker; gave him some guns and ammo," Rick explained, standing back up to his feet. "I never knew what happened to him. He never answered any of my calls on the walkie-talkie. I promised him I would try to contact him every day at dawn but I wasn't able to keep up with that. There was always something keeping me from keeping up with it. After a while I just assumed maybe he was dead."

Stepping away from Morgan, he found a stretcher and pulled it over to them before crouching down to lift Morgan up. Shane offered his assistance and they both lifted the unconscious man up to lie on the stretcher. Rick then walked over toward the front entrance of the building where Morgan had been standing atop of. Shane moved in step with him as they looked the area over.

"Keep an eye out for booby traps," Rick warned. "Looks like he's gotten pretty creative so far."

"I thought we were just gonna get in and get the hell out of here."

"I'm not leaving him on the street."

Shane shook his head and stepped more directly in front of Rick, holding up a hand. "Listen, I know you said he helped you—"

"He saved my _life_ ," Rick clarified, practically growling. Then, somewhat defensively, he added, "He wasn't like this then." Turning back toward Morgan, he looked upon Jo just standing there; one hand on ready to grab for her gun again and the other wrapped tightly around the handle of her machete in case Morgan woke up and tried anything. And then, suddenly, a thought struck him. "Jesus, he has a son."

"You think he's in there?" Jo wondered, calling out from Morgan's side, having been able to hear what the two friends were saying to each other. When they looked at her, she eyed the building.

Rick didn't respond, but he holstered his own gun finally and crouched down between two spikes on either side of him, hunching forward toward the entrance.

"Don't," Shane cautioned. "Booby traps, remember?"

Carefully, Rick peeled back the welcome mat in front of the door, revealing a small pit filled with sharp spikes inside. "Thank you," he threw over his shoulder at his friend.

"Let's just get him inside and go."

Both friends returned to Morgan's body and lifted him off the stretcher, each standing on either side of him as they made their way inside the building and ascended the staircase before them. At the top of the stairs was a white sheet with the words ' **NOT SHITTING YOU** ' spray-painted upon it in red which was a more confusing message than the others they'd seen outside. Just before they reached the top of the stairs, Rick called out for Shane to stop.

There was a thin wire running across the step from wall to wall.

Slowly and carefully, Rick pulled back the sheet and they were greeted by a bloody axe, propped up and ready to swing at the first thing that tripped the wire.

"Jo, watch the wire," Rick warned as he and Shane successfully managed to get Morgan through.

"Jesus Christ," Jo muttered when she saw he axe. She braced her hands on the walls on either side of the stairs as she stepped over the wire and ducked out of the way of the bloody blade. Turning left, she followed after the guys into the heart of the upstairs and stopping when they did at the sight surrounding them.

The room was littered with all varieties of weapons, ammo and insane musings written all over the walls.

"You said you showed him the weapons locker last year," Shane commented, taking it all in.

"This was all in it?" Jo wondered.

Rick shook his head. "Not even half. He's been busy." Spotting a cot in the corner, he gestured to it. "The cot," he informed as he and Shane quickly dragged Morgan over and dropped him down.

Without hesitation, Shane and Jo began to grab duffel bags to gather up the weapons and ammo they would need, which was probably at least the half that came from the police station, if not more. Rick finally joined in, or at least he seemed to, until he pulled a rather battered-looking walkie-talkie out of a chest and pressed it to his forehead. When he stood up, Jo turned her attention toward him and the words he was reading on the wall before him.

**DUANE TURNED**

"You alright, Rick?" she asked.

"No," he muttered. "We're gonna wait for him to wake up; make sure he's okay."

"He tried to kill us," Shane remarked, dropping his hands to his sides.

"He told us to go. He didn't know who we were," Rick replied.

"He tried to kill us and we didn't leave him for the walkers. He's had a good day," Shane clarified. "I know you said he saved your life or whatever once upon a time, but you don't owe him anything anymore. We got people back at the prison who are counting on us. He doesn't need half of these guns. _We do_."

"We're waiting for him to wake up. That's it," Rick pressed more adamantly.

Shane stepped around Jo and up to Rick. "Have you taken a look around this place? The axe, the spikes, the walls."

Rick responded by getting right in Shane's face. "You think he's crazy?"

"No. I think he's dangerous."

Jo wasn't caring much for the tension between the pair and stood up, prepared to get between them if necessary.

"I know him," Rick insisted.

Shane nodded sarcastically. "Yeah, yeah. 'He wasn't like this then.'"

Staring his friend down, Rick finally took a step back. "We're gonna wait for him to wake up," he repeated.

Grabbing a few zip ties, Rick walked over to Morgan and tied his hands to the edge of the cot as Jo and Shane looked on.

After a moment, Jo turned and walked into the other room, intrigued by what looked to be a map drawn with chalk on the wall. Rick noticed her exiting the room and stood up to follow after her, standing in the archway between both rooms.

"What is it?" Rick asked.

"I think it's your neighborhood," she replied. Her attention went to the bottom right side of the wall, at a block of homes that was crossed out, and one that was labeled ' **RICK'S HOUSE** ' as well as an overall note saying it had been taken and then burned out. She turned around and looked at him sadly. "It's gone."

Rick dipped his head and nodded. "Well, like I said: this ain't home anymore." The sound of a crunching brought Rick's attention around to Shane who was seated on one of the closed chests to find his friend eating a protein bar. "We're eating his food now?"

Shane shrugged. "The mat said welcome."

As Rick and Jo both returned into the main room, Shane stood up and wandered over to the map on the wall, staring at an area at the top. Crunching up the protein bar wrapper and stuffing it into one of his pockets, he turned back and called out to Rick.

"I'm gonna go on a run," he informed.

Rick lifted his head and eyed his friend. "Where?"

"The King County Café. There's something there I want to grab that I think Lori could use."

With a nod of his head, Rick closed the lid of the chest he'd retrieved Morgan's walkie-talkie from and sat down upon it. "Okay. But if you get into any trouble, you holler. We'll hear it from here."

"There's all those walker traps out there. I'll be fine, pops," Shane remarked with a sly grin.

Jo looked over at Rick, and then to Shane. She crouched down and grabbed up an extra bag and tossed it over to him. "Take that, in case you find diapers or something."

Shane caught the bag with ease and nodded at the pair he was leaving behind with Morgan for the time being. "I'll see what I can do."

Without another word, Shane disappeared out into the outer room and down out of the apartment altogether.

Wandering back over to the outer room to look at the map of the neighborhood Morgan had clearly drawn by memory, Jo studied every inch of it, trying to imagine what the area looked like before the outbreak. She smiled at the image in her head of Rick in some sort of uniform, riding around town in his patrol car, tipping his hat respectfully to the older ladies in town like a proper southern gentleman. No doubt he was probably clean shaven then. She never knew of any cops who had grown out hair on their heads or faces like Rick looked now. She was partial to the scruff, though. Always had been, and not just with Rick.

Her husband Oscar always wore a beard half the year. He started growing it during the fall and shaved it off in time for spring when it got warmer out. He had always looked good either way, though she did seem to prefer the beard, and Jo wondered how well of a beard Rick was capable of growing or if he'd ever grown one out before. Somehow she figured this was the first time he'd ever let himself go, and it was only because they were living in a post-apocalyptic world where shaving wasn't exactly a priority.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Rick inquired, walking up behind her.

Jo shook her head with a laugh. "Nothing important," she replied. "Trust me."

Moving closer to her, Rick placed a hand on her hip and leaned his face down toward her shoulder, making the bold move in nuzzling his nose against her cheek before placing a kiss just below her ear. Closing her eyes, leaned back into him and just stood there as he encircled his arms around her waist and continued to kiss his way down her neck, to her shoulder.

"When all this is said and done with The Governor, and if we all survive unscathed, I'm gonna take you out on a run, just you and I. We'll take some cans of fruit cocktail and find some abandoned restaurant and maybe a couple bottles of wine in its wine cellar and we'll have the new world's equivalent of a proper date," he whispered against her skin.

Jo chuckled at the imagery he placed in her mind. "You don't have to take me away from the prison to take me on a date," she chided. "Let me join you on watch some night." Turning around while he maintained his arms around her, Jo lifted her hands and placed them on his upper arms. Tilting her head up toward his face, she smiled. "I just enjoy being with you. It doesn't matter where or how. You're the first person to make me feel like I have a future since the world went to hell."

Letting his blue eyes move from holding her green ones, to staring at her lips, Rick leaned in and kissed her properly, letting his tongue slip inside her mouth when she parted it enough for him. The sound of her sighing contentedly against him was one of the most wonderful sounds in the world to him these days and he couldn't help but thank his lucky stars that she felt the same way about him that he felt about her.

Being surrounded by the people they considered family was one thing, but knowing they wouldn't have to spend the time they had left on this earth without companionship was even better.

"I'm just glad you feel the same," he spoke quietly, bringing her in for more of a hug.

"I'd be an idiot not to." Slipping out of his arms, Jo gestured back toward the room Morgan was out cold in. "How long do you think till he wakes up? It's not like I hit him in the head. It was just a gunshot and it struck his vest."

Rick shrugged. "Soon, hopefully."

Leaning in once more, he placed a gentle peck upon her lips and then walked back into the main room to crouch down beside Morgan while Jo returned her interest to the walls as she followed him in.

There were names of people who had apparently turned, along with random scrawling that just didn't make any sense to her.

"I'm sorry this happened to you," Rick was saying to Morgan.

Jo looked over her shoulder and watch as Rick stood up to walk over to a different wall. They made eye contact briefly and then both returned to their respective walls. After a moment, Rick picked up one of the rifles with a scope on it and peered through it when the sound of a bullet casing clattered to the floor. Both him and Jo turned around and looked over at Morgan who remained in the same position. The way the sound echoed in the room, though, it was possible the noise came from anywhere in the room. Maybe it was a mouse. Maybe a walker had been in the apartment the entire time and was coming from one of the other rooms.

Rick lifted the rifle as he and Jo both looked toward the outer room where the wall map was drawn, just as Rick sensed something not right behind him.

Whirling around, he found Morgan launching himself at him with a knife in hand, but Rick was able to bring the rifle up and knock Morgan down on his ass. Hovering over Morgan, Rick reached out with one hand while Jo gripped her own gun again, just in case she would be needed to shoot Morgan for real this time.

"Do you know who I am?" Rick asked. And then, a little more loudly and gesturing to himself, "Do you _see_ who I am?"

"People wearing dead people's faces," Morgan stated, all crazy-eyed and gripping his knife tight.

"Morgan, listen to me."

"No, _I don't know you_!"

"You _do_ know me!" Rick shouted.

"I _don't_ know you!" Morgan growled as he pulled himself up off the ground and launched himself at Rick again. The pair twirled around, with Rick trying to keep from being impaled by the knife Morgan was so determined to stab him with.

Pushing Morgan up against a wall, Rick pressed on. "You saved my life, Morgan! You know me. Look at me."

Clocking Rick in the jaw, Morgan was able to get Rick off him and knock him down onto the ground. "You don't clear, man," he said, climbing up over Rick. "You turn."

"Get off him, Morgan!" Jo shouted, raising her gun and aiming it at Morgan.

"It's okay, Jo. Don't shoot him," Rick insisted.

"I don't know you," Morgan said, looking directly at her. "You all turn. Everyone turns."

"He'll kill you," Jo pleaded. She didn't have to shoot Morgan fatally. She could clip in in the shoulder. He was hunched over Rick at such an angle that it was possible for her to do.

"No," Rick insisted, grunting. "Morgan, stop."

"You turn. You just die," Morgan continued.

" _You know me_!" Rick shouted.

" _I don't know anyone anymore_!" Morgan shouted right back. "You don't _clear_!"

In a move too swift for Jo to react, Morgan buried the knife down into Rick's chest, in the area below his shoulder and just barely above his heart. Jo screamed in fear of losing the man she was falling in love with and stepped forward. Hauling back, she brought her gun smack across the side of Morgan's head, causing him to roll off of Rick.

"Oh my God, Rick—"

" _You know me_ ," Rick repeated, pulling the knife out and tossing it to the ground. Clamoring up to his feet, he snatched Jo's Glock out of her hand and aimed it directly at Morgan's face. "You crazy sonofabitch!"

Scooting back up into a wall, Morgan stared down the short barrel and looked almost happy. "Please," he begged, grabbing the gun and pulling it closer to his face, startling Rick. "Please kill me."

Rick ripped the gun away and stood back, flustered and in pain. Jo walked over to him as he stumbled slightly, while Morgan just rolled onto his side, crying somewhat. In some sort of shock, over what just happened, Rick could only just stand there and try to process the turn of events while Jo began to open his shirt and peel it off him so she could inspect his wound.

"Ow," he winced.

"You should've let me shoot him in the shoulder when I had the chance and then maybe he wouldn't have stabbed you," she snipped, slapping his arm once she knew he'd survive his wound. "You dumb fucking asshole."

"Hey, ow." He stared down at her as he sat down upon a table, watching her clench her jaw, but not in anger; in worry and fear. "I couldn't make that call," he said in a low voice for only her ears. "He's not thinking straight. He lost his wife, his son, and he's been alone. He clearly hasn't been with people in a long time."

"I don't care. Two inches lower and you could be dead right now, okay? I don't care if he's been alone for a decade. If he'd killed you—"

"—He didn't."

"He _could've_." Rick and Jo just stared each other down as she grabbed up a towel and pressed it against Rick's wound. "Hold that there," she commanded before turning away from him and grabbing some zip ties off the ground. Walking up to Morgan she reached for the collar of his shirt and urged him up to his feet. "Move," she told him and his sorrowful self obliged her.

After she led him over to a small mattress on the ground, she sat him down and moved behind him, pulling his arms back and binding his hands together while looking over his shoulder at Rick who just watched her with a respectful gaze.

In the month and a half that she'd been in his life, never had he seen her take charge like this. She had remained mostly on the sidelines, helping out where she could, offering input here and there, but it was always in a quiet sort of way. It was as if she hadn't wanted to rustle any feathers, which was understandable, Rick supposed. She was still the newest addition to his group and perhaps she still felt like an outsider.

But here she was now, suddenly this force to be reckoned with.

Rick liked it.

"You move an inch and I will hurt you," she informed Morgan as he just nodded, although it seemed he wasn't completely coherent.

As Jo walked back up to Rick, she pulled the towel off his wound, causing him to wince again.

"I like this side of you," he commented, catching her eye briefly while she looked around them for something.

"What side of me?"

"The side of you with the ability to put the fear of God into the lowliest heathen."

When Jo glanced back up at him, with a bottle of Jack Daniels in hand she found on the floor, she saw him smirk slightly. "I don't find anything about any of this amusing."

Twisting off the cap from the bottle, she tipped it slightly and let some of the amber liquid spill out over Rick's gash, causing him to hiss at the sting it caused. A little bit of blood ran down his pectoral muscle with the whiskey but she quickly caught it and mopped it up with the clean side of the towel. Then, stepping over to a first aid kit Morgan had, Jo opened it up and found a needle and some thread.

"You need a few stitches and I've never done this before so you're going to have to just suck it up and deal, okay?"

"I guess we're even then," he remarked, grimacing from the pain he'd been biting back. "I patched you up last night, and now it's my turn to be the patient."

"Yeah, well, you wouldn't have had to be the patient if you'd let me shoot him," she reiterated, nodding over toward Morgan.

"And I couldn't allow that."

Locking eyes with him while trying to thread the needle, Jo sighed. "Next time I'm just going to let the next nutjob run you all the way through and you can stitch _yourself_ up. How's that?" She was staring down at the needle again, finally successful in threading it.

Rick didn't bother to respond, he just watched her as she poured some of the whiskey over the needle to sterilize it. When she looked up at him again, she was the one wincing as she pinched the skin on either side of his gash together.

Rick hissed again and grabbed the bottle with the right arm to take a swig of the alcohol.

"Alright, here goes nothing."

Sticking the needle through his skin, she tried to pretend he was a pair of pants she was patching up and that the blood that dribbled down was nonexistent. She bit her lips together in concentration and ignored Rick as he took a couple more swigs of whiskey to numb to pain as much and as quickly as he could.

"Shit," he grimaced, looking over her shoulder toward Morgan who was rocking himself back and forth, muttering something under his breath.

"Just kill me. Just kill me. Just kill me. Just...just kill me."

"We aren't going to kill you, Morgan," Jo assured; the repetition of his words grating on her nerves while she tried to keep her focus on stitching Rick up.

"You found me last year in my front yard, Morgan," Rick spoke up. "You and...you found me. You fed me. You told me what's happening. You _saved_ me."

Jo looked up at Rick's face for a moment and then back down at finishing up. There weren't many stitched that he needed but it was still a tedious process, and she was worried the thread would somehow break and the wound wouldn't be stitched up properly.

Upon the last stitch, Jo grabbed a tiny pair of scissors and clipped the excess thread of and set the needle down. Next she picked up a white, absorbent compress dressing and placed it to the stitched up wound and grabbed Rick's hand to hold the dressing in place while she then removed a roller bandage from the first aid kit. Unrolling it, she began to wrap it around his chest twice; from his left shoulder down across to his right torso, and then repeat. Cutting the excess off once more, Jo kept the roller bandage in place by tucking the end in.

"Thank you," Rick muttered, leaning his head forward against hers for a moment.

Catching his eye, she nodded and replied in a quiet voice, "You're welcome."

Getting down off the table and pulling his shirt back on with only his right arm, Rick looked back at Morgan. "My name is Rick Grimes, Morgan. You know me. I'm not wearing a dead man's face." Stalking off near the other man with his shirt wide open, Rick reached forward for the walkie-talkie. "I gave you this." He crouched down, holding the device up as Morgan looked back at him apprehensively. "I said I'd turn it on every day at dawn so you could find me."

A tear began to fall from the corner of Morgan's eye and a look of recognition appeared on his face. "Rick? I know you." He smiled, almost relieved. "Oh, man. Damn it, I...I know you. I know who you are. You said you'd turn yours on at dawn. That's what you said. I mean, I hadn't worked up to it yet, and...then I did. On the roof, every morning for days, for weeks, me and my boy. And then...me." His smile faded and he looked away for a moment. "Just static, though. Nothing but static. And then nothing but nothing. You weren't there. You were never there."

"I was," Rick insisted meekly.

" _No_ , not when _I_ tried. I mean, you said you would turn on your radio _every_ day at dawn."

"Morgan, I—"

" _You said that you would turn on your radio—_ "

" _I did_!"

" _—every day at dawn and you were not there_!" Morgan shouted.

Rick leaned back, flustered, wiping his eye with his right hand. "I kept getting...I kept getting pushed farther out," Rick tried explaining, and then standing up. "I had to. I didn't have a choice." He glanced momentarily at Jo who was just standing back quietly, watching this reunion unfold. "I found my wife and my boy. I had people. I had to keep them safe," Rick continued, pacing. "We kept getting pushed back deeper into the country. I—I swear to _God_ I didn't have a choice."

Morgan kicked the walkie-talkie across the floor to Rick. "You can have your _radio_ back 'cause it looks like I finally found _you_ ," he barked angrily. "You found your _wife_ and your _son_. That's what happened, _right_? You _found_ them." Off Rick's nod, so did Morgan. "And did they...did she...did your wife...did she turn?"

"No, she's still alive, but we aren't together anymore," Rick answered, looking down at the floor. "Our son, though, he died. He was shot by a hunter. I got him to this farm and a man by the name of Hershel who was a doctor tried to help him, but he didn't get the tools he needed in time to save my boy. We watched our son die and then we watched him come back and I put a bullet in his head." Tears began to stream from Rick's eyes but he was quick to wipe them away. "I watched my boy become a walker."

Morgan looked back at him with sympathy. "Everybody turns."

"Yeah, they do."

"You remember my wife, my Jenny? You remember what happened to her? You remember what she was? Yeah." Morgan nodded and then a sense of further realization seemed to hit him. "Oh. You gave me the gun. You tried."

"What did I try, Morgan? What did I try?" Rick crouched back down in front of the other man.

"You tried to get me to do it 'cause I was supposed to do it. I was supposed to kill her, my Jenny. Knew I was supposed to, but I let it go. Let it go like there wasn't gonna be a reckoning." Morgan looked off for a second, as if he'd lost his train of thought and then brought his gaze back to Rick. "We was always looking for food. You know, it always came down to food. And I was...I was checking out a cellar and I didn't want Duane to come down there with me. And then when I came up...she was standing there right in front of him and he had his gun up and he couldn't do it."

Jo, although she had remained silent, her heart was violently breaking for this man she had been ready to shoot dead minutes ago. She knew that pain he was feeling, of not being able to kill the person you loved after they turned. She had done the same thing with her husband, who she could only assume was still locked in their bedroom back at their home in Decatur.

A pang of guilt ate at her heart and she couldn't believe it was nearly one year on and she had left him to know no peace.

"So I called to him and he turned," Morgan continued. "And then she was just…just _on him_. And I see _red_. _I see red. Everything_ is _red_. _Everything_ I _see_ is _red_. And I _do_ it. Finally. Finally was too late. I was supposed to. I was selfish. I was weak. You gave me the gun."

Rick turned and looked over his shoulder at Jo who was wiping tears of her own from her face now. With a bob of his head, he looked down at the ground.

"Hey, your boy," Morgan spoke, gauging Rick's full attention again. "I'm sorry you lost your boy."

"I'm sorry you lost yours, too, Morgan. I really am."

Morgan nodded his appreciation. "See, people like you, the good people, they always die. And the bad people do, too. But the weak people, the people like me...we have inherited the Earth." He was almost proud as he said it, but the way he said it was utterly heartbreaking. Casting his dark eyes past Rick and over to Jo, he tilted his head. "You his wife that's not his wife anymore?" Then, back to Rick, he asked, "What's your wife's name? I can't remember if you ever told me."

"Lori," Rick replied. "But that's not Lori." Standing up, he nodded at Jo with a loving smile. "This is Jo."

Morgan glanced between the pair, trying to read between the lines. "Do you have a husband or kids, Jo?"

"I had a husband," she replied. "He died and turned in the very beginning. I couldn't kill him either. I just left him behind and ran away. But I do have a daughter. She's not my husband's, though. I had her two weeks ago." Looking at Rick, she smiled with great affection. "Rick helped deliver her."

"What's her name? Your daughter?"

"Hope."

"Hope," Morgan repeated, an amused smile spreading to his face as he glanced up at Rick. "You brought Hope into this world."

"Yeah, that seems to be the case," Rick smiled back.

"Are you Hope's father?"

Rick was about to respond, but Jo cut in. "He's not her _biological_ father."

Without hesitation, Rick turned and looked directly at her and what those words she spoke meant, and what they meant to him.

She considered Hope to be his child, just as he did; genetics be damned.

Walking over to one of the front windows, he peered down at the street and how there were a few walkers impaled on the spikes. Amidst everything running through his head at the moment, Rick was able to focus on the situation at hand. Looking back at Morgan, he frowned.

"I'm not going to kill you," he said, stepping away from the window and pulling out a pocket knife. "I don't think that's what's supposed to happen." Leaning down to cut the zip ties binding Morgan's hands together, he added, "I think you're supposed to come back with us."

Morgan chuckled and pulled his hands into his lap, rubbing at his wrists. "After all that? After me trying to blow your head off, stab your heart out, happily ever after together?"

"You couldn't kill me, I couldn't kill you. I'll take that as a sign."

"Huh."

"We found a prison. The fences can keep 'em out."

"Is that where your son died?"

"No," Rick shook his head. "He died at that man Hershel's farm, about a week after I left you."

Morgan shrugged. "I think I should stay here."

Jo took a few steps forward, looking down at him. "You can come back with us. You can heal," she offered, correctly assuming she wasn't overstepping her bounds by doing so.

Gesturing to the supply of guns in the room, Morgan seemed doubtful still. "You're taking a lot of guns, Rick. No, I'm just saying that that all is a lot of guns. Why do you need the guns, Rick? 'Cause if you got something good that just means that there's someone who wants to take it. And that is what is happening, right?"

"We're gonna win," Rick insisted. "You can be there. You can help."

"You will be torn apart by teeth or bullets. The both of you and your daughter. Your people, but not me. Because I am _not_ gonna watch that happen again." Morgan fell silent, and then got to his feet. "Man, you take the guns."

"You know there's a chance. That's what you can't square. That's what hurts," Rick pressed. "You _know_ there's a _chance_!"

Morgan whipped around and shouted, "I don't think you heard a _damn_ word that I said!"

Jo caught Rick's eye and walked up to Morgan, placing a hand on his shoulder. He shrugged her away at first but she was unyielding. "We all started out in the same place. Things went bad for you, things went bad for Rick, and things went bad for me. But you're not seeing things right," she spoke softly as he stared out a window.

Rick nodded, although Morgan's back was to him and couldn't see it. "I don't blame you, what you've lost, what you've been through." As he neared the pair, Morgan turned around and looked at him and he stopped. "You're _not_ seeing things right, but you can come back from this, I know you can. You have to. This can't be it. It can't be. You got to be able to come back from this."

"No." Morgan stepped back.

"Morgan, please."

" _No_! I have to clear. That's why I didn't die today. That's the sign. I have to, man. I have to. I have to clear." He held his hands out at his sides and smirked.

Jo pursed her lips together and looked at Rick, who was prepared to accept Morgan's decision not to come back with them and leave it at that. But she couldn't without one last attempt. This man had been through the ringer and he shouldn't remain alone.

"Morgan," she spoke, garnering his full attention. "We need help. What's happening back at the prison, we've lost people because we were attacked by the man who is my daughter's biological father. He's worse than walkers. He's a monster and he will take innocent lives to take my daughter from me and she is not the only child there. He has already killed three of our people and he will kill more of us. We're not asking you to fight with us, but we're asking you to be with us. You can help protect people." Jo stepped closer to him and took his hand in hers. "Can you just sit back and hide away here, clearing whatever it is you need to clear, when you could've helped innocent lives? Can you live with yourself knowing that?"

Morgan shifted his gaze away from her. "I have to clear," he repeated.

"Alright." Jo nodded and sauntered off toward a duffel bag and began to shove ammo into it. "After I've been tortured and killed, and after Rick's been tortured and killed, and after our people have been slaughtered and our prison burned down, and my daughter is being raised by her mother's rapist, at least you can breathe easy knowing you cleared your crazy away."

"Jo," Rick muttered, walking over to her and grabbing her arm, but she jerked away.

"No, it's fine. Let him clear the cobwebs or whatever. I don't care. I care about my daughter and I care about you and I care about not losing any more of our people." She tossed a few handguns into the duffel bag and moved around the room to another few boxes of ammo. "We've wasted enough time. We need to gather up what he can and get back to the prison, and hopefully it's still standing."

"Let's not take all of it," he whispered. "Leave him with enough."

Jo paused and then looked over Rick's shoulder. "Yeah. Okay."

Morgan just stood there, having turned his back to them again, and stared out the window.

 

* * *

 

As Rick and Jo each carried a few large duffel bags and totes full of weapons and ammo, Shane was just approaching.

"Hey," Rick greeted. "I was just about to look for you."

Shane was covered in soot and blood, but none of the latter seemed to be his own.

"Yeah, I got into a skirmish with some locals at the café." Of course, Shane meant walkers. In one hand he was holding a picture frame and in the other was the duffel bag he had left Morgan's apartment with, which was not full of some sort of supplies.

"Well, you're here now."

"What'd you get?" Jo asked, gesturing to both the frame and the bag.

Shane hoisted the bag up a little. "Diapers, formula, some little girly outfits for Hope to grow into, and some rash cream for her ass," he replied with a smirk.

"What's the picture?" Rick wondered.

Hesitating, Shane handed it over and Rick took it.

Leaning in, Jo glanced first at Rick's expression, and then down at the image of Lori and Rick, both smiling and hugging their son, Carl. It wasn't just how happy they looked or the fact that Jo finally got to see what Carl looked like, but she got to see what Rick looked like with short hair and not a lick of stubble whatsoever.

With a look of appreciation, Rick nodded and handed the photo back to Shane. "Lori will be really happy to get this."

"Yeah, I thought so," Shane agreed. "I thought maybe we could actually hang it up somewhere we all can see it."

"That'd be nice."

Jo smiled at the pair of friends and then set one of her heavy totes down. "Let's trade," she said. "I'll take the bag with diapers and you take one of these gun and ammo bags."

"I'll tell you what. I'll take both your bags and you can carry the diaper bag and the frame for me," Shane countered.

"Sounds even better."

"Hey, what happened here?" Shane gestured to the bloody gash in Rick's shirt.

"Ah, it's nothing," Rick insisted. "Jo patched me up."

Shane, in response, took a third bag, so Rick didn't have the extra weight on his injured side.

"Thanks," Rick acknowledged.

As the trio set off, ducking under cords and barbed wire and around sharp wooden spikes, Shane nodded over at Morgan who was putting down the walkers impaled on the spikes and then piling them onto the stretcher.

"Everything alright here with him? He's okay?"

Rick didn't even bother to lie. "No, he's not."

The two longtime friends continued forward without looking back, whereas Jo stole a glance over at Morgan, who sensed her eyes upon him and leaned up to meet her gaze halfway. She frowned but nodded a goodbye at him before turning away and sidling up beside Rick.

 

* * *

 

About ten minutes later, they had reached the Tucson again.

By the position of the sun in the sky, they would be back to the prison in an hour's time, if there were no new developments on the road, and still have several hours of daylight leftover. All things considered, it was a good day.

As they piled up the bags into the back of the vehicle, Jo smiled down at the picture frame in her hands and then carried that smile up to Rick's face.

"What?" he questioned.

Reaching a hand up, Jo cup his chin and spread her fingers out on either side of his face, giving his cheeks a slight scratch. "I like the stubble better." Setting the picture gently down on top of the last bag, she watched as Shane walked around them and went right to slipping once more into the back passenger seat. Taking the opportunity of brief privacy, Jo pulled Rick's face down to hers and smiled as their lips connected. "Good day," she murmured against his mouth.

"Says the woman who wasn't stabbed," he retorted with a smile and then deepened their kiss a little.

A throat being cleared made them pull back from each other and they both assumed it was Shane catching them in the act, but then they realized Shane was in the car and the sound came from the opposite direction.

Turning their heads to a few feet away from the Tucson, Rick and Jo found Morgan standing there with a backpack in one hand and his Kevlar vest in the other.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you."

Rick noted the backpack and smirked as he let his gaze focus on Morgan's face. "Nah, it's alright."

"I, uh…you said that man who attacked you, that he's a killer and a rapist?"

Jo and Rick both nodded solemnly.

"He is," Jo confirmed.

"Is that how your daughter came to be?"

She nodded again, looking down at the ground. "It is."

"And, Rick, you're raising, ah, Hope…you're raising her as your own?"

"I am," Rick replied with a firm nod while casting a small smile at Jo.

Morgan nodded as well and fidgeted a little. "I wasn't able to save my wife and I wasn't able to kill her when I had the chance. If I had, my son might still be alive," he muttered. "I couldn't save my boy. I made a mistake and my boy paid the price. I can't…I can't live with myself if I don't do all I can do. I couldn't save my boy," Morgan repeated, bringing his eyes back up and glanced between the pair in front of him. "But I would like to help save your daughter and any other children in your care. That is, if you'll still have me."

Rick smiled. "The offer definitely still stands." Reaching out a hand, he gave Morgan a pat to the shoulder. "There's room in the backseat with Shane."

Morgan nodded his thanks and walked around to the other back passenger door, leaving Rick and Jo to look at each other with a smirk.

Pulling the keys out of his pants pocket, Rick handed them to Jo. "You drive. My shoulder is killing me."

"Poor baby," she teased, shutting the back hatch. "Remind me to kiss it later."

"I'll hold you to that."

As they both walked toward the front of the Tucson, Rick slid into the front passenger seat and Jo into the driver's seat. Turning around slightly, Rick managed to glance back at both Shane and Morgan sitting in confused, awkward silence beside each other.

"Shane, Morgan. Morgan, Shane," he introduced. "Morgan's coming back with us."

"Sorry for shooting at you," Morgan said to Shane.

Shane shrugged. "Not the first time it's happened to me."

Both men shook hands and Rick turned back around with a smile as he glanced at Jo. "Good day."

Putting the key into the ignition, she started the car up and the trio turned foursome drove off together to head home to the prison.


	17. Help

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...I kinda got away from myself and took this chapter in a direction I wasn't planning on just yet, but I honestly don't think any of you will mind. Leave your actual mind's in the gutter 'cause it's just gonna go there anyway by the chapter's end. Mwahahaha. As always, please R&R. Every little bit of feedback goes a long way!

_"And now my life has changed in oh so many ways_  
_My independence seems to vanish in the haze_  
_But every now and then I feel so insecure_  
_I know that I just need you like I've never done before."_  
— The Beatles"

* * *

 

As the sun crested a little lower in the sky, Jo drove the Tucson down the road that led to the prison, but she slowed the speed down, feeling wary about their return approach.

Rick turned and glanced at her, sharing her same fear of the possibility of them not being alone on the road. Although, they did have a small arsenal in the back of the car if they needed it at a moment’s notice. Plus, they had to slow down so that someone inside the prison could move the RV back out of the way for them to head back up the gravel road through the yard.

Bringing the car to a stop outside the first outer fence, Rick hopped out and lifted a hand over his eyes, shielding it from the sun, so he could see if there was anyone around. Narrowing his gaze, he spotted Glenn running down the gravel road, waving at them with a small smile on his face.

The fact that he was smiling was a good sign.

Shane hopped out next, leaving Jo alone inside the vehicle with Morgan, who was sat behind her and leaning forward to take in the sight of the prison before them.

“I thought Rick said there were fences to keep the walkers out?” He lifted a hand and pointed at the two outer gates that had been demolished and the RV blocking their entrance.

“Did you see that bread truck inside the yard, by any chance?” she asked, glancing at him over her shoulder. “That was a gift from The Governor when he attacked us yesterday morning. That truck barreled through the gates with a driver wearing protective gear. Driver got away, along with The Governor and his lackeys after they shot up the place and our people, but not before leaving us with the parting gift of the bread truck full of walkers.” Jo turned more fully around to look Morgan in the face. “You made the choice to come with us. This is what lies ahead now.”

“The living are worse than the dead,” Morgan deduced, sitting back in his seat.

Jo nodded. “Walkers were people, but they don’t have control over what they do anymore. People still alive, on the other hand, have a choice. People like us, the good guys; we just want to live. Meanwhile, people like The Governor just want to destroy. Destroy homes, lives…”

“And he’s not done with his destruction, is he?”

Jo shrugged and shook her head at the same time. “Yesterday was just the appetizer. He’s cooking up his main course as we speak, no doubt.” Jo watched as Rick and Shane walked over to the fence to talk to Glenn through it before the younger man got into the RV. “We don’t necessarily want to fight. We all know there are good people living in Woodbury where The Governor is, but he’s a charmer and can woo the socks off ya if you let him. He’ll rally his people behind him, probably make up some lie about how we attacked him first, and they’ll believe him. They won’t have any reason not to.”

“Is that what he did? Did he woo the socks off _you_?”

“He was handsome and kind enough, but there was something about him that didn’t sit right with me and made me a little uncomfortable.” Jo glimpsed Morgan’s eyes staring back at her in the rearview mirror. “He didn’t have to woo me to get what he wanted. He just drugged me.”

Rick walked back over to the Tucson and opened the passenger door. Leaning inside he looked between both Jo in the front seat and Morgan in the back. “As soon as Glenn moves the RV, head on through. Shane and I are gonna hang back and try and prop the gates back up a little. Maggie’s waiting at the main gate.”

Jo nodded. “Alright.”

Closing the door back up, Rick stepped back and waited along with them as Glenn disappeared for a moment and then the RV came to life. A few seconds later it lurched backward until it cleared the entrance to the yard. Jo waved at Glenn, who waved back, before turning the car back on accelerating forward up the gravel road.

When they came to the main gate, she placed her right foot on the break long enough for Maggie to slide the gate open for them. Driving through into the courtyard, Jo maneuvered the vehicle around so that the back hatch faced the entrance to C Block. That way, carrying all the weapons and ammo would be an easier trip to and from.

Hopping out of the car, Jo was greeted by Daryl and Andrea first, who came out of C Block. Merle was up in the main tower with T-Dog of all people and both waved down at her and she back at them when she noticed the looks of curiousness on all their faces when they saw Morgan climbing out of the backseat.

“Who’s this?” Daryl questioned, pointing at Morgan as if he was threatened by his presence.

“This is Morgan,” Jo replied. “He’s the guy that helped Rick in the beginning. We found him back in King County going a little crazy by himself.”

“And you brought his crazy ass back?”

“I’m not crazy,” Morgan insisted, eyeing both Daryl and Andrea almost thoughtfully. “I was alone too long. I lost…too much. But I am here to help where I can.”

“You’re the one Rick would talk to in the mornings when he first arrived to our camp?” Andrea wondered.

“Well, he tried, but I never heard.”

Jo gestured to the back hatch of the Tucson. “We got weapons-a-plenty now.”

“And ammo?” Daryl asked, following her to the back.

“And ammo,” she confirmed with a nod. “Morgan was stockpiling all of King County’s supply and then some. We brought what we could but there’s still more we left behind when we thought he wasn’t coming back with us.”

Daryl sidled up beside Jo and lifted the back hatch up and stared inside. “Yeah, this’ll do. I s’pose if we need to we can go back to King County and get the rest.”

“Yeah, we could. It was pretty much smooth sailing the entire drive there. Only one small blockage in the road, but we got around it easy enough.”

“Everything else go smoothly once you got there?”

Jo eyed Morgan and Daryl’s eyes followed. “Not quite, but we made it out alive, didn’t we?”

The main gate was slid open again by Maggie as Rick, Shane and Glenn walked through.

“Where are they?” Rick asked sternly. He seemed to be on a mission of some sorts.

Daryl nudged Glenn’s arm as he stepped by with Rick and Shane. “You tell ‘em about the newcomers, I take it?”

Glenn just nodded and then did a double take when he realized Morgan was standing there. “We’re gonna double our numbers at this rate,” he remarked with a smirk.

Jo seemed confused. “What newcomers?”

As Glenn followed Rick and Shane back into C Block, Daryl began to lift two of the bags up. Andrea came around to help as well. Before it could slip and fall, Jo had grabbed the picture frame and pressed it to her chest as she grabbed the bag with the items for Hope. Morgan took the remainder and closed the back hatch for them.

“Some people found their way into the back of the prison that’s been destroyed, the part we don’t go,” Andrea replied. “Five of them: all adults except for one kid in his late teens. Two are brother and sister; the other three are a married couple with their son. The wife was bit in the woods and died about an hour ago.”

“When did they show up?” Jo wondered, as they made their way toward C Block’s entrance.

“Not long after you left, maybe forty minutes.” Andrea nodded back at Daryl. “He found them holed up in the infirmary while doing a routine sweep.”

As they all entered into the Common Room, their eyes fell upon Rick and Shane standing defensively on one side of the room, facing a foursome that were seated at one of the tables while the rest of the prison group seemed considerably more relaxed by the new additions.

The man who seemed to be in charge of the new group stood up. He looked between those standing before him and those who just came in. Although he looked like he could take on a Mac truck, he seemed as tame as a lamb; like a gentle giant.

“I’m Tyreese,” he introduced, offering his hand to Rick who made no move to reciprocate the gesture. Taking the hint, he nodded and pointed over his shoulder at the three surviving members of his group. “That’s my sister Sasha, and that’s Allen and his son Ben.”

Rick nodded politely, though his fists were balled up tight and his stance remained on the defensive side of things. “How’d you get in?”

“Fire damage to the administrative part of the prison. Wall's down.”

“That side’s completely overrun with walkers. How’d you get this far?”

“We didn’t,” Tyreese replied, holding Rick’s gaze. “We lost our friend, Donna.”

“They were lost in the Tombs,” Daryl piped up, causing Rick to turn and look at him. “I brought ‘em in here, but kept ‘em away from the rest till you got back, just in case.”

Rick held eye contact with Daryl for a moment before letting his gaze pan over the faces of his own group. Not one seemed threatened by the foursome standing opposite of them. He focused on Shane, who seemed to be more on the distrustful side, but then he moved his focus to Jo who seemed more intrigued and receptive. Not necessarily wanting to play the hardass persona after the rollercoaster of emotions he’d experienced with Morgan earlier, Rick loosened his posture and softened his gaze when he turned back to look at Tyreese and the other three.

“I’m sorry about your friend,” Rick nodded sympathetically, resting his hand on the handle of his Colt. “We know what that’s like.”

Tyreese gestured at Glenn. “Glenn said you could use extra hands.”

Rick turned and caught sight of the Korean man out the corner of his eye. “He did, did he?” Rick wasn’t exactly upset, but he was a bit put off that the offer wasn’t run by him first.

“Yeah.” Tyreese looked to his sister on his right, then back to Rick. “We’re no stranger to hard work. We’ll go out and get our own food, stay outta your hair. You got a problem with another group; we’ll help with that, too. Anything to contribute.”

Rick just stared at Tyreese for a moment and then looked down at his feet. “I can’t ask strangers to fight an outside threat with us.”

“Please,” Sasha begged. “It’s like ‘10 Little Indians’ out there. It’s just us now.”

“You brought _this_ guy back with you and he’s a stranger to _us_ ,” Maggie remarked, pointing at Morgan.

Turning around to look at Maggie, Rick pointed at Morgan as well. “He ain’t a stranger. His name’s Morgan and he’s the one who helped me when I got out of the hospital after this world went down the drain. Morgan’s the one who told me about what happened and how to survive. I _owe_ Morgan.” He spun around and gestured at Tyreese and the other three. “I don’t know you,” he said, eyeing the burly man in front of him. “No offense, but I have no reason to trust you. The problem we got with another group…you could be part of that other group for all I know, sent here as a Trojan horse to take us down from the inside out.”

“We ain’t part of no other group,” Allen piped up, defiantly. “I just lost my goddamned wife. My son lost his mother. Put yourself in our shoes.”

Rick clenched his jaw and shot Allen a look before shaking his head. “I—I gotta think about this.” Turning around once more to face his people, he gestured for them to head toward the cells. “Inside. C’mon, go.”

“Rick,” Lori spoke up, placing her hands on her hips.

“Lori, babe, go wait in there. I’ll be right behind you,” Shane remarked, touching his hands down to her wrists.

With a begrudged nod, Lori shot a defiant look at Rick and then a softer one to Shane before exiting the Common Room with most of the others. Only Shane, Daryl, Glenn and Jo remained with Rick initially.

“I can’t be responsible for your deaths if something happens,” Rick said, looking once more upon Tyreese.

The larger man leaned forward and, with a soft but bold voice, said, “Turn us out, you _are_ responsible.”

Rick held Tyreese’s gaze and brought a hand up to his face before scratching at his stubble. “You stay in here for now. I’ll make my decision soon enough.”

All Tyreese could do was nod, acceptingly, and stand there as Rick ushered everyone else out of the Common Room as they brought their new supply of guns and ammo into the cell block with them as a safety precaution. Taking the keys from Daryl, Rick locked the barred door behind them and stood there as everyone stared back at him.

Glenn stepped forward first to speak in a quieter tone so his voice wouldn’t carry into the Common Room. “Rick,” he began. “Ever since I got you out of that tank, you've done so much for this group. You’ve gone above and beyond, even after you lost Carl. You didn’t give up on us. You didn’t give up on keeping us as safe as can be, and I appreciate that. We _all_ do. We owe you our _lives_. We—we’ve done _everything_ you asked without question. And I'm telling you right now, you can’t turn those people away. There’s no way they’re with The Governor and there’s no way they’ll survive much longer outside these walls without people like us. You need to give them a chance, the same way you gave Oscar and Axel a chance.” Then, for added effect, “The way you gave _Jo_ a chance.”

Rick lifted his gaze off the floor to look Glenn in the eye. He didn’t reply, but he did let his gaze subconsciously wander over to Jo who had since passed the picture frame to Shane and claimed her daughter from Carol’s arms.

“If Hershel were here, you know he would want to us to accept Tyreese, Sasha and the other two. He’d want you to take a chance,” Glenn pressed. “Don’t you think we owe it to Hershel by believing there’s good in people and opening our doors to those in need?”

Despite himself, Rick smirked. “That’s a low blow, using Hershel as part of your defense.”

“It’s not defense, it’s truth.”

Rick hesitated in answering for a few moments. Bringing a hand up to his jaw, he rubbed his chin and then placed his hands on his hips and looked out at the others, taking turns looking at each of their faces. He settled back on Glenn’s afterward and spoke quietly, “If they try anything, if they give me one reason to doubt their intentions, they’re out on their asses faster than you can guilt me with Hershel again.”

He stared knowingly at Glenn, but his stare wasn’t exactly stern. There was a glimmer of amusement in his blue eyes that brought a small smile to the younger man’s lips.

“Should we tell them?”

Rick placed a hand on Glenn’s shoulder. “Let’s let ‘em sweat it out for a while,” he replied. “I just got back and would like to sit down for a few minutes.” Moving away from Glenn, he quietly addressed the others. “They can stay, but for now they remain in there. We’ll put ‘em up in D Block and then go from there.”

Everyone seemed happy with this decision and began to disperse.

“Someone should tell Merle and T-Dog, so they ain’t too surprised,” Daryl remarked.

Rick nodded at the archer. “Go ahead.”

With a nod of his own, Daryl snatched the keys back from Rick and unlocked the barred door to let himself out into the Common Room. Watching as the Daryl stalked through without even one look at the expectant foursome, Rick turned and gestured for the other set of keys to be brought forward to locked them back into their cell block again. Andrea stepped forward with the key ring and tossed them to Rick, who had not only caught the keys, but also the looks of Tyreese and Sasha.

When he turned around, Sophia walked up to him and reached up to touch his shirt where it was stained with blood. “You got hurt?”

“I did, but I’m okay.”

“What happened?”

“I happened,” Morgan commented.

“So you’re Morgan,” Lori remarked, folding her arms across her chest. “Rick told me a lot about you after he found us.”

“I heard a lot about you, too.” Morgan didn’t allude to any details. He simply nodded respectfully at the brunette. “Sorry to hear about your boy. I lost mine as well. I understand that loss.”

“Thank you,” Lori nodded.

“Shane,” Jo spoke, gesturing to the picture frame he still held in his hands.

“What—oh, yeah.” With a smile, Shane handed the picture frame over and watched Lori’s face as she took it. “I went and found this for you. It was hanging above the bar at the King County Café, same place it’s always been.”

“Oh my god,” Lori gasped, placing one hand to her mouth as tears brimmed her eyes. “Oh my god, I never thought I’d see his face again.” She brought her lips down and kissed the dusty glass, and not caring about it. “My baby.” Looking up from the picture, she turned and threw her arms around Shane’s neck and hugged him so tight it looked as if she might decapitate him. After a deep, yet chaste kiss, she pulled apart from him and looked over at Rick, holding the picture up to show him. “Did you see this? It’s our boy.”

Rick smiled and nodded. “I did,” he confirmed. “It _is_ nice to see his face again. I was starting to worry I would forget what he looked like.”

“Me, too,” she agreed and then shook her head with disbelief. She then walked over to Jo with bright, teary eyes and beamed so happily. “Did you see the picture?” Lori tapped the glass and looked down at it. “This is Carl. You would’ve loved him if you’d known him. He was the sweetest boy that ever lived. Had his daddy’s eyes and his daddy’s stubbornness.”

“I can imagine,” Jo replied with a smile, placing a hand on Lori’s shoulder. “I’m happy Shane found this for you.”

Lori began to cry a little more. “Thank you,” she said through her tears, but then laughed at herself.

Rick stepped over to Lori and pulled her in for a hug, the first time they had hugged in months. The last time had been after Hershel had yelled at them for all their bickering at the storage facility. Appreciating the gesture, Lori leaned into his embrace and patted his back, between his shoulder blades.

“Thank you for going home so Shane could get this,” she muttered in his ear.

“Hey, I’m glad he found it, too.”

As they pulled apart, Rick placed a kiss to her forehead and then let her trot off over to Shane as he turned his attention to Jo. He took a few steps to close the distance between them and set his left hand on the back of Hope’s head and then kissed her little forehead as well.

“We’re you a good girl while your mama was away?”

The infant girl just stared at him in response.

Leaning in toward Jo’s face, he whispered, “Why don’t you tend to her and I’ll come see you in a few minutes. I wanna get Morgan situated and then go through our restocked arsenal.”

Jo nodded. “Okay.”

Placing a hand on her upper arm, Rick let it linger, and although he didn’t outright kiss her with everyone hanging around, the look in his eyes was just as welcomed as a kiss would’ve been. He mostly didn’t make that move because he wasn’t sure they were ready to be public with where their relationship was going yet, if they could even _call_ it a relationship yet.

As Jo slipped past him she nodded over to Carol while Rick stepped away with Morgan to lead him upstairs to one of the vacant cells.

“How was she?” she asked Carol. “Did she eat at all?”

“Lori had her most of the morning,” Carol admitted. “I only took over about fifteen minutes before you all got back. Andrea and Daryl took turns with her, too. But from what I saw, she took to the formula pretty well.”

Jo nodded. “That’s good.” Then, “ _Daryl_ was taking care of her?” she questioned with a grin plastering her face.

Carol chuckled. “Yeah, and he was really good with her, too. A real natural. He kept calling her Lil’ Ass Kicker instead of Hope, though.”

“Yeah, he mentioned something like that after she was born,” Jo nodded. Looking down at her baby girl, she kissed her little nose. “How’s mama’s Lil’ Ass Kicker?”

Hope merely scrunched up her nose and let out the tiniest sneeze in response.

 

* * *

 

Not too long after, Rick had sauntered into the Common Room and made his case to Tyreese’s group, letting them know the decision was made that they could stay and have D Block all to themselves and also that they didn’t need to worry about going out to find their own food just yet because, now that they would be living in the prison, if they ventured out, and the “outside threat” was watching, they could be in danger. Rick welcomed them to share in what they had for the time being.

Tyreese was over the moon with how grateful he was as he and his group were shown to D Block so they could settle in.

It was a little while after that when Rick and Shane returned from D Block, informing the others that they had brought the newcomers up to speed on the situation with The Governor and gave them the choice of fighting with them when the time came or leaving. Apparently Allen wasn’t too keen on putting his son in the position to be killed for people they barely knew, so Rick offered a solution where Ben could hide with Sophia, Hope and the others who wouldn’t be taking up arms; again, when the time came. That had seemed to soothe Allen’s mind a little. Tyreese and Sasha, however, were very willing to earn their keep, even if it meant taking up arms and fighting side by side with Rick and his people.

After everything Rick and Shane had explained about The Governor, what he’d done to Jo (though not going into full detail for Jo’s sake), and the attack he’d made on the prison the day before and their losses because of it, Tyreese was even more convinced that standing with Rick was the right thing to do.

“This world has become an ugly place. We’re all just barely surviving, and I’ll be damned if I stand idly by and let good, honest people, willing to take us in, fight alone against a man trying to make this world even uglier,” Tyreese had professed.

Rick was grateful, too.

He was glad he listened to Glenn’s plea of giving people chances. He was now quite certain Tyreese, Sasha, Allen and Ben were good, honest people, too. When Allen asked about being able to bury his wife, Rick said they had a place in the yard where a few of their people had been buried and Allen was welcome to find a spot for his wife, but to do so before nightfall, while they still had sunlight.

Once back in C Block, Rick had asked Glenn if he would show Allen and Ben to the shovels, but then told him to have Daryl help keep an eye on them.

Tyreese and Sasha, Rick now trusted well enough. But there was something about Allen that Rick didn’t like and couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it was.

As everyone was getting settled in for the evening, and dinner was being prepared by Carol and Lori in the Common Room, Rick finally made his way to Jo’s cell and found her lying on her back. She had one leg stretched out and the other bent at the knee as she stared up at the underside of the top bunk with her hands folded over her stomach. Hope was quietly napping in her pack-n-play crib, and snoring ever so gently.

“Hey,” he greeted.

Jo turned her head and stared up at him with a smile. “Hey. The newbies settled in?”

Rick nodded. “They are. Glenn’s gonna show Allen where the shovels are so he and his son can bury his wife. I’m having Daryl keep an eye on things, though.” He placed a hand onto the railing of the top bunk and moved closer toward her. “I trust Tyreese and his sister well enough, but—”

“—Allen seemed a bit shifty,” Jo cut in.

“Yeah,” Rick agreed.

“He came off as if he’d rather not have to share the prison with us.”

“Yeah, that’s the feeling I got, too.” Rick shrugged. “Well, there’s more of us than them if they _do_ try anything.”

“But it _would_ be nice if the only threat was outside these walls and not _inside_.”

“Yeah.”

His gaze softening more as he focused his attention off the subject of the newcomers and just the sight of her in general, Rick smiled and sank down to sit beside her legs on the bottom bunk. He twisted his torso slightly and leaned forward, placing his right hand against her left him while his left hand braced himself on the mattress while he held her gaze.

“You’re incredibly beautiful,” he blurted.

A bright smile spread across her lips and a touch of pink rose to the surface of her cheeks as she stared back at him. “You’re not so bad on the eyes either.” Lifting her right hand up, she pressed her fingertips gently to the bloodstain on his shirt, where he was bandaged underneath. “You should take some meds for the pain and to ward off an infection. I could only do so much with that whiskey.”

“You did more than enough and I’m thankful you did.” He let his eyes lower to her mouth, visually tracing every curve of her lips. “You owe me a kiss, if I’m not mistaken.”

“I can’t exactly rip your shirt open right now and kiss your boo-boo,” she teased, dropping her hand back down to her stomach. “Anybody could walk right by and see us and we’re not exactly at that point, are we?”

Rick mentally chuckled. She really _was_ on the same wavelength as him.

“Well, I think there’s a way around that,” he commented, causing her to raise an eyebrow.

As he stood back up, he turned to face the bunks and pulled the bedsheet off the top and brought it over to the cell door. He draped part of it over the top and then slowly and carefully pulled the door shut so that there was no way to see inside unless you got down on your stomach and stared through due to the bottom of the sheet that didn’t reach the floor completely. Turning around, Rick smiled back at Jo and sat back down beside her. The cell was considerably darker now, but that was alright. They could’ve lit her candle, but they didn’t want to waste the matches or the candle itself.

Sitting up on her elbows, Jo smiled at him in return as he snaked an arm around her waist and pulled her up more to press her chest against his. At first, he simply nuzzled his nose against hers and then he leaned his face down to the crook of her neck where he inhaled her scent before pressing his lips to the salty skin of her neck.

A contented sigh brushed past her lips as she brought her hands up to unbutton his shirt, starting from the bottom and working her way up. When his shirt was completely opened to her, she ran her fingers along his toned stomach and then leaned in to place a kiss along his right clavicle. As they parted back from each other slightly, Jo placed the fingertips from her right hand to her lips and then pressed them gently against his bandage covering his stitched up wound.

“When it’s healed a little better and you don’t need the bandage anymore, I’ll kiss it for real,” she remarked in a quiet tone. “I’m not gonna lie; it’s probably still a little bloody and gross right now and that does not excite me.”

Rick chuckled. “I don’t blame you.”

“But _you_ excite me,” she amended, which garnered a raised eyebrow from him. “I need you to know that I’m not going to be ready to take it to the next level for a while, both physically and mentally, but trust me when I say you will definitely know when I am.”

Smiling, Rick nodded at her. “Don’t worry. There’s no rush,” he assured her. “Just knowing you feel the way I do is enough to keep me going and give me more of a reason to keep fighting for all of this.”

“And I definitely do,” she insisted.

Inching her face closer to his, Jo placed her hands on either side of his face and kissed him softly at first, but the slight rumble of a moan from within his throat provoked her to deepen the kiss. Their mouths opened and his tongue found hers. It felt like they were practically inhaling each other. Their breathing quickened, along with the pounding in their chests from their hearts and the blood coursing through their veins like hot lava.

The moment of feeling like teenagers in the backseat of a car at a drive-in kicked in and suddenly their hands were everywhere, roaming the sides of each other’s body and then up to entangle in each other’s hair.

In one fell swoop, Rick pulled Jo up to sit in his lap, facing him, and gripped her hips with his fingers. Her knees hit the mattress as she scooted a little more closely against him.

“Well, shit,” she muttered against his lips.

“What?” he muttered back.

“I guess I’m not as _un_ ready as I thought.”

Rick leaned back and looked her in the eye; not blind to how puffy her lips had become from such fierce kissing. “Are you—?”

“No, still not _that_ ready, but, I’m not adverse to other things,” Jo whispered, tilting her head to claim his mouth once more.

He wasted no time in reciprocating the gesture, either. As she began to tug his shirt off his shoulders, he let her and buried his face in her neck, where he suckled on her skin, eliciting a quiet moan from her. A slight roll of her hips against the stiffening bulge in his jeans had him biting his tongue to keep from moaning too loud. Not only were neither of them at the point in their budding relationship where they wanted anyone to know their business, they also didn’t want to wake Hope up.

Snaking his hands around her waist, he grabbed the hem of her shirt and lifted it up off her head and set it beside them with his shirt. Smiling at how amazing, as well as flustered, she looked, Rick lowered his lips to the valley between her bra-clad breasts and kissed her skin. To keep a hold on her, he reached his hands around to her lower back and dropped them down inside her own jeans and cupping her ass a little which lit somewhat of a fire in her; enough to make her gyrate in slow, insistent circles in his lap.

His breathing became unsteady as he brought his lips back to hers, claiming them with his own. She worked her fingers into the brown curls on the back of his head, and gripped tight.

Rick was literally seconds from moving his hands off her ass to undo the front clasp of her bra so he could finally see her breasts, when someone stepped up outside the cell and cleared their throat to get their attention.

“Um, Jo?”

Oh, God, it was Andrea.

Jo pulled her mouth from Rick’s like a bat out of hell and looked toward the bedsheet. From the light out in the cell block, Andrea’s shadow was cast upon the sheet, and Jo and Rick went stock still, practically holding their breaths.

“Y-yeah?”

“If you’re hungry, Carol and Lori said dinner’s ready.”

“Oh?” Jo inquired, trying to catch her breath and turning her gazes to Rick who was looking at the sheet still. “What’d they make?”

“They boiled a bunch of noodles, drained them and then made an Alfredo sauce with a bunch of these packets. It smells amazing, to be honest.”

“Alright, well, I’m just finishing up feeding Hope,” Jo lied, which caused Rick to look at her with a lusty smirk. When he slid his hands out of the backs of her jeans, and then gripped her waist with his fingers, she had to fight not to laugh at how the gesture almost tickled. “I’ll be out in a few minutes. Make sure to save me some.”

“Will do.”

Jo and Rick sat there, still as the grave, waiting for Andrea to walk away. They were looking at each other the entire time, the tips of their noses touching and their lips just barely.

“Did you need anything else?” Jo called out against Rick’s mouth.

Out the corner of their eyes, they could tell Andrea had stepped closer to Jo’s closed, sheet-clad cell door.

“Actually, yeah,” Andrea replied in just above a whisper. “Do you want me to save you a plate, too, Rick?”

The pair stared a little more wide-eyed at each other and for what felt like an eternity, neither could find their voice to respond.

“I’m not an idiot, you know.” There was amusement in the other blonde’s voice. “I won’t say anything. You’re adults and what you do together is between the two of you.”

Letting out a sigh, Rick tipped his head against Jo’s shoulder and chuckled under his breath. “Yeah, save me a bowl,” he finally spoke up.

The amusement in Andrea’s voice developed into a quiet, but noticeable giggle. “Alright. I’ll leave you two to finish up whatever it is I rudely interrupted. Feeding Hope, was it?”

As Andrea finally walked away, Jo and Rick just sat there, letting rationality beat down their libidos. Before they separated, he leaned in and kissed her softly this time and then just held her close in his arms.

“So, that makes two,” he mumbled.

“Two what?”

“Two people who know about this between us. Or, well, maybe three.”

“Who beside Andrea?”

Rick smirked, his brow raising as he gestured toward the door as if the people in question were standing right there. “Shane knows something’s up, and I think when you told Morgan I was more or less Hope’s father, he might’ve assumed enough.”

Placing her hands on his chest, Jo hunched forward and pressed her lips down to the bandage over his wound, kissing it and then working her way back up to his neck. When she reached his earlobe, she whispered, “You _are_ Hope’s father.” Leaning back, she just stared at him; her face completely serious. “I don’t want her to know anyone but you to be her father. When she says ‘dada’ for the first time, I want her to be referring to you. There’s even the fact that you have blue eyes, the same as she does.” Placing her hands on either side of his stubbly face, Jo smiled lovingly. “You delivered her, you were the first face she saw and you were the first person to hold her. The way you look at her and the way she reacts so calmly when she sees you or hears your voice; she’s bonded to you and she loves you already as a father. If you’ll accept the position, I would love for you to consider her yours as much as she is mine.”

Biting his lips together, tears began to sting Rick’s eyes as he slowly nodded his head. “I want to be her father more than anything in this world.”

Jo grinned. “Then, there you go.” She dropped her hands from his face to his bare shoulders. “Belated congratulations on the birth of your daughter.”

“My daughter,” he repeated, looking toward the pack-n-play crib where Hope still slept soundly.

“I suppose she shouldn’t be Hope Dale Moore anymore, either. She should have her daddy’s last name.”

Rick beamed with pride. “Hope Dale Grimes? I like it.”

“I’m glad. I like it, too.” Pressing her lips briefly to his, Jo smirked and leaned over to grab her shirt back up. “Well, Daddy Grimes,” she spoke, garnering an impish rise of his eyebrow from him, “we don’t want to be too fashionably late to dinner, otherwise _everyone_ will know we’re in ‘cahoots’ together.”

Giving her a soft slap to her ass, Rick nodded and kissed her back once more with a smiling curling his lips upward. “Yes, mama.”

 

* * *

 

By the time Rick and Jo had made their ways — separately, and a few minutes apart — out of her cell, they were quite literally the last ones from their group to sit down for dinner. Even the newcomers were already present and expressing their thanks for the meal. As for Hope, she still slept, so she was able to stay put in the cell while everyone else ate.

Since Jo wasn’t the one with the noticeable bulge in her pants, once she had her shirt back on, she had been able to leave the cell first; leaving Rick to take his time and think of anything other than her to put the beast to rest. Imagining shoving his fist through the decayed, rancid skull of a walker did the trick soon enough. He stood up with his shirt and winced as he pulled it back on and buttoned it up. Running a hand through his hair, he looked down at Hope briefly with a smile and then ducked out of the cell and into Hershel’s empty cell next door where the group’s limited stock of medication was.

Not wanting to waste any of it, Rick figured he could live with the pain but keeping an infection at bay was more of a priority. He found a bottle of some type of penicillin and took two tablets and swallowed them dry, making a face as he did so. After stopping once more in his own cell he removed his shirt, balled it up and tossed it onto the floor before grabbing a clean shirt that had someone had washed and folded for him, and then placed at the foot of his bed.

Rick was sweaty, dirty and hadn’t showered in a couple of days, which made him wonder how Jo didn’t gag from the faint smell permeating from him. He lifted his right arm and made another face, fighting his own gag reflex. Not wanting to dirty up a clean shirt by putting it on before showering, Rick simply grabbed his deodorant stick, one of the many that had been found in that supply closet near the infirmary, and applied a decent layer to his underarms. Walking out of his cell, shirtless, he finally joined the others in the Common Room.

Everyone looked up as he entered; either nodding to him silently or looking at him with concern over the bandage strapped around his chest. Carol jumped up and scooped him out a bowl of noodles and Alfredo sauce and then handed him a bottle of water.

“Thanks,” he said to her, taking both at he found an available seat beside Maggie.

“We’re low on utensils,” Maggie said, setting her fork down into her empty bowl. “You can use mine. Just gotta rinse it off.”

Rick frowned and smiled at the same time, taking the fork she offered. “I’m not worried about sharing your germs,” he teased, giving her a slight nudge into her amputated left arm. “We’re all infected with something much worse, remember?”

Maggie attempted a smirk, but it fell flat. She was still in too much grief over losing her father only a day and a half before. Fortunately, she still had Glenn there for her.

“So, all things considered today, it was a good day, huh?” T-Dog questioned, sitting on the floor with his back against one of the cages. His legs were bent up at the knees and he held his own bowl in front of him. “Got a shitload of guns and ammo, Hope even got some more diapers and whatnot, and we got five new faces to help us. And we didn’t lose anyone today.”

“I lost my wife,” Allen muttered, bitterly, sounding as he if was personally offended by T-Dog’s very existence.

“Well, he was talking about _our_ group, wasn’t he?” Merle piped up, which caught Rick’s attention.

First Merle and T-Dog agreeing with each other the night before, then guard duty together earlier, and now Merle more or less coming to T-Dog’s defense? Had hell frozen over? Had they finally let bygones be bygones?

Rick lifted his head and looked at the widower. “I said earlier I was sorry for your loss, and when I said that I meant it not just from myself but on behalf of my people, as well,” he spoke, twirling some noodles around in the cream-colored sauce, which really was very good. “But we lost three people just yesterday, one of them being Maggie’s father Hershel, and two weeks before another person.” He then lifted his fork and began to point at different people in his group. “Maggie _and_ Andrea both lost their sisters, Lori and I lost our son, Carol lost her husband—”

“Honestly, I’m not choked up about that one,” Carol admitted, with a guilty shrug as she eyed her daughter. Sophia, however, didn’t seem upset by the comment. If anything the young teen seemed to agree with her mother.

“Jo lost her husband,” Rick continued. “We’ve lost our brothers, our sisters, our parents, our children, our friends and neighbors. We’ve _all_ lost a lot of people and it fuckin’ sucks. It’s never gonna get any easier and we’re _still_ going to lose people. People in this room are gonna die. Maybe not tomorrow, maybe not a week or month from now. Maybe not even a _year_ from now. We’re _all_ gonna die, but right now we're alive. _We_ are _here_. _You_ are here. You gotta be able to live with that, with how the world is now, or else there’s no point to anything anymore.”

“Here, here,” Shane remarked, raising his water bottle.

Standing up, Andrea held her own water bottle out as well and looked around at everyone. “Rick’s right, as usual,” she grinned knowingly. “But even though we have to focus on the here and now, on those still alive, we shouldn’t forget those who didn’t make it.” Andrea raised her bottle higher. “To my mom and dad, my sister Amy, to Jim, Jacqui, Carl, Otis, Beth, Jimmy, Patricia, Dale, Hershel, Oscar, Axel…”

“To Jenny and Duane,” Morgan added, looking solemnly down at his bowl.

“To my parents, my sisters,” Glenn said.

“To The Governor’s right eye,” Jo remarked, gaining her a few curious looks and chuckles. She raised her water bottle and smirked. “May the left one join it sooner rather than later.”

“Now _that_ I will definitely toast to,” Maggie announced, raising her bottle and giving a nod to Jo. The Governor was responsible for her father’s death and had very personal reasons now to see that man dead as well.

 

* * *

 

After dinner and some deciding to wait until morning to discuss the next plan of attack, literally and figuratively, for Woodbury, everyone began to scatter. Some hung back in the Common Room to clean up or sit around playing cards or clean their weapons. Others returned to their respective cells. Shane took watch with Glenn in the main tower and Tyreese’s group went back to D Block to call it a night, but not before thanking Rick and the others again for their kindness.

Rick had sauntered off to the Shower Room with his clean shirt and some clean underwear as well, but planned to change back into the same pair of jeans. On his way, he considered how he should try looking for packages of new socks the next time they were able take a run, after the business with The Governor was put to bed. The pair he wore now was soiled and had holes in them, and was just generally worn down from the inside of his equally worn out boots. They also did not smell good at all. He was better off just throwing them out and going barefoot in his boots at this point.

Once he was at the shower, he stripped down to his boxer briefs and turned on the water. Slowly, he removed the bandage strapped across his chest, knowing it was just going to get soggy and useless once the water rained down on it. He stood behind the opaque privacy curtain and reached for the bar of soap after stepping out of his underwear and kicking them over to his pants that laid in a pile a few feet away. Lathering up his hands, he set the bar back down and began to scrub his arms and then his hair; not caring that the water was cold. It had been such a hot day that the cold water was a small blessing.

As the water rolled down his face, some of the suds seeped into his stitched up stab wound and his swore under his breath from how much it stung.

“Fuckin’ fuck, fuck…”

“Potty mouth,” came a voice several feet behind him.

Wet, dripping curls matted against his face as he turned to look around the shower curtain and found Jo standing there with her hands on her hips. She was smirking at him and all he could do was duck back behind the curtain and shake his head as a smile took up residence on his face.

“You paying me back for walking in on you about to take your shower last night?” he asked as he continued to wash up.

“No, I brought clean bandages to put on you when you’re done,” she replied.

“Well, I almost am,” Rick announced, finding a little weird that he was lathering up his unmentionables with her standing so close. The movements he made and knowing she was right there made both the situation and himself hard, and he cursed under his breath again. “Shit.”

“Did you drop the soap?” Jo teased.

“It’s got nothing to do with the soap. Trust me.”

Jo looked down at the ground and rocked on the heels of her boots. “Do you want me to just wait in your cell?”

“No,” he replied, a little too quickly. “You can stay. Like I said, I’m almost done.” Practically glaring at his junk, he willed it to stand down. When nothing seemed to work, he just sighed with frustration.

“You seem to be having issues over there.”

“You’re telling me.”

“Is it your stitches? Did they come apart?”

“No, definitely not the stitches.”

“Then, what’s wrong?” she wondered. “Listen, if it’s about earlier, about me saying I want you to be Hope’s father. I don’t want you to feel pressured to take on that position if it’s something you’re not really up for. I mean, I didn’t—”

“It’s not about, Hope,” Rick cut her off. He ran a hand along his length to finish rinsing himself off and that simple gesture made him shudder.

For Christ’s sake, this was awkward for him. If he were alone, he would’ve just jerked himself off and been done with it. But Jo was there and he didn’t want her to go, and he couldn’t just jerk himself off with there, so he was literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.

“Okay,” Jo muttered. “Anything I can help with? Did you leave something in your cell that you need?”

“I need something alright, but it ain’t in my cell.” God, he was aching.

Jo’s mind wandered for a moment, and then she started to put the pieces together. She had been married. She was beginning to remember situations like this from when her husband was alive and well.

Inhaling a steady breath and smirking to herself, Jo hunched forward and began to remove her boots. After setting them down beside her, she lifted her shirt off, dropped it on top of her boots and then slipped out of her jeans. Once they pooled around her ankles, she stepped out of them and walked forward, pushing the opaque privacy curtain out of the way, startling the hell out of Rick.

“What are you doing?” he asked, a little intrigued by her sudden appearance.

“Helping.”

Rick looked down at her, at how the cold shower water fell all over her, soaking her hair, as well as her bra and underwear. “You’re getting wet.”

“That ship has sailed.”

Raising an eyebrow at her, he watched as she looked him over and then focused below, which didn’t help his situation in the slightest. If anything it made it more…strained.

“You don’t have—”

“I said I wasn’t completely ready,” she interrupted. “But I’m ready enough for some things.”

Reaching one hand up, she snaked her fingers through the clingy curls on the back of his head and their faces leaned in toward one another for a kiss. His hands were on her waist almost instantly pulling her close, while her other hand dipped down between their bodies and took hold of him in such a way that he was sure he would start seeing stars.

It had been way too long since anyone other than him had done that and it felt amazing. The palm of her hand was so soft and warm, and now so slick from the water. Closing his eyes, he focused on how her hand felt, stroking and fondling him. His breathing hitched a few times and then his eyes flew open when he felt her kisses leave his lips and work their way down his chest.

With one hand, Rick braced himself on the wall in front of him and the other made its way through the blonde tendrils of hair on the top of her head as she dropped to her knees. He was completely mesmerized at the sight of her tongue swirling around his tip, eliciting the first of many moans from his throat, and when his length began to slowly disappear into the cavern of her mouth, his eyes glazed over with such a heady mixture of lust and gratitude.

It had been an even longer time since he’d gotten this particular kind of help.

As her head bobbed, he moved along with her movements until his body began to tense up with that all too familiar tickling at the base of his spine.

“Jo, I’m gonna—”

She just hummed in response, which did the trick. As he came, it felt like the longest, hottest release of his life and he literally gasped as his hips bucked involuntarily.

Removing his hand from her hair, he reached for the knobs to the shower and turned the water off. Taking a moment to catch his breath, he finally looked back down at her and shook his head with a smile. “I don’t even know where to begin,” he muttered.

“You don’t have to _say_ anything,” she insisted, wiping the corners of her mouth, which was just as sexy as what she’d done for him.

“Then I won’t say anything,” Rick remarked with a devilish grin. Sinking down to his knees, he placed his hands on either side of her face and kissed her as if he was trying to devour her very soul. He tasted himself on her lips and moaned simply from the incredibly recent memory. Then, without warning, he swiveled her body around and laid her down on the wet floor so she was staring up at him. Shimmying down the length of her body, he reached for her underwear and pulled them down her legs and tossed them carelessly over his shoulder. “I know you’re not ready for everything,” he said, kissing her puffy stomach, which garnered a loving smile from her, “but I can help you with something for you, too.”

Parting her legs, he tossed them over his shoulders as he leaned down and placed his mouth against her mound, using his fingers and tongue to return the favor. Her hands roamed through the damp curls on his head as he worked the junction between her thighs like it was his job. Not even her husband, who had been a remarkable lover during their marriage, could give it as good as Rick was in this very moment.

“Oh, sweet Christ, fuck…” Jo began to cry out. “For the love of—oh my god!”

Rick smiled against her as her body began to shake and shudder while he drove it home for her. And, when her body was spent, and after he had licked her clean, Rick crawled up her body like a lion stalking its prey in the wild. If Jo had no restraint, she would’ve allowed him to take her completely right then and there, but she wasn’t ready for everything.

What had just happened had been unplanned and amazing, but she was still only two weeks post postpartum and sometimes, when she even daydreamed about sex with Rick, foggy images of The Governor on top of her popped into her head.

She knew she would eventually get to that point mentally and physically, but it was still too soon and she was thankful Rick understood and didn’t pressure her in the slightest.

Even though they didn’t do anything further, Rick laid his weight down upon her, resting his head upon her chest while their breathing returned to normal. His arms wrapped around her back and she did the same. She could feel his softening length against her inner thigh, and as exciting a feeling it was to have him there, it was also just a simple and sweet feeling as well.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

“You’re welcome,” she replied. “Thank _you_.”

“You’re welcome, too.” Lifting his head, Rick moved up her body slightly to kiss her lips. “We should get you dried off so no one talks.”

Jo nodded and sat up with his help, then got to her feet and reached for her underwear while Rick just watched her, having sat up as well, but just remained there with his legs bent up at the knees. As she slipped back into her underwear, she reached for the towel he had brought with him along with his clean shirt and underwear, and then patted her hair and body dried before tossing it to him. He caught it with one hand and smirked.

“You’re beautiful,” he reiterated his earlier statement to her.

Jo had her back to him as she shimmied into her jeans, and threw him a look over her shoulder. She didn’t say anything, though. She merely smiled back at him.

When he finally got up to his feet, he began to dry off his body and followed suit in getting redressed. Before he put on his clean shirt, though, he waited for Jo who was preparing the new bandage for him. She stepped right up to him and placed a fresh absorbent compress dressing over the stitches, having him hold it in place for her, and then began to wrap the roller bandage around him like the previous one. After all was said in done, Rick pulled on his shirt, wincing again.

Jo caught sight of it and wagged a finger at him. “I told you to take a pain pill or something.”

“I took two penicillin types.”

“You need something for the pain.”

“Someone else might need what we have more.”

“Well, when that time comes, we’ll worry about it then. Right now you’re the one who needs it.”

Rick nodded obediently. “Yes, ma’am.”

Lifting his boots up and choosing to walk barefoot back to C Block with her, Rick placed a kiss to her lips and then they left the Shower Room, feeling just fine.


	18. Plan

_"Without a plan, there's no attack. Without attack, no victory."_ — Curtis Armstrong

* * *

 

Footsteps barely making a sound still seemed to a find a way into Jo’s ears as she laid in bed somewhere just after dawn the following day. She had been having a dreamless sleep, which was always a step up from the occasional nightmare involving The Governor, more often than not. As the footsteps registered even more into her waking mind, her eyes fluttered slightly until she was staring at the grey, brick wall her bunk was pushed up against. Rolling onto her back, she lifted her head slightly and stared out her opened cell door but saw no one and neither did she hear the footsteps anymore.

Perhaps she had been dreaming after all.

Lying back down, she stared up at the underside of the top bunk and listened to the silence. The more she focused on it, though, the more she picked up on small sounds, like Hope breathing or the creak of mattresses from people moving around in their sleep, in their respective cells.

Letting her mind wander further past the faint sounds permeating around C Block at the start of a new day, Jo thought back to the events of the previous day, namely what went on more in the evening between her and Rick.

In the Shower Room.

Without their clothes on.

Pressing her lips firmly together, she brought her hands up to cover her face and hide the girlish smile that began to spread across her face as if she was Sophia’s age again and the cutest guy in school had just winked at her.

Her reverie was broken when she heard a door shutting and then the footsteps again, letting her know she hadn’t dreamt them after all.

And this time they were heavier and faster.

Jo sat up just as Daryl darted into the cell block from the Common Room and blew by her cell. She swung her legs over the edge of her bed and pulled herself up to her feet, crossing her arms over her chest as she walked to the opening of her cell and peered out. Turning her head left, she saw standing halfway into Rick’s cell and talking in tones so hushed that she couldn’t catch what was being said.

However, like a flash of lightning from the storm a few nights before, Rick was up and out of his cell, pulling his shirt on as he went. He didn’t even notice Jo standing at the entrance to her own cell as he ran out of the cell block and into the Common Room with Daryl hot on his tail.

Concerned that something was wrong and curiosity getting the better of her, Jo gave one look to Hope to make sure she was still asleep and okay before crouching down to pull her boots onto her feet as quickly as she could manage. Then, once that task had been completed, Jo scurried out of her cell and made a beeline for the Common Room, where she didn’t find either Rick or Daryl, or anyone else for that matter. There were only two directions they would’ve gone in such hurry; toward the Tombs or outside. And, while she knew the Tombs were supposed to be currently overrun with walkers again, it didn’t seem to pose an immediate threat to anyone in C Block as long as the gated door leading into the Common Room was kept locked, which it was, at all times.

No, the two men had to have gone outside, and that’s just where Jo decided she would follow.

To be safe, though, she ran over all their new stock of weapons was laid out and grabbed one hunting knife and one handgun. She checked to see if the handgun was loaded, which it was, and then made sure the safety was on before she tucked it into the back pocket of her jeans she had slept in.

Quietly and quickly she zipped up the small set of stairs that led to the outside door. Pushing it open, she was immediately greeted by warm sunlight. Letting the door close behind her, she stepped through the caged entrance and down the next set of small steps to the door that led out of the gated entrance.

Once again, she saw neither head nor tail of either of the two men, but she did see Shane in the tower, pacing back and forth and occasionally scoping the woods with his binoculars.

“Shane!” she called up.

His head looked around, seemingly distracted, before he realized she was the one calling his name and looking down at her.

“Did something happen? I saw Rick and Daryl run out real quick.”

“Walkers,” he said.

“Is there another herd?” she wondered, walking up toward the main gate and peering out into the yard where she saw Rick and Daryl standing on the inside of the second outer fence, looking at a small group of walkers, about four or five, that were huddled together and clawing at the first outer fence.

“Five walkers, chained together. One of ‘em has a note ‘round their neck,” Shane replied. “Daryl went down to check it out, didn’t like what he saw, and got Rick.”

“What does the note say?”

Shane shrugged, looking anxious. “He didn’t say, and I can’t make it out with these binoculars.”

Frowning, Jo pulled the main gate open and then closed it behind her as she stepped out of the courtyard and into the grassy yard to walk down the gravel road.

“You should wait back up here for them. It might not be safe.”

Jo held up her knife and pulled out her gun. “I’ve got protection, plus Rick and Daryl are right there.”

Turning away from him and ignoring his attempt to keep her away from whatever was developing, Jo wandered down toward Rick and Daryl, quickening her pace as she stepped off the gravel and into the grass. She didn’t go about it nonchalantly either. She kept her wits about her and her eyes and ears alert. She had already returned the gun to her back pocket but she held onto the hunting knife just in case she needed it at a moment’s notice.

“Shane said there’s a note?”

Rick turned around and stared back at her with anger, frustration and worry on his face, but she could get tell none of it was directed at her. At least the anger and frustration weren’t. As Daryl also looked over at her, Rick stepped aside to allow her a better view of the five walkers chained together. He didn’t say anything at first; he just let her take in the sight of how it was four sets of handcuffs chaining the walkers together, wrist to wrist and the walker in the middle had a piece of cardboard pinned to his chest with words written on in, probably from a Sharpie marker.

Tilting her head to one side and narrowing her gaze, Jo read the words aloud.

“Give me what’s mine and no one has to die. You have three days.” Straightening her head, Jo turned immediate to look at Rick with widened eyes. “The Governor sent them, didn’t he?”

Even though it came out as a question, she really wasn’t asking him as a question. It was more of a statement, really.

“Looks to be that way,” Rick replied, placing his thumb and index finger to the bridge of his nose and looking toward the ground briefly. Letting out a sigh, he looked back up at the walkers and placed his hands on his narrow hips.

“Shane and I were on watch all night. We never saw no one bring ‘em,” Daryl remarked, gesturing to the walkers. “Didn’t hear no vans or trucks either, like that bread truck brought the last batch.”

“They weren’t dropped off but they were led here,” Jo stated, stepping closer to the fence and narrowing her gaze at the five snarling corpses before them. “What if someone walked behind them, crouched down, pushing them along with a sort of stick?” She shrugged at her own suggestion. “And then made a run for it when they were sure you or Shane weren’t looking?”

Daryl looked at her, and she looked back. He shrugged as well. “Seems possible.”

“I don’t like it, no matter how they got here or who specifically brought them here.” Rick’s face went dark. “We know it was The Governor. There’s no one else it could be and he’s toying with us.” He threw a hand in the air out of frustration, and glared at the walkers. “Jo’s been with us almost two months now. He can’t be stupid enough to think we’d just give her up like some damned bargaining chip. That motherfucker is betting on a fight. He’s hoping for it. He just wants to play games with us.” Slamming a hand against the fence, it rattled slightly, which led to the walkers getting a little extra riled up. “Fucker wants to play games? Then let’s play.”

Without a word Rick pulled out his gun, but it wasn’t his usual Colt. It was his Glock 17 with a suppressor made out of a Maglite flashlight. Raising it and aiming it through the links in the fence, he fired one shot into each head of the five walkers as quickly as possible, because once one dropped, the others would get pulled down from being handcuffed together.

Jo and Daryl stood back and watched him as he holstered the gun and turned around to head back up the gravel road. Silently, they followed behind Rick.

“What’d the note say?” Shane asked as they neared the tower.

“Come down,” Rick called up as he pulled the main gate open. “Town meeting in five.”

“Who’s gonna stay on watch?”

“Fuck watch.”

Daryl threw Jo a look, which she glimpsed out the corner of her eye but chose not to acknowledge as her focus on mainly on Rick as they continued to follow behind him. By the time they were heading back into C Block, Shane was out of the main tower and closing the gate behind him to join the others inside. It was like a storm entered the Common Room, the way Rick through open the door and blustered in; his footsteps heavy and his breathing ragged from frustration.

Stalking over to the opened door that led into the cell block, he stuck his head through and called out to everyone, whether they were still asleep or not. “Time to get up!” he shouted. “Town meeting!”

“Rick,” Daryl began, trying to get their fearless leader to just ease up a little.

Rick seemed oblivious to the archer’s tone, and continued, “Daryl, I need you to head over to D Block; wake up Tyreese and his group.” He scanned the Common Room and let his eyes briefly fall upon Jo before looking over at Shane who finally walked in from the courtyard. “He says they’ll fight with us? Now’s the time for him to put his money where his mouth is.”

Not wanting to aggravate Rick and further than he already was, Daryl simply nodded and slipped through into the cell block, passing a few sleep-eyed people coming out of their cells, all murmuring what the fuss was about.

“Rick, what did that note say?” Shane pressed, stepping closer to his best friend.

Rick held Shane’s gaze for a moment, but said nothing as he walked over to Jo and placed a hand on her arm. “You’re not coming to Woodbury when we take the fight to him,” he said, referring to The Governor.

“Excuse you, yes I am,” she retorted.

“This is not up for debate,” he replied, more firmly.

“And it’s not your decision to make for me.” Jo pulled her arm away from him and just stared him in the eye. “If I want to go throw myself into a herd of ravenous walkers, then that is exactly what I am going to do. You aren’t my father, Rick.”

Rick leaned in, his nose practically touching hers, while the rest of their group began to file into the Common Room. “No, but I _am_ Hope’s father now, remember? And I want her to have at least one parent live in case things end badly.”

Stepping back from Jo, Rick turned around to greet the others who all seemed to be standing the exact same way; with their arms cross over their chests and yawning or rubbing the sleep from their eyes.

“What’s the shouting for?” Andrea inquired.

Placing his hands on his hips and standing with his legs firmly planted apart from each other, Rick exuded leadership from his every pore. With his jaw clenched and his nostrils flaring a little, he looked from face to face and said nothing right away until he saw Daryl returning with Tyreese, Sasha, Allen and Ben in tow.

With a tilt of his head, he began.

“We seemed to have just had ourselves an unexpected second visit from our good friend, The Governor.”

The murmurs quickly built up among the group.

“He left us another present in the form of walkers, only this time it was smaller, but more to the point,” he explained. “Five walkers were handcuffed to each other and led here by unknown means and one of them had a note pinned to its chest telling us we have three days to give him what he wants and he won’t kill any of us.”

“Then just give him what he wants,” Allen piped up from the back.

Rick shot him a grave look. “If your wife was alive and The Governor wanted her, would you hand her over?”

“No.”

“Then why would you expect me to even consider handing _Jo_ over?”

“Oh, wait—he want’s Jo?”

Rick rolled his eyes.

Sasha whipped her head around to look at Allen. “Did you not hear _anything_ he told us yesterday about that man when he showed us to D Block?” she questioned, and which Rick quietly appreciated.

Rick also hadn’t realized it, but, by what he had just said, he had more or less just outed his feelings for Jo, no matter how subtle and unintentional it was. A few looks were exchanged among the group but not one person dwelled on it too long. It wasn’t exactly the most important piece of information at that particular moment in time.

“So, what’s the plan? Are we going to Woodbury or are we letting him bring the fight to us?” T-Dog questioned.

“I wish we didn’t have to fight at all,” Lori commented.

“Well, not fighting isn’t an option,” Rick replied. “It’s not about _if_ we fight, it’s about _how_ we fight and, more importantly, _when_.”

“And where,” Glenn added. “If we take the fight to him and he survives or any of his people survive, who’s to say it doesn’t spill over and come back here anyway. We have to prepare to fight here no matter what. Putting up wooden pallets and locking ourselves in won’t work as well as we think it’s going to. Bullets can go through wood and we don’t exactly have a lot of scrap metal lying around. Not that any of that would matter anyway. Tyreese and his group got in through the back and made it past the walkers in the Tombs. Who’s to say The Governor and his people can’t do the same?”

“They can easily tear down the fences just by driving more trucks into them,” Maggie put forth.

“Exactly,” Glenn nodded at his girlfriend who was suddenly sporting a very sparkly ring on her right ring finger.

“The little Chinese boy is right,” Merle muttered, knowing full well what Glenn’s name is.

“He’s Korean,” Daryl corrected.

Merle made a face that showed he didn’t give a shit about being politically corrected. “The point is, and not saying we are, but even if we _did_ hand Jo and her daughter over, you really think The Governor will just let all of us walk away unharmed as that note claimed? I _know_ that man. I _helped_ that man do things I’m not proud of. I’ve seen his true face, the one he hides away from those people in Woodbury who look to him like he’s their savior. He won’t let us walk away,” he repeated, stepping more in front of the group, closer to Rick, and looking around at everyone. “If we gave him Jo and Hope, he would smile and thank us, but once he got them tucked away out of our reach to get them back, him and his soldiers would open fire on us, execution-style. Leave no witnesses, no survivors; no one to contradict his side of the story he’ll go back and tell the people of Woodbury about.”

Nerves seemed to be fraying by the minute among the entire group. Glenn and Maggie seemed to stand closer together, Sophia hugged her mother’s side, and Lori reached for Shane’s hand out of comfort. No one was saying anything either. They were really just waiting to see what Rick had to say next.

Maintaining his stance with his hands on his hips and his feet apart, Rick took center stage again, figuratively speaking, and looked around at all the worried faces. “Listen, I know we haven’t faced anything of this caliber before, but we can do this. I know we can,” he insisted, talking in a less agitated tone. “Now, we already talked about how not everyone would go to Woodbury. We talked about how the rest would hide or prepare to leave the prison altogether. We already agreed upon meeting up at that old house where we found Jo and Sophia, and that’s still the plan. The only difference is now we have more people on our side to either fight or to protect.”

“So, are the same people going to Woodbury?” Andrea asked.

“Yes, and then some, hopefully,” Jo put in her two cents, garnering a look from Rick. It was almost pleading, but she wouldn’t waver. “I mean, if anyone’s changed their minds and doesn’t _want_ to go, I think we should take that into consideration. But those who _do_ want to go, that’s their choice, too.”

“Well, I’m going,” Andrea said, taking a step forward and looking to see who else was still going to do the same.

“We’ll need some muscle to stay behind, just in case,” T-Dog informed.

Carol threw him an impish, raised eyebrow. “Are you insinuating us weaklings can’t hold our own?” she questioned. “I’ll have you know my marksmanship has improved a great deal in the last year.”

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

Carol just smirked and held her daughter tight against her side as she looked back at Rick. “I’ll stay with the children; Sophia, Hope,” she said, and then looked over her shoulder back at Allen and Ben. “Ben is welcome to stay with me, too.”

“I’ll stay with the children, as well. I think I would just get in the way,” Lori spoke, holding her hands up. “I mean, my aim’s decent enough, but I’m not exactly a fighter.”

Tyreese looked between him and his sister. After she nodded at him, he declared, “You can count us in to go with you. I said we’d fight with you and I meant it.”

Rick nodded appreciatively at the siblings.

“Obviously, I’m going,” Merle remarked. “I know that place like the back of my good hand.” Holding his left hand up, he let out a chuckle.

“I’m in, too,” Daryl agreed.

Shane turned and looked at Rick. “And you know I am.”

“Maggie and I will stay,” Glenn announced. “She’s not in a position to fight yet, and if we need to leave in the RV and it breaks down, I’ll be able to fix it. Dale showed me how.”

Rick nodded, briefly recalling all those times Dale had Glenn help him tinker with that old vehicle that had been with them since the Atlanta camp. He then looked over the shoulders of the others at Allen and his son, as well as Morgan.

“What about you, Allen? You gonna fight or stay behind? Ben—you’re, what, seventeen? You’re not exactly a kid anymore, are you? You gonna fight, too? If not, there’s nothing wrong with staying here either.”

“I’ll fight,” Ben insisted.

“No,” Allen admonished. “I’m not gonna watch you get killed. I’m not losing you, too.”

“You don’t know that I will, and Rick said it yesterday: we’re all gonna die. We don’t know when; and if I’m gonna, I’m gonna go out helping people,” Ben professed. “I’d rather die for a cause than get bit like mom.”

“This _isn’t_ our cause.”

Rick cleared his throat and pointed to the door leading out of the Common Room and to the courtyard. “Well, you either fight or you stay here and protect… _or_ you can leave.” He maintained eye contact with the other man. “I believe I made myself clear about that yesterday. Those were the terms.”

Allen stared back with his jaw clenched, and then looked at his son who remained resolute in his decision to fight. Letting out a defeated sigh, Allen’s shoulders drooped. “Where my son goes, I go. If he wants to fight, then I’ll fight alongside him, if only just to make sure he makes it out alive.”

Rick nodded. Morgan was left.

“I cannot fight, Rick,” Morgan shrugged, sensing it was his turn to add his two cents. “I’m not in that place. I can’t…”

“It’s okay, Morgan,” Rick assured.

“I’m not in that place,” Morgan repeated. “But I can be here. I can do for the others what I couldn’t do for my family.”

Carol smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder. “We are your family now.”

“That’s right,” Rick agreed.

With a nod of appreciation, Morgan smiled ruefully as he cast his eyes down toward the floor. “I appreciate that.”

“Alright, so that’s been squared away. Me, Shane, Daryl, Andrea, Merle, Tyreese, Sasha, Allen and Ben will go to Woodbury,” Rick rattled. “The rest will stay here and batten down the hatches and prepare to leave at a moment’s notice if need be.”

Jo’s face grew stern. Stepping into his line of sight, she glared up at him with her arms folded firmly across her chest. “Did you think I was joking when I said I was going, too?”

Rick looked back at her and leaned close to her face. “Did you think _I_ was joking when I said you _weren’t_? It’s not up for discussion. I told you I want you to stay here, so stay here.”

“No, _Rick_ ,” she spat. “I’m not some invalid incapable of fighting or contributing to a fight. I can hold my own. I survived alone in this world after the outbreak before I found Sophia, and afterward I took care of us both. I might not have had the opportunity to prove myself as some sort of apocalyptic warrior queen since I got tossed into, basically, a fucking dungeon and since you and the others found me, but I am plenty capable.”

“I didn’t say you _weren’t_ capable,” Rick replied in a quieter voice. “I’m saying I don’t want you to fight. I don’t want to run the risk of you dying because of that man, that monster.” He practically shook as he stared her in the eye. “I don’t want to lose you.”

“You won’t,” she guaranteed. “I have enough reason to survive. But even if I _do_ die, it’s going to be from killing The Governor and ensuring my daughter can grow up in this hell on earth without the threat of that man ever being able to lay his hands on her.”

“She _would_ be helpful in Woodbury,” Merle remarked, clearly having overheard everything as clear as day like everyone else, despite Rick and Jo carrying on as if they were speaking privately to one another. “If we need to split up, she’ll know enough of where to go once we get there.”

“You should’ve seen her with her sword,” came Sophia’s voice, out of the blue. “She was really good with it. She moved like a dancer.”

Jo turned and looked at the girl she still considered as a daughter, and smiled. “Thanks for the votes of confidence,” she said to both Sophia and Merle. Throwing her gaze back at Rick, she pushed past him, purposely bumping into his shoulder; although, it wasn’t is injured one because she wasn’t an asshole.

She didn’t even bother to say anything else to Rick or anyone; she simply walked out of the Common Room and into the cell block to check on the state of her daughter. Once in her cell, and peering down into the pack-n-play crib, she saw her little one was awake and trying to chew on her fingers. It brought the most loving yet most simple smile to Jo’s face and, for a brief moment in time, nothing was wrong in her life. The apocalypse wasn’t real, there was no psychopath that wanted her dead and to take Hope from her and she sure as hell wasn’t living in a prison. For a few seconds, she forgot all of that just by looking at her daughter.

Of course, the world came flooding back into her senses and it felt like there was a weight suddenly on her chest. Crouching down, she stared through the mesh fabric into the pack-n-play crib, watching as Hope tried to follow her with her eyes. Fear of what could happen to Hope over the next couple of days was nerve-wracking to Jo and she began to cry.

“Jo, are you alright?”

It was Glenn.

Wiping her eyes, she shrugged. “If I said yes, I would be lying.” Jo sighed. “I’m just tired of worrying. I’m tired of feeling guilty that this threat has been posed on everyone because of me.”

Glenn frowned and stepped aside a little to reveal that Maggie was standing there with him. “It’s not your fault,” he insisted. “None of this is your fault by any means.”

“You can’t blame yourself for something that was done to you,” Maggie remarked. “You didn’t ask for it to happen. The Governor is the only one responsible. He could’ve just left you alone once you and Sophia got away. I mean, didn’t you say he told all of Woodbury you were dead? So, what would’ve been the harm in letting you stay theoretically dead by not trying to find you?”

“He’s just a mad man with a convoluted sense of revenge,” Glenn stated, crouching down to be at Jo’s level. He reached out a hand and placed it on her shoulder. “Look how far you’ve come. Look at all you’ve survived. There’s a reason for that, and it’s not to sit back and let the world rip you a new one or take the blame for anything you have no control over.”

“Thank you,” Jo muttered, wiping her eyes again. She didn’t want to cry in front of anyone.

“Glenn, Maggie,” came Rick’s voice.

Glenn turned and looked up to see Rick standing behind him and Maggie, and Glenn stood up to nod at the other man. He didn’t have to even have Rick say anything to him. He could just tell by the look in Rick’s face that he wanted to talk to Jo, alone. With a look over at Maggie, he smiled a small smile and led her off toward their cell while Rick moved closer to the entrance of Jo’s cell.

Rick crouched down, the same as Glenn had, and even reached out to her as well, but she shrugged him off and stood up. Taking a step away, Jo turned her back from him and placed her hands on her hips, looking down at the floor.

“Jo,” he spoke, slowly standing up and wincing a little at the slight ache in his knees. He wasn’t exactly some spring chicken anymore. He closed the gap between them and placed his hands on her shoulders and pulled her back up against his chest as he leaned his face forward to whisper in her ear. “I’m sorry about this, but I just don’t want to see you get killed.”

“Why do you assume I will be?”

“I’m not,” he insisted. “But I don’t want to take that risk.”

“It’s not your decision.”

Rick sighed out of frustration and dropped his hands. “I would lock you and Hope in this cell if it meant keeping you both safe.”

“I had enough of being locked away, thank you,” she frowned, turning around to look at him.

“Well, there’s a difference between locking you up to keep you safe and locking you up to keep you prisoner and nothing more than a real life sex toy.”

Jo made a face and shied back from Rick. “Don’t you understand that that’s why I need to go to Woodbury? I need to see The Governor die, whether it’s by my own hand or someone else’s. I need to see him die with my own eyes.”

“I get that, I do. I just—”

“—don’t want to take the risk. Yeah, I heard you.”

“God _dammit_ , Jo, I don’t think you understand _why_ I’m so scared of letting you come,” he practically growled at her. His blue eyes darkened and he bared his teeth very briefly out of his frustration. “I don’t want to _lose_ you. I don’t want to watch you _die_.” He furrowed his brow and tilted his head slightly, placing his hands upon her shoulders once more and pulling her closer toward him. “I had to watch my son wither away and die, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I don’t want to lose someone else like that.”

“And you won’t,” she insisted.

“Says the woman who claims she’d rather die a slower death from a walker bite just so she can say goodbye,” Rick quipped, leaning back slightly, but not removing his grip from her shoulders.

“That was a cut and dry theoretical situation where I could only pick between two deaths,” Jo rolled her eyes. “Not at all realistic because _no one_ gets to choose how they die. It happens when it happens.”

“So why put yourself in a situation where it _could_ very well happen, Jo?” He was almost pleading with her now, as if the Boogie Man from childhood lore was standing behind her and he was trying to convince her not to turn around and acknowledge it.

“Rick,” Jo frowned, bringing her hands up between their bodies and placing them on either side of his face. Gently, she stroked the increasing beard growth on his face and leaned his head forward so she could touch his forehead against hers, while their noses just barely grazed each other. “We can’t stop the world from turning. We can’t stop death, whenever it happens. So, please don’t worry so badly.” Jo leaned back and looked him in the eyes to see his looked somewhat damp. “Don’t you think I’m scared of you going off to Woodbury without me? What if _you_ die? What do I do then?”

Rick narrowed his eyes, his hardened and anxious expression softening under her gaze. Licking his bottom lip, he lifted her hands off his face and just held them between their bodies. “Listen, I don’t know if this is the right moment to talk about this, but…” Rick sighed and looked down. “I know you and I have only known each other not even two months, but there’s been something growing between us since that first day we met. It didn’t happen right away, when I first saw you or anything like that. I mean, when I first saw you all I could think was ‘whoa, she's pregnant.’”

That brought a smile to Jo’s lips as she nodded. “I remember barely being able to keep my eyes open. I was so tired and hungry, and then these four men come into the room out of nowhere and Sophia ran up to the handsomest one.”

Rick smiled as well, a small smile, as he kept his demeanor soft but serious. “I think I might have first noticed something different when I helped you get through the fence when the handcuff on your wrist got you stuck. It sounds cliché and like something out of a _terrible_ romantic comedy, but our fingers touched and it was like something changed in that instant and I may not have known what it was then, but it’s been building up since.” Rick let go of her hands and placed his palms to the sides of her face, just looking her in the eye. “I can’t—I can’t lose you. I _won’t_ lose you…because I love you, Jo. I love you so _fuckin’ much_ and if you died, _I_ would die.”

“Well,” Jo fumbled over what to say next, considering what he admitted to her and how it made a bunch of butterflies come to life in her stomach. It made her feel as if she were a schoolgirl, which she tried her best to chastise herself about, but failed. “Well, we can’t _both_ die. Who would take care of Hope?”

“Maggie and Glenn? Lori and Shane?” Rick shrugged. “If we both died she should be with two people who love each other.”

“The way _we_ love each other?” she replied, whispering it, and holding his gaze.

The look on Rick’s face seemed to be one of relief. Hearing her admit that she, too, loved him; that was enough to calm his nerves and instill that fire in him to fight even harder to protect her and Hope and everyone else.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “The way _I_ love _you_ , and the way _you_ love _me_.” Without saying anything else, Rick moved his arms and hands around her body and pulled her close up against his. One hand he brought up to the back of her head as she leaned her face into his chest.

And they just stood there, in their embrace, quietly enjoying the new development between them and the overall closeness of their bodies.

Jo couldn’t help but feel like her skin was on fire as she replayed, in her head, the image of his face when he said he actually loved her. She hadn’t felt this strongly about anyone in her life since the day she married her husband Oscar, and they had been together several years before that had happened. She had only known Rick just under two months and it hadn’t even been a full week since she’d begun to realize he meant the world to her. And when she thought about how strongly she felt about him now, she almost felt guilty that she couldn’t remember feeling the vibrancy of love for Oscar; her poor, goofy Oscar who fell so early to the outbreak.

It was just so strange how quickly and wholeheartedly she found herself in love with Rick and she was sure he had to feel the same bit of awkwardness to how quickly it all developed, too. So, she felt the need to say as much.

“Is it crazy to have reached this point in our relationship, so soon? To be in love and wanting to die if the other died, after not even two months?”

Rick shrugged, pulling back from their embrace to look down at her. “I think if this was the world before, then yeah; I’d have my reservations. But this _isn’t_ the world before. This is the world now and we’re all learning to maneuver it as we go. And, I mean, I look at Glenn and Maggie,” he chuckled, “and they didn’t even know each other a few days before they were sleeping together. And I’m fairly certain they only knew each other a week before they admitted they loved each other.”

“Really?” Jo smirked.

“Really.” Looking contemplative, a smile grew on Rick’s lips. “Remember _Speed_?”

“The movie or the drug?”

Rick raised an eyebrow at her and snickered. “The movie.”

“Yeah,” Jo nodded. “With Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock and that bus.”

Rick nodded. “Yeah, well, there was a line at the end of that movie that makes me think of us, and of Glenn and Maggie, or anyone who’s lucky to enough to find someone to love these days. I mean, the line was kind of negative toward relationships, but it went something like ‘relationships that start under intense circumstances never last.’ But, I dunno. I think that’s what keeps people like us together. We’re thrown together under these intense circumstances and we have to rely on each other and we all grow close to one another, like family, and some of us find something more in another person that makes living in this world worthwhile.” Once again, Rick lifted his hands up, but only one rested on her shoulder and the other brushed hair off her face. “You’re my person. Well, you _and_ Hope are, but, uh, I think that goes without saying.”

Jo stared back at him and then patted her hands on his chest, but gently as not to hurt the wound on his left side. “After all that said and you still haven’t kissed me yet?”

Rick grinned and leaned his face down, pressing his lips to hers. Throwing his arms down around her waist, he hoisted her up off the ground in a sort of bear hug while never letting their kiss break. Jo wrapped her arms around his neck to help support herself and keep from slipping out of his grasp while simultaneously playing with the curls at the nape of his neck. As his tongue slipped briefly into her mouth, twirling with hers a bit, Hope began to fuss.

Their eyes had been closed as they enjoyed their moment, but the moment they heard that little girl begin to wind up, their eyes popped open and they stared at each other with their lips still locked. Slowly, they smiled against each other’s mouths and pulled apart. As Rick set Jo back down to her feet, he moved away from her and over to the pack-n-play crib to look down at Hope and how her lips and chin quivered at the onset of the wail that immediately followed.

“Hey, sweetheart, it’s alright,” he hushed, reaching down and lifting her up into his arms. “Daddy’s here.”

That, alone (the image of the two of them, and Rick’s words), was enough to make Jo’s heart swell.

When it appeared that Hope was in no mood to settle down, Jo held out her hands. “Unfortunately, I don’t think you have what she needs right now.” Upon Rick’s confused look, Jo grabbed one of her boobs, which was enough for Rick to catch her meaning. “It’s breakfast time.”

“Oh, shit, right…okay.” Handing Hope over, Rick then took a step back closer to the door. “I should probably talk to the others about when we’re gonna go to Woodbury. I sort of walked away to follow after you.”

Jo sat down with her daughter and began to lift up her shirt, foregoing the privacy blanket she normally used. “You don’t want to stay and watch your daughter being fed?”

Rick looked down and smirked. “As beautiful as it is to see a mother nursing her child, and as much as I love you both, I think I’d rather the first time I saw your breasts that a baby wasn’t attached.”

“What—are you saying _you’d_ rather be the one attached to them?”

“Honestly?” he questioned, looking back up at her.

He didn’t even half to confirm his answer. Jo let out a hearty chuckle and just nodded her head, reaching for the privacy blanket after all. “Alright, fair enough.” Before he could duck out of her cell, she got his attention by announcing, “I’m still going to Woodbury.” Rick turned back around to give her his full attention. “I love you, too, and I’m not trying to guilt you with this, but if you truly love me, you won’t try and stop me from going. You _have_ to know I need to be there and see this through.”

Rick sighed and nodded. “I know. I know you do.” Running a hand down over his face he made a gesture with his hand and then slapped it down against his side. “Okay. Okay. If you’re coming, you’re staying with me, at all times. I need to know where you are so that if something goes wrong I can protect you. And, before you say anything about being able to protect yourself, because I know you can, I just need you to know that I _need_ to be able to protect you. I love you. It’s part of how I show it. If we separate into two groups like Merle mentioned, then you’re with me then, too.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Jo nodded, accepting his terms with a victorious grin.

 

* * *

 

By lunch time, plans had been changed considerably.

The same people were staying or going, but it was technically the details that had been altered.

The group had remained congregated in the Common Room after they finished eating and were now also taking stock of their weapons again; of what would stay and what they would take to Woodbury.

“It’s too bad we didn’t have, like, a bazooka or something,” Daryl quipped.

“I actually did have one of those,” Morgan informed. “It was in one of the chests that Rick didn’t choose to bring back here.”

Rick made a face, as if he was bummed but shrugged it off. “Wouldn’t have been practical anyway,” he remarked, while sitting on top of one of the tables with his feet resting on the seat below, where Jo sat between his legs.

They had chosen to not hide their relationship, although they hadn’t come right out and officially announced it. They didn’t feel they really had to, either. Like Andrea had said: they were adults. There were a few glances their way, of course; smirks, raised eyebrows and the like. But no one seemed to say anything about it. Not that there was an ideal moment to do so anyway, since they had the more pressing matter of planning their attack on Woodbury down to the very last detail.

“Shane, Daryl, the two of you took watch all night last night,” Rick continued. “If we’re doing this tonight, you’re gonna need to be rested up. We don’t need any slip-ups because you’re overtired.”

Shane nodded and leaned into Lori, grabbing the back of her neck and kissing her temple while whispering something in her ear. She nodded at whatever he had said and then turned to watch him head out of the Common Room to catch some z’s in their cell. Daryl followed after, heading up to lie down on his mattress on the Perch.

The rest returned to the situation at hand while Sophia walked into the Common Room with Hope in her arms, to grab a bottle of water for herself. The others stopped talking shop for a few more moments, smiling after the twosome and their gazes followed them after they’d returned back into the cell block where Sophia had been entrusted with taking care of the infant while the adults discussed plans.

“I still don’t understand why this has got to be done tonight,” Allen muttered sourly. “You said that note said we had three days.”

“We ain’t waiting for the fight to come to us,” Rick responded.

“Then why not tomorrow morning? Why so soon?”

“You ever heard of the element of surprise?” Merle retorted with a roll of his eyes. He looked over at Rick who nodded back at him.

“Now, we’re only taking the truck and the hatchback. That still leaves the RV in case our plans go south and ya’ll staying need to get out of here quick,” Rick said, dropping his hands down onto Jo’s shoulders. “We’ll park a little ways away from Woodbury and walk the rest of the way. Merle says the gate he got Jo and Sophia through is further away from the main strip of the town and not manned as vigilantly. The least amount of lives we need to take, the better, of course, but if we need to take down whoever’s on guard, Daryl’s already on board. His crossbow can take someone out from afar, and silently, unlike a gun, and stealth is something we need to maintain.”

“We’ll make our way through, behind the buildings,” Merle added. “Even though The Governor gives everyone a curfew after a certain time at night, there’s always a few stragglers, not to mention any and all who would be on guard, or even The Governor, himself.”

“The hope is to get up to his apartment without being noticed. If he’s not there, we’ll hunker down and wait till he shows up, and if he _is_ already there, well, either way we should have the element of surprise,” Rick commented, with another look to Merle. “We’ll break up into two groups, though. Half will remain on watch along the outskirts of Woodbury while I take the other half with me to the apartment. The main goal of this attack is, first and foremost, to take out The Governor. Beyond that, it’s exposing the man he really is to the people he has there and get them to understand. But let me make one thing clear,” he stressed, holding up a hand. “We don’t attack anyone who doesn’t attack us first. We’re not those kinds of people. If someone shoots at you or tries to kill you, then so be it.”

“We don’t kill the living unless _they_ try to kill _us_ ; then all bets are off,” Jo stated.

Rick nodded and placed his hand back down to her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “Exactly.”

“What happens to all the people after The Governor’s dead?” Tyreese inquired.

“We give ‘em a choice,” Rick replied, looking upon everyone’s faces. “They can continue living in Woodbury and go about their lives, but with better leadership; someone who won’t retaliate against us or be anything like The Governor. Or, they can come here.”

“We _do_ have the room,” Lori noted. “We could turn this into a _real_ community.”

“What if they don’t want to stay at Woodbury _or_ come here?” Morgan asked. “What happens to _those_ people then?”

Rick shrugged. “That’s not our problem. If they choose to strike out on their own, that’s up to them.” He looked down at the nape of Jo’s neck for a moment and then up again at everyone else. “Those of you staying here, you’ll go into the Tombs and hide, preferably in one of the offices in the Administration buildings. If The Governor gives us the slip somehow and comes back here before we do, and if they come into the prison, it’s unlikely he’ll assume any of you would be there. Pack up our things, place them in the RV and take the RV into the woods and hide it. The Governor and his men will think we hightailed it the fuck outta here.”

“What if he doesn’t leave? What if he decides to stay here because he thinks you took Woodbury from him?” Glenn questioned. “Shouldn’t we have a backup plan? I mean, you’re not taking all the guns. We’ll be armed here. We can throw some smoke bombs at them; unleash some of the walkers from the Tombs on them. We have that riot gear still to protect ourselves. We can get onto the roofs and fire at them from multiple locations and angles; make them think they’re surrounded by a shit ton of us.”

Maggie nodded. “We can take down a few walkers in the Tombs before y’all leave tonight and prop them up around the grounds, in the towers or on the roofs like a bunch of snipers. It could add to the façade.”

Rick nodded. “That’s actually not a bad idea. We’ll do that, with the walkers, but don’t rely on the back-up plan of firing on The Governor and smoking him out with bombs and walkers unless you absolutely have to,” he stressed. “Hopefully, it won’t come to him or any of his diehard fans escaping Woodbury alive to even think about coming here.”

“What happens when you come face to face with The Governor? Will you shoot first and ask questions later, or will you sit down with him and see if there isn’t some sort of peaceful agreement you can come to?” Morgan wondered further.

Chuckling a little, Rick shook his head. “There will be no sit down with that man. He murdered three of our people in cold blood. He violated Jo in the worst of ways, and not just once. He kept her locked up and chained to a wall, living in squalor while pregnant. And, apparently he has a room with fish tanks holding severed heads of the dead, all of whom he probably killed. He even kept his own undead daughter chained up in a cage.” Rick sat back a little and scoffed at the notion Morgan presented. “That man doesn’t _deserve_ a sit down. He’s not someone who even deserves the life he has.”

Jo looked down at her hands, listening as Rick mentioned what The Governor had done to her. She knew he only brought it up to make his point about how terrible The Governor was, but she didn’t like having to remember it. She just hoped that after tonight, and after they hopefully managed to kill The Governor once and for all, she could put that part of her life to bed and just look forward.

“I suggest we all take it easy the remainder of the day and rest up, because we got a long night ahead of us,” Rick continued.

As everyone began to break apart and, more or less, head back toward their respective cell blocks, Allen slowly approached Rick and Jo, with his son trailing behind him. He nodded at Rick and looked a bit antsy.

Rick tilted his head slightly and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“I’ve been talking it over with Ben, and I’ve convinced him to stay here. He can help protect the others and I would feel better knowing he stood a better chance at surviving this bullshit than me,” Allen informed.

“Are you saying going to Woodbury is bullshit or the fight between us and The Governor that’s gonna happen no matter what?” Rick eyed Allen warily, almost daring him to say something against their plans; anything that could give Rick a reason to punch him. There was just something about Allen that got under his skin.

“Both, honestly.”

“Well, like I said,” Rick said, choosing his words carefully, “You’re more than welcome to stay here, too, and protect the others, _or_ …you can leave this prison and try making it out there alone. I don’t think Tyreese or Sasha are in any rush to leave and go back out into the world anytime soon and, _to be honest_ , your son don’t seem so keen on the idea either.”

Allen threw a look over his shoulder at his son who looked sheepishly down at the ground. “I just don’t think it’s fair that those are our only choices.”

“This is _our_ place,” Rick declared, moving his right leg behind Jo’s back and then climbing down from the table to stand in front of Allen, glaring down at him. “We took it, we spilled our blood here.” He tossed a look to Jo and returned a hand to her shoulder, giving it a loving squeeze. “We brought life into this place,” he added, before turning to look back at Allen, “and I’ll be damned if _anyone_ , whether it’s you or some other asshole, comes into _my_ home and disrespects me, or my family, or my decisions. If you don’t like it: leave. I’m not keeping you here.”

“Dad,” Ben spoke, placing a hand to his father’s arm.

Allen just stood there, clenching his jaw, while losing the implicit glaring contest between him and Rick. With a conceding nod, Allen took a step back. “Alright, alright. I’ll play by the rules. I’m not an asshole. I just want what’s best for my boy.”

Rick clicked his tongue against the inside of his bottom lip and nodded back. “Then we’re understood.”

“We are,” Allen agreed, but the flare of his nostrils suggested he wasn’t content.

After a moment of further staring each other down like two alpha dogs fighting for dominance, Allen took his leave with Ben; leading them both back to D Block. Cracking both sides of his neck and then flexing his shoulders backward so that his back cracked slightly as well, Rick turned and looked at Jo with an impish grin.

She was smirking back at him. “You good?” she questioned. “You done marking your territory there?”

Rick stepped up between her legs and leaned down, placing his hands on either side of her arms and then down onto the table behind her. In doing so, she was forced to lean back even further and, in the process, he closed the distance between their faces as he claimed her lips with his own.

“Yeah, I’m good,” he whispered into her mouth after their kiss lingered for a few moments. As he stood back upright, he looked down at her and held out his hands to her, which she took. “Let’s get some rest.”

Standing up with him, Jo let him lead her out of the Common Room and into their cell block. They were about to duck into her cell when they stopped upon seeing Sophia sitting on Jo’s bottom bunk with Hope in her arms, humming some sort of lullaby.

Sophia looked up and smiled. “Do you want her back?”

Jo smiled back and shook her head. Holding up a hand, she insisted, “No, it’s okay. You can stay there with her if you want.”

“Yeah, thanks,” Sophia nodded in response. The thirteen-year-old was very much enamored with Hope and seemed to look at the infant as the sister she never had or, at the very least, like a real life baby doll.

Looking up at Rick, Jo gestured to their right and he caught on as he gave her hand a squeeze and led her away from her cell and instead to his.

As soon as they were inside, Rick sat down first on the bottom bunk and then pulled Jo to sit down beside him. In tandem, they laid upon their sides; Rick closer to the wall, playing the part of the big spoon to her little spoon. They bent their knees together and Rick wrapped his left arm around to her front to pull her back up against his chest as he buried his face into her neck, inhaling the scent of her skin and her hair. He began to leave a trail of small kisses there and all the way to her ear, and the sigh of contentment he heard escape her lips was like music to him.

“I love you,” he whispered into her ear, slowly closing his eyes.

Jo smirked and snuggled more into his embrace. “I love you, too.”

 

* * *

 

Less than eight hours later, ten people from the prison were traveling along the dark Georgian roads with only the headlights from their vehicles and the full moon above them to light the way.

In the first vehicle, Hershel’s old truck, which had technically been Otis’ once upon a time, Rick was driving, with Merle in the passenger seat and Jo sandwiched between them. Rick hadn’t been kidding when he said that if she was going, he wanted her at his side at all times. In Shane’s Tucson, he drove. Beside him was T-Dog, and in the back seat sat Tyreese, Sasha and Allen.

As for Daryl and Andrea, Daryl had decided he would bring his bike along and offered Andrea a ride on the back of it so she didn’t have to end up sitting in the bed of Hershel’s truck, clinging on for dear life.

After a while, Merle pointed to a spot and Rick tapped the breaks of the truck twice to signal those behind them before bring the truck to a crawl and stopping altogether. As engines were turned off, everyone climbed out of their respective vehicles and grabbed their weapons and rounds of ammo they were going to bring with them.

Rick stood in the dark, vacant road and pulled out a flashlight, which he turned on and pointed at the woods before them all. “Merle’s gonna lead us through here. The other side of these woods will bring us out to the backyards of some abandoned houses. Those houses are on the road leading up the back entrance to Woodbury,” he informed. “Now, it’ll be tricky, doing this in the dark, so keep your eyes and ears open for walkers, and don’t make a sound unless absolutely necessary.” He eyed each person individually. “We don’t want them to hear us coming.”

“The walkers or Woodbury?” T-Dog questioned with a hint of a smile.

“Both.” With a nod, after he was sure everyone was ready, Rick looked at Merle. “Alright, lead the way.”

Either single file, or side by side, the group of ten entered the woods with their guns lowered and their blades at the ready. The blades were silent and would be easier for dispatching any walkers before they reached Woodbury.

During the entire ten minute walk through the trees, there were only about five or six walkers they had come across and Shane, Daryl and Sasha seemed to take them out without anyone else needing to lift a finger. Also, the entire time, Rick remained almost shoulder to shoulder with Jo; occasionally slipping her a sidelong glance and a smile when she looked back.

When they soon began to exit the other side of the woods, they found themselves between the backyards of two ranch-style houses; one that was red brick and one that was possibly yellow siding. It was hard to be sure of the exact color in the darkness around them.

Soundlessly they made their way onto the road, keeping an eye out for walkers, of which there seemed to be none and then Merle turned and faced everyone while pointing up the road to their left.

“That way,” he whispered, once again leading the way. “C’mon.”

The others either kept their blades up or were changing them out for their guns in case there was a change in plans and they needed to protect themselves in a way blades wouldn’t help.

It was possibly only another two minutes of walking when Merle held his bladed stump up so that everyone halted behind him. They were bathed in the darkness from the overgrown trees lining either side of the road, but approximately a hundred feet away, give or take, there was the back gate into Woodbury with walls on either side, stacked with large tires that once belonged to tractor trailers. And, up top, armed with a rifle, was a man on guard.

Jo’s breath hitched.

It wasn’t the same kid who’d been on guard when Merle had helped her escape almost two months earlier, but it was the same gate. She remembered the houses they had all just walked past and the abandoned cars along both sides of the road. And suddenly it was all so real, coming back with the sole intent to finally kill The Governor.

She was both terrified of seeing him again, face to face, and excited to see him die, preferably at her hand.

Rick looked to her and gave a nudge to her arm with his elbow. “Are you ready?” he asked her in a whisper.

Jo looked back at him and nodded. “Is it cliché to say I was born ready?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.” After giving her a brief grin, Rick looked over to Daryl and then gestured with a bob of his head toward the man on top of the wall. “You’re up,” he murmured.

The archer moved silently to the front of the group and pointed his crossbow upward. Narrowing his gaze, he steadied his aim, exhaled a breath and released the arrow, which flew through the air without a sound until it buried deep into the eye socket of the man on the wall. After a brief stumble, the man on the wall fell forward, landing on the outside of the wall with a sickening crack of his skull and other bones against the pavement which was littered with dead leaves and other debris.

A few of the group flinched at the scene, but didn’t otherwise react.

With a nod to Daryl, who retreated back into the group, Rick turned around to face everyone. “Alright, everyone: it’s time to put this plan of attack in motion.”


	19. Attack

_"I won't suffer, be broken, get tired, or wasted_  
_Surrender to nothing, or give up what I_  
_Started and stopped it, from end to beginning_  
_A new day is coming, and I am finally free."_  
— 30 Seconds To Mars

* * *

  
Silent as the grave, the group of ten from the prison moved up to the gate with their guns raised and at the ready. Even Jo, who felt more at home with a blade in her hand, had a Smith  & Wesson M&P a semi-automatic pistol Rick had given her a brief lesson in how to use before they hit the road. Merle was still at the front of the group, finding an outer latch that allowed for the gate to be opened from the outside and not needing anyone inside to do it.

“Take that guy’s hat and jacket off,” Jo whispered to anyone listening as she pointed to the dead watchman on the ground; the same watchman Daryl had shot down from the wall with a bolt to the eye socket. The bolt itself had since been removed by Daryl, not wanting to waste his bolts.

“What—why?” Sasha questioned, stepping closer and looking at the dead guy.

“If anyone in Woodbury looks over at the gate and doesn’t see anyone on watch, a red flag might go up. Someone should put on the jacket and hat and take his gun, too. It’ll give the impression someone is still guarding this wall.”

“I’m his body type and less of a necessity to this group anyway,” Allen spoke up. “I’ll do it.”

Rick locked eyes with the other man and nodded appreciatively at him as he watched Allen set down his gun and roll the dead watchman onto his side to yank the jacket off and then throw it on himself. After placing the hat on top of his head, he took the watchman’s rifle and handed his gun off to Tyreese, who in turn handed it to Rick. Rick pocketed the gun in the back of his pants and then looked around at everyone before letting his eyes fall lastly upon an impatient Merle.

“We ready or not?” Merle questioned. “We’re burning moonlight here.”

Rick nodded. “We’re good. Go.”

Without another word, Merle slipped through the gate, which he had only opened up just enough for everyone to slip through. Anymore and it probably would’ve been too obvious. Some from the prison group walked in backwards, keeping an eye out for any walkers that might possibly come out of the shadows and approach them at the gate. Fortunately, that was not the case at that moment.

As soon as every last one of them had made it inside, they took pause and looked at the generally quiet road before them. The median up the center of the road contained several barrels with small fires burning inside them, as well as several tiki torches on either side of the road, to offer the only light source for the entire street. Although, up ahead and down road, since the road was on a slight incline, they could see the main gate clear as day with two spotlights aimed at the road on the other side and there was movement; there was either two or three men on watch there.

Rick held up a fist to signal everyone to stay put and then gestured to Allen to climb up the stairs to the fence and “take watch”. He then signaled for everyone to follow him over to the side which was covered in shadow and everyone crouched down as he looked around at their faces. “This is where we split up,” he informed. “Merle, take Daryl and Andrea; check that Town Hall you told me about and take out any threats, but only if you have to. If you find The Governor, take him alive.” He eyed Jo and gave her a knowing smile. “Jo deserves the honors.”

“What about the rest of us?” Tyreese asked.

Rick looked back at the large man and his sister. “You and Sasha stay here near the fence. You’re still new to our group and I do feel a little bad putting ya’ll right into the thick of our issues like this. So, if anyone approaches Allen or blows his cover, you contain that shit however you need to without drawing any attention.

Sasha nodded and looked at her big brother and then darted quietly across to the other side of the road to hunker down in the shadows alongside a building. Tyreese watched his sister carefully and then looked to Rick before moving further backward into the shadows of where the group already was.

Rick began to look at the remainder of the group. “I’ll lead the rest of us, but Jo will give direction as to where we go. Shane and T-Dog, you’re on guard once we get into The Governor’s apartment building.”

“What if The Governor isn’t even here? Like, what if he’s not in Woodbury at all right now?” Andrea wondered, speaking barely above a whisper.

“Then we take this place, as diplomatically as possible, and call a literal town meeting with the people here and let them know exactly who The Governor really is, and reveal that Jo isn’t dead like he told them all, for good measure,” Rick replied. “We’re letting these people know what’s what either way; whether or not a firefight precedes it.” With a nod of his head, he added, “Be careful.”

As everyone seemed to nod back, they waited for Rick to move first before breaking off into their two groups and heading down opposite sides of the street. Merle led Daryl and Andrea down the left side of the street where they all had just been, soon ducking behind two buildings to most likely sneak behind them to stay out of sight, while Rick led Jo, Shane and T-Dog down the sidewalk on the right side of the road, single file.

Eventually, Jo had to tug at the back of Rick’s shirt to get him and pull him back between two buildings, along with Shane and T-Dog following suit, when a resident began to cut across the street in their direction. Hiding in the shadows of the narrow alley with their backs up against the wall, they each held their breaths as they waited for the footsteps to fade away. After a few more moments, Rick stuck his head out and looked down the road and saw the coast was clear again and motioned for the other three to follow once more.

After a few cautious yards, Jo pulled at Rick’s shirt again. “The brick building at the end of this corner,” she whispered, as her nerves began to feel like they were being set on fire. “The entrance to the upper apartments is on the side of the building.”

Her heartbeat quickened and a wave of fear washed over her as the memory of the last time she was in that building flooded her senses. Her shaky breathing was a telltale sign to Rick about what she was reacting to. He turned around and took her hand.

“I’m here. It’s okay,” he assured and then looked over shoulder at the other two. “Shane: stay down here and keep an eye on the entrance, but try to keep out of sight, too.”

Shane nodded. “Will do.”

“T-Dog, follow behind us. You’ll be our lookout when we get into the apartment.”

Nodding as well, T-Dog raised his shotgun, pointing upward instead of in front of him as the four of them darted around the corner slightly, continuing to cling to the shadows. The side street had a slight downward incline, causing the side entrance Jo had mentioned to no longer be street level. There was a small set of stairs, however, that led up to the entrance’s alcove. Each of them climbed up those steps within seconds and shrouded themselves in the darkness of the alcove, thanking their lucky stars they’d made the jaunt undetected.

With a look to Shane to stay there, Rick held the door open and let Jo and T-Dog slip in first before joining them. He then stepped back away from the doors and took pause; listening for any suspicious sounds that could jeopardize this mission. Jo, who was standing across from him, beside T-Dog, nodded to Rick and gestured silently to the staircase before them.

“What floor?” Rick mouthed.

“The top,” she mouthed back; her nerves still jumping around underneath her skin.

Rick responded by taking to the staircase first and expecting Jo and T-Dog to follow, which they did. He began taking the stairs two by two after reaching the first landing while his head was worrying about if everything would go smoothly enough, what he’d say to The Governor when he found himself finally face to face with him and if the others from their group were faring well with their respective tasks.

Once at the top floor, Rick threw Jo a look over his shoulder and gestured toward the two doors on either side of the short hallway with the barrel of his rifle. “Which door?” he asked almost soundlessly.

Jo pointed to the door on the left as her chest heaved from anxiety. It must’ve showed on her face again as Rick came right up to her and pressed his forehead to hers. As their noses briefly brushed against each other, he whispered, for her ears only, that she was strong and that she could do this, and that The Governor didn’t deserve her fear.

With a nod of appreciation for him just being there and saying those words of encouragement, Jo took a step back from him. She watched as he stepped to the opposite side of the door and then pointed to T-Dog, gesturing for him to stay right there and keep an eye out in case anyone came up the stairs or out of the other apartment door.

Slowly reaching for the doorknob, Rick gave it a quick turn and found it to be unlocked. Pushing the door open just as quickly, Rick burst into the apartment, with his gun aimed and ready to fire at the drop of a hat if anything or anyone popped up in front of them.

It was a generally decent apartment; mostly clean and it was obvious a man occupied the space. Not just the way it was decorated, but also by the muskier scent that hung in the air like humidity before a storm.

The scent in question was all too familiar for Jo and made her nauseated. She closed her eyes and tried blocking it out as best as she can as she moved around behind Rick with her gun trained in front of her. While he moved forward toward the windows that looked out upon the main road, Jo walked over to a display cabinet with a curiosity she needed to quench.

There, behind the glass, was her short sword, in the same place she had originally tried stealing it back from that night she lost her freedom to The Governor.

Shoving her gun into the holster hanging off her belt, Jo reached out for the display cabinet and opened the doors with nervous fingers. Rick had sensed her moving about with something and turned around to join her. When he saw the sword she was grabbing for, he smirked as he watched her wrap her right hand around the hilt and hold the blade up in front of her.

Taking a few, safe steps back away from both the cabinet and Rick, Jo gave the short sword a few swishes and it suddenly felt like coming home. The feel of it in her hands was like picking up a bike and riding it for the first time after years of not doing so.

“She got a name?” Rick quipped, referring to the short sword.

“She does now,” Jo replied, sending him an impish look. Off his raised eyebrow, she replied, “The Governor Slayer.”

Rick chuckled. “I like it.”

Just as he moved to close the cabinet doors up, a glint of something gold caught Jo’s eye. “Wait.”

Rick stopped and turned around to look at her. “What?”

Jo stepped up to the cabinet and reached out for something on the bottom shelf with her left hand and pulled it up to her chest like an animal protecting his kin. After a moment, she turned her hand over, palm side up and revealed a gold pocket watch to Rick. “This was my father’s,” she informed. “It was packed in my bag, back in the apartment I was living in with Sophia, on the night I broke in here to get my sword back. He must’ve taken my bag and gone through it; kept what he wanted, like my father’s pocket watch.”

Pressing her lips together, tears began to form along her eyelids, threatening to fall. Rick, already having been watching her face, noticed the change in her expression almost immediately. He stepped up to her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders and then held onto the back of her head, gently, with one hand. He pulled her head close to his and pressed his lips against her forehead.

“I’m glad you got these things back.”

“Me, too,” she agreed. “This watch is all I have left of my father.”

As they pulled back from each other, Rick smiled, but his smile didn’t last long when the clearing of someone’s throat from the next room over made them both nearly jump out of their skin.

“How touching,” came the charming, Southern drawl of the voice that haunted Jo’s nightmares.

Rick and Jo both turned their attention to the man standing in the archway between the apartment’s living space and the bedroom; The Governor, in the flesh, and a mere fifteen feet away.

“I gotta say, this is quite the surprise,” he continued, taking a cautious step forward as Rick swiftly aimed his rifle at him. The Governor smiled and threw his hands up, as if to surrender, but mostly to reveal he had no weapons on him that they could see. “Had I known you’d be coming early, I’d have prepared a nice meal, and maybe broken out nice merlot.” The Governor specifically eyed Jo, looking her over from head to toe and letting out an amused chuckle. “You remember how good my wine selection is, don’t you?”

That was a clear dig at the night he’d roofied her, and Jo and Rick were perfectly aware that’s what The Governor was referencing.

Rick practically snarled and his nostrils flared as he pointed his rifle at the man’s head. “You know why we’re here,” he commented as calmly as he could manage.

“To kill me, obviously.” The Governor looked rather amused, but there was an underlying hint of seething rage in his lone eye. He was just too aloof about the current situation, considering there were two people with multiple weapons trained on him. With a gesture of one of his still raised hands, he asked, “Were those your people I just noticed slipping through the shadows across the street.”

“Pretty good eyesight for someone with only one eye,” Rick retorted, giving a slight tilt of his head.

“I have our lovely Jo here to thank for that. It’s been one of those things where you lose one sense and the others enhance. Well, now I only have the one eye to rely on so it’s pulling double-duty, I guess you could say.”

“I’d be more than happy to send it on a permanent vacation with the other one,” Jo finally found her voice.

The Governor eyed her and licked his bottom lip as he smirked in such a way that it was clear he was plotting all the ways to destroy her in his head. However, it went without saying that the feeling was mutual.

“Even though this trip you made here has been _unexpected_ , the both of _you_ can expect to not make it out of here alive. But, first, let’s talk some issues out, shall we?” The Governor gestured to his kitchen table, but just that slight movement was enough to get both Rick and Jo to tense up and prepare to blow him away right there. In response, The Governor once again held his hands up and then slowly lowered them to pull up the hem of his shirt as he turned around once to reveal he had not gun or knife tucked away in his pants.

“We didn’t come here to talk,” Rick growled. “There is no talking.”

“And what do you think it is we’re doing right now?” The Governor grinned.

“Wasting my fucking time.”

The Governor tutted and then took a seat at the table with his palms face down on the surface and in plain view for Rick and Jo to feel comfortable with. “Come now. Sit. We have a lot to talk about.”

“You attacked us,” Rick spat; not, for once, lowering his rifle. “Makes things pretty clear.”

“I was trying to make things clear. I could’ve killed you all, but I didn’t.”

“And yet here we are.”

The amusement on The Governor’s face seemed to fade somewhat as he studied Rick carefully. “Well, I am sitting here unarmed. If you’re not going to sit, would you at least lower the weapons from my face while we talk?”

Jo and Rick glanced at each other briefly before he begrudgingly let his rifles rest at his side. Jo, however, kept her short sword aimed upward, though not directly at The Governor. Either way, she was ready to use it should she need to. Neither she nor Rick trusted The Governor as far as they could throw him.

“Well, if you wanna talk — _talk_ ,” Rick spoke, having not time for any of this shit.

The Governor looked between the pair; letting his eye settle mostly on Jo. “I just want what’s mine; what was _taken_ from me. And _you_ have it.” He gestured to her stomach, speaking directly to her. “Or, at least, you did.”

“I know what you’ve done,” Rick informed, placing a hand on the back of the chair closest to him and gripping it tight. He held eye contact with The Governor when the other man swung his gaze back away from Jo. “The raids, the heads,” he continued. “ _Jo._ ”

The Governor smirked. “I’m not gonna lie. Jo was quite special. I thought there could be something truly wonderful between us when she first arrived here with her daughter.” So, he still didn’t know that Sophia wasn’t actually Jo’s daughter. “But she needed some persuasion to get her in the mood.”

“You _drugged_ her!” Rick shouted, slamming his fist on the table and hunching forward slightly. Inhaling a steadying breath, he almost hissed as he added, “You drugged her and, when she was unconscious, you _raped_ her. You took advantage of a good woman and you’re not even sorry.” Rick look absolutely nauseated by the man before him.

“I’m sorry I chose her.”

“ _Chose_ me?” Jo spat.

The Governor shrugged. “It was either you or that little redhead, Marianne, and I’ve always had a preference for blondes. Plus, there was that whole schoolteacher thing.”

Rick’s jaw was clenched and his nostrils resumed their flaring. Why he hadn’t just shot the bastard already was beside him. Perhaps he just needed to hear the man admit his wrongdoings and allow him some last words before they killed him. Perhaps he just needed some worthwhile reasoning behind the man’s actions and maybe some remorse.

Up until this point, Rick had only ever heard of The Governor or seen him from a distance while being shot at by him. He hadn’t gotten to see him like this, one on one, to see for himself who the man behind the stories really was.

So far, Rick couldn’t stomach him and, everything he’d been told, The Governor was living up to.

“So, you know all about me, but I don’t know anything about you,” The Governor noted. “For example, what’s your name?” There was no response right away, just the two men staring each other down, so The Governor continued. “How did you come to meet Jo?”

“That’s none of your concern _how_ anything,” Rick sneered. “You _stalked_ us. You found where we are and then you _attacked_ us, unprovoked. You killed three of our people. _Good_ people. And you want to know my _name?”_ He leaned forward more, practically spitting as he talked. “I’m Rick Grimes. Officer Grimes if you’d like to keep things formal.”

“You were a cop?” he questioned. Without receiving a response to confirm his question, he just held Rick’s scowl for a moment before turning his focus once more to Jo. “Where’s my child?”

“I shoved this sword through her skull, remember?” Jo responded. “Right before I shoved my thumb into your eye socket.”

Her face went completely hard. All the resentment and rage and sorrow she felt because of him and for him was practically boiling her blood. Her hands shook slightly, but not from nerves necessarily; just from the desire to do great violence upon him.

“You know who I’m talking about.”

“You don’t have any more children,” Jo replied. “I do. Rick does.”

The Governor’s face was the next to turn hard. His lone eye darted briefly to Rick who had a bit of a smirk toying at his lips. “That is my child and I want it,” he demanded. “I didn’t keep you alive out of the goodness of my heart.”

“There is no goodness in your heart,” Jo threw back at him. “And you seemed to find plenty of enough reason to keep me alive in that fucking hellhole.”

A tiny smile appeared for a brief moment in The Governor’s eye and at one corner of his mouth. “Well, I wasn’t about to have my cake and _not_ eat it, too.”

Rick stood up straight and raised his gun again.

The Governor, meanwhile, managed to keep his cool.

“I made a promise that none of your people would have to die if you just gave me what I wanted. You still have about two days now,” he continued. “You can turn around and leave and I will keep my men off your backs as you retreat.”

Rick shook his head. “You know, before your attack on us, I was prepared to let you live out your days however you saw fit as long as you never crossed our paths or hurt anyone I cared about ever again.” He chewed the inside of his bottom lip and looked down at the table. “I was prepared to let the past stay in the past; to let bygones be bygones.”

“It can still be that way,” The Governor insisted. “Just give me what I want.”

“The child,” Rick deduced with a chuckle at the other man’s deluded persistence.

“And Jo. She took my eye and _both_ of my children from me. She doesn’t get to walk away from this place alive. Not again.”

“Well, that ain’t happening,” Rick declared. “You ain’t getting either, so stop making demands like some little bitch.”

“You’d be wise to watch how you speak to me.”

Rick scoffed. “I’ll talk to you however I choose to.” Rick lowered his rifle and gesture to the other man with his free hand. “You’re not my Governor.”

The Governor nodded and held up his hands as he sat back slightly in his chair. The movement alone was enough for Rick and Jo to both tense up and tighten their grips on their weapons again. “That's—that’s their term, not mine,” The Governor gestured to the town beyond his apartment, referring to the residents.

“But still, you're beholden to your people.”

“Well, of course.”

“You have responsibility to them.”

“I do.”

“Wasn't Merle your lieutenant?”

“He was helpful, yeah,” The Governor confirmed.

“But you knew he was erratic.”

“He was a wild card, but he was effective. He got the dirty jobs done.”

“Yeah, well, he’s with my people now. He’s found his brother and wants nothing to do with you or this place anymore, and I don’t blame him.” Rick shook his head and pushed away from the chair in front of him. “I don’t know why I thought you’d take responsibility. I thought by not shooting you first and asking questions later that maybe I could hear you admit, word for word, all the terrible things you’ve done to my people—to _me_. I thought you would have some remorse, but you don’t. You're practically pleased with yourself.”

“I thought you were a cop, not a lawyer,” The Governor quipped.

Rick shrugged and gave an amused tilt of his head. “Either way, I don't pretend to be a _governor_.”

“I told you, I'm their leader.”

Jo jeered. “You're the town drunk who knocked over our fence and ripped up our yard, and when you’re feeling particularly evil, you drug, rape and beat women.” She stepped closer to the table and pointed her short sword at his throat, even though there were still a couple feet between him and the tip of the blade. “There’s a special place in hell reserved just for you that not even the Devil will go near.”

The Governor’s smirk seemed to waver. He leaned forward on the table, folding his hands in front of him and ignoring the blade pointed at him as he stared at Rick.

“My baby,” he began. “Is it a boy or a girl?” He turned his gaze to Jo then. “Did I have a son or another daughter?”

“You’ll never know,” she replied, “because it’s not your child to lay claim to.”

“I beg to differ.”

Rick twisted his lips. “You may have created that child without the mother’s consent, but that doesn’t make you the father.”

Letting his eyes return to Rick, The Governor was practically grinning. “Am I to understand you’re helping Jo care for it?”

“I’m raising the child as my own,” Rick confirmed. “I’m its father and I’m the only father it’ll ever know.”

The grin faded fast from The Governor’s face. “Why don’t you sit down, stay a while. We can flesh this issue out.” He gestured with his thumb over his shoulder. “I have whiskey.”

“Nah,” Rick shook his head. “You’d probably only lace it with some drug anyway. And I’m done talking.” Raising his rifle and aiming it directly at The Governor, he glared. “Get up.”

“I’d rather sit.”

“It wasn’t a suggestion.”

“Do you want to know what’s gonna happen here tonight?” Jo questioned. “Merle was looking for you at the Town Hall but his back-up plan that we discussed on the way here was to gather the good people of Woodbury and let them know the truth about the real you; not the version you that you present with a smiling face and a wink of the, well…your _only_ eye.”

“And why would anyone believe him?”

“Because once they realize you lied about me being dead and the way you kept me locked up, and when everyone we brought here to fight you stands behind us and the truth of what we say, these people here will see you as the monster you are.”

The Governor dropped his hands into his lap and chuckled. “It’ll be hard for them to see that you’re alive when I shoot you dead.”

A sudden ripping sound echoed from underneath the table and The Governor whipped his right hand up, revealing he was brandishing a pistol he must’ve kept hidden. Without hesitation, he fired a shot directly at Jo’s head, but with the tiniest sliver of luck, she was somehow able to react in time.

The bullet didn’t strike her, but she did feel it graze by the skin of her temple and blow through her hair to lodge in the wall behind her. Without hesitating, Rick shoved her out of the way and fired a few shots with his rifle at The Governor, who was quick to kick the kitchen table over in time as a makeshift shield while firing a few shots back at Rick. And, as bullets flew, glass and other material objects were instead struck and destroyed or ruined. One of the front windows shattered, and the sound of distressed shouts quickly echoed from outside.

Due to the flurry of sudden gunfire, the door to the apartment opened to reveal T-Dog. He didn’t wait to ask Rick or Jo if they were okay. He simply turned his own rifle at the man attacking his friends.

Unfortunately, T-Dog wasn’t as quick on his feet as Woodbury’s one-eyed leader.

The Governor ducked and emptied his clip into T-Dog’s chest before turning, picking up the chair he had been sitting in and hoisting it over the table and chucking it directly at Rick. The former cop fell back onto the floor and that momentary distraction was enough for The Governor to use the time to get back up to his feet and grab T-Dog’s rifle from his hand and then grab Jo by the hair and pull her up to her feet.

“C’mon, darling,” he growled in her ear. “You’re coming with me.”

He knocked her short sword out of her hand with the barrel of T-Dog’s rifle and then dragged her around the mortally wounded man and out the apartment door. As Rick jumped up to his feet, The Governor shot at him. Rick ducked out of the way in time and then darted to the door to see The Governor holding the hot end of the rifle’s barrel under Jo’s chin, using her as a hostage so he could get away.

Rick stepped around T-Dog and down over the railing to the stairwell; a barrage of bullets just barely missing his head and shoulder. He leaned back and cursed under his breath as he looked at the stairwell and back at T-Dog. He made the decision to go back to T-Dog and check on him.

Maybe it wasn’t so bad. Maybe the wounds were something he could survive and Hershel could—

 _Shit_.

Rick had forgotten for a moment that Hershel was dead.

“T-Dog, I’m so sorry,” Rick muttered, trying to hoist the burlier man up to prop him against the doorframe to the apartment. “This shouldn’t have happened to you.”

The other man struggled to talk as blood came bubbling forth out of his mouth from the blood that had most likely begun to fill his lungs. “Don’t worry,” he managed. “Save Jo. Hope needs her.”

“You’ll be alright,” Rick lied.

And T-Dog knew it, too. He smirked, despite it all. “You need her, too,” he continued, and then began to really choke on his own blood. “Rick…”

“Yeah.”

T-Dog reached for the barrel of Rick’s rifle and pressed it to his head. “Do it now.”

Rick felt the weight of the world even more on his shoulders as he looked into T-Dog’s pleading, brown eyes. As both men looked at each other, there was a nod and a silent goodbye that passed between them as Rick pulled the trigger.

T-Dog slumped over onto the ground, dead, with the contents of his head painted on the doorframe and the wall, and now oozing out from the back of his skull onto the floor.

“I’m sorry, brother,” Rick whispered before standing up and running out of the apartment and down the stairs as fast as his feet could take him.

He hoped that Shane had been able to stop The Governor from leaving the building with Jo. He hadn’t heard any further gunshots, so he wasn’t sure. When Rick made it to the ground floor, he darted out the side entrance and found Shane walking up to him, all flustered and wide-eyed.

“What happened?” Shane demanded.

“Did The Governor come this way with Jo?”

“No—wait, what? Rick, what happened? The Governor was upstairs?”

“Yeah, and shit went downhill. T-Dog…”

Shane looked at Rick’s face and shirt which was lightly covered in blood splatter.

“No, not T-Dog.”

“The Governor got him, just before he got out with Jo,” Rick replied. “And you didn’t see him leave with her?”

“No, I was out here.” Shane pointed over to the main street. “Some gun shots started going off over there. I heard the ones coming from upstairs, though, but I stayed here just in case.”

Rick looked sick to his stomach suddenly. “I—I gotta find Jo.”

Shane patted his friend’s shoulder. “If he didn’t come out this door, maybe he’s in another apartment hiding, or…or is there another exit?” he questioned. “There was that front door that led into what used to be some business on the first floor. Maybe one of the doors in that hall leads into that storefront.”

Rick turned and looked back inside and nodded. “Yeah, maybe.” Looking mildly in daze, he asked, “Can you get T-Dog? We can’t leave him here. We need to bring him back.”

Hesitating for a moment, partly to register the question Rick was asking, Shane nodded his head. “Yeah. I will. You just go get your little woman.”

Rick would’ve smirked if he were in the mood for it. But now was not the time for fun in games. Just as he began to head back inside, with Shane behind him, he turned and said, “And get Jo’s sword for her. She dropped it.” Turning the knob to the door that most likely led to the storefront, he added, “She’ll need it to kill The Governor with.”

“Got it.”

Off Shane’s nod, Rick slipped through the door. He left the rifle rest at his side by its strap over his shoulder and instead withdrew his trusty Colt Python from its holster. Taking quiet, careful steps forward through the dark, Rick maneuvered through what seemed to be a back storage room before stepping out onto what was once the sales floor but was now what looked to be some sort of community room with an almost endless supply of boxed and canned foods.

Aside from his quiet footsteps, there were no other sounds except those coming from outside the front door that someone had left open.

The only thought in Rick’s head was of Jo and making sure she was alive and safe. He cared about all the people in his group. They were his family now. But Jo was the woman he was in love with. She was the mother of the child who had become his daughter. Jo was the one who mattered most to him now above anyone else. If everyone else survived and she didn’t, he would go mad from grief.

Running out the door with his Colt raised, Rick went right out into the middle of the road as he noticed some gunfire down toward the main gate. He ran toward it, hoping that he could find Merle, Daryl or Andrea and one of them could tell him if they’d seen The Governor or Jo.

As a bullet whizzed by his head, Rick turned to see one of The Governor’s lackeys aiming a gun at him. Glowering, Rick fired back, catching the guy once in the shoulder and once in the head before moving on.

It suddenly felt like a full on battle had erupted. A few smoke bombs went off, clouding the street in haze that was hard to see through and which made it aggravating to breathe in. Rick coughed and sputtered, placing the back of his free hand against his mouth as he squinted and moved through the smoke, firing shots at whoever had begun to fire at him. The fact that there were smoke bombs going off at all let him know that Merle, Daryl and Andrea were still alive and well. Or, at the very least, one or two of them were.

“Jo!” he shouted and got no response other than more gunfire directed aimlessly at him. “Daryl! Merle! Where are you? Andrea!”

“Rick!” came Daryl’s voice through the smoke at his left.

Rick moved toward it and found himself being yanked into the alcove of a building’s entrance and realizing it was the archer standing there with him.

“D’ya find The Governor?” Daryl asked; either not noticing the blood on Rick or not bothering to ask him about it at the moment.

Rick nodded. “Yeah, we did. We tried talking for a few, but then he fired at us, and we retaliated,” he replied. “He shot T-Dog. I had—I had to…”

Daryl grunted and shook his head. “We can’t worry about that now,” he insisted, understanding what Rick was trying to say he had done. “Where’s Jo and Shane?”

“Shane’s getting T-Dog. We can’t leave his body behind. And The Governor took Jo with him, but I don’t know where. He gave us the slip.” With a frustrated grunt and a look of anxiety all over his face, Rick eyed Daryl while simultaneously trying to peer through the smoke that was slowly beginning to dissipate. “Where’s Andrea and your brother?”

“Andrea’s wrangling up the women and children or some bullshit. Merle was across the street last I saw him,” the archer replied. “He’s a survivor, my brother, so I ain’t too worried about him.”

“That he is.” Rick peered around the corner of the alcove and nodded. “I need to find Merle, though. He might know where The Governor would’ve taken Jo; whether it was someplace here in Woodbury or if he’s trying to leave altogether with her.”

Daryl nodded. “I got your back.” Pulling out another smoke bomb from the small satchel slung across his chest, he removed the pin and tossed it into the road to give Rick better coverage and then lifted his crossbow. “Go on.”

Without another word, Rick ran across the street, through the smoke funneling out of the new and dying canisters alike. Hurrying along the opposite sidewalk, he tried peering through the windows of the storefronts until he spotted Merle poking his head out of narrow alley overgrown with ivy. As soon as the older Dixon brother spotted Rick he gestured from him to take cover with him as bullets began to fly in Rick’s direction from the main gate.

Both men leaned back against separate brick walls and looked at each other with their weapons pointed up.

“Where’s Jo?” Merle questioned right off the bat.

The fact that Merle seemed genuinely concerned about her endeared him to Rick. It was refreshing to see glimpses of the good man Merle had the capability of being but, more often than not, masked it with crudeness and bigotry.

“The Governor took her,” Rick lamented. “Shit went down in his apartment. He got the upper hand real quick and used Jo as a shield to get away after shooting T-Dog.”

“T-Dog okay?”

“No, he’s dead.”

“Well, shit, I was just starting to like Magila Gorilla.”

Rick rolled his eyes. Just when Merle showed hope of being kinder, there he swooped in with his usual self. Instead of commenting on Merle’s slur, he turned his focus to the most pressing matter for him. “You said you know this place up and down,” he spoke. “Where would The Governor have taken Jo?”

“My best guess would be his Playroom, which is in the same building he kept her locked away for six months.”

As those words entered Rick’s ears, his stomach dropped. Merle had brought up the Playroom to him briefly and playing was the last thing that really happened there. He’d remembered the mention of the dentist’s chair and the tools used for torture and it all made Rick’s blood boil. He could feel his pulse thumping erratically in his veins and hear it in his ears. Pursing his lips and flaring his nostrils in anger, Rick eyed Merle.

“Where is this Playroom?”

Merle gestured over his shoulder, up the road in the direction they had all come in from. “Second last building on the other side of the road, just before the gate,” he directed. “There’s a good sized alley between it and the first building closest to the gate. The door’s usually hidden behind some barrels or a tarp; anything to keep people out of the loop that it exists. The door leads right down to the basement. Take the hallway all the way to the end and then turn the corner.” Then, he added, “Jo was kept in the room just before the turn.”

With a nod of his head, Rick looked down at his Colt and checked the chamber; reloading the spots that were empty with new bullets from his pocket. “Thank you,” he muttered.

“Just get her out of there alive,” Merle said. “I didn’t risk my neck to get her out of there in the first place only for her to end up back there and killed by that sumbitch.”

“Not if I have anything to do about it.” With a stern but deadpan look, Rick said nothing else as he ducked out of the alley and headed north up the road, avoiding any gunfire that might’ve been directed at him and only firing two shots himself.

He crossed the road at the main intersection where The Governor’s apartment building was and then continued up the sidewalk until he reached the end near the back fence and gate. Only a few citizens were darting out across the street near him and then running away to find safety when they saw how armed he was. They were just regular citizens of Woodbury, though, and without any weapons to protect themselves, so they posed no threat to Rick. And, after all, his only focus was getting to Jo; everything else be damned at this point.

Just as he reached the building in question that Merle mentioned, Sasha darted out across the street from where she’d remained on guard to keep an eye on Allen. She had her rifle at the ready still and regarded at him with a concerned look upon her face.

“Rick,” she addressed. “Give me something more to do. I can’t just sit there while all this is going down. All that gunfire and those smoke bombs on the other end of this strip of road…is anyone even still alive?” She noted he was alone and without those he left for The Governor’s apartment with. “Is it just us left?”

Rick shook his head. “Only one casualty on our side and I’d like to keep it that way,” he replied, anxious to head down to the Playroom. “Did The Governor come through this way?”

Sasha shrugged. “I didn’t see anyone. Maybe he took the back alley like Merle and the others did earlier?”

Rick looked from her to the alley in front of them. “He took Jo, and he might be down in this building’s basement with her. It’s the same place he kept her locked up.”

“I’ll come with you,” Sasha offered.

Rick was about to say no, to discourage her, but back up was very much appreciated. “Alright,” he nodded.

As the twosome headed into the overgrown alleyway, Rick pushed aside some wooden pallets blocking the door Merle had told him about and then whipped the door open without any hesitation. He was inside in the blink of an eye and Sasha followed like an obedient soldier; the both of them practically running down the stairs. With his arm held up, Rick kept his Colt aimed in front of him as he led the way down the dank hallway that was dimly lit with some overhead lighting.

Letting his eyes scan to the left, he spotted a solitary chair positioned directly across from a metal door with a small, sliding window. The door belonged to a room that was at the end of the hallway before it turned and Rick knew at once that it was the room Jo had been kept in.

He was tempted to open it and look inside, just to know what it looked like, but it wasn’t where he needed to be.

Inhaling a steadying breath, he turned the corner as if he was prepared to fire a shot into the chest of The Governor if he was actually standing there. The man wasn’t but there was a sliding metal door several feet before him and Sasha that beckoned like the Devil himself.

Stalking right up to it, Rick could feel Sasha’s apprehension as he lowered his Colt to pull the door open.

Inside was just as dimly lit as the hallway, but there was at least one overhead light, directly over the dentist chair that sat between two support beams that had chains attached. Rick noted the table with “torture” tools on them and it made him sick to wonder who they may have been used on over the course of The Governor’s tenure in Woodbury.

“What is this room?”

“The Governor’s torture room,” Rick muttered. “According to Merle, though, he calls it the Playroom, like the psychotic fuck he is.”

The room was empty, though, so he supposed that was a good sign, but then Rick thought back to the room next door and immediately thought the worst. Without letting on to Sasha what his mind was whispering to him, Rick darted out of the Playroom and out into the hall where he turned and looked upon that somber metal door with the sliding, viewing window once more. Sasha was quick to follow after, amid slight confusion, but just waited for his next move, which was his jerking the door open and stepping inside.

It was dark — so incredibly dark — and there was no light source other than what little filtered in from the hallway, and Rick remembered Jo mentioning she had lived in literal darkness for so long. It also smelled of blood, musk, mildew and body odor, and couldn’t imagine how Jo had endured such a place for so long without going mad. He had to give her credit for holding out and his respect for her will to survive tripled.

However, the room was also empty.

“Shit,” he muttered. “I don’t think they came down here.”

“Yeah,” Sasha agreed. “Why return to the scene of the original crime?”

Rick looked over his shoulder at Sasha. “Huh?”

“He’s gotta know you know what he did to her, and where he kept her. This would be the first place he’d probably assume you’d seek Jo out. And, clearly, he wouldn’t be wrong, ‘cause here were are…looking for Jo.”

Rick held her gaze for a moment and then out into the hallway, where he stepped back out into in silence that was interrupted by nearby gunfire. Concerned, he nodded for Sasha to follow him down the hall and back up the stairs to return outside.

Once they made it back to the alley, they ran side by side out onto the street and found Tyreese on his knees on the sidewalk and nursing a gunshot to left arm. Allen also wasn’t in immediate sight.

“What happened?” Rick demanded.

“Ty, you okay?” Sasha ran over to her brother and crouched down.

The large man in the beanie nodded his head and looked up at both. “Man with the eyepatch—The Governor; he just came through this way with Jo. Came out of one of those building across the street with her. Allen fired at him, The Governor fired back and killed Allen,” Tyreese explained, shaking his head solemnly. “He fell over the fence like that guy Daryl took out. Clean shot to the head. I tried firing back to stop him and he got one in me, but so did I to him. He was limping as he opened the gate and dragged Jo out.”

“He took her outside these walls?” Rick questioned.

Tyreese nodded. “He did.”

“Was she still alive?”

“And kicking.”

Rick was suddenly filled with some hope.

 _‘Atta girl_ , he thought. _Don’t go down without a fight._ Then, _Better yet, don’t go down at all._

Staring at the gate left ajar, Rick began to breathe heavily. Sasha stood back up from her crouched position and nudged his arm with her elbow. “I’ll come with you again,” she spoke. “I know you’re going out there after them, and it shouldn’t be alone.” Casting a glance to her brother, she asked him, “Will you be okay, big brother?”

Tyreese nodded again. “I will.”

“Thank you,” Rick remarked at both of them. Stepping closer to Tyreese, he asked, “If you can make it, I need you to find one of our people and let them know I’ve gone after The Governor to get Jo back. He’s abandoned ship and taken the woman I love as his hostage and I can’t let him get away with it. The people here need to know what’s going on. Just…try and help gather everyone in this town up. They need to understand what’s happened, and with all this fighting and any of the deaths that have occurred, they need to know what it was about and why it happened.”

Pulling himself up to his feet and wincing as he went, Tyreese nodded and put on a brave face. “I’ll do what I can,” he assured. “And Rick?”

“Yeah?” Rick muttered just as he was about to slip out of the gate.

“Evil will not win. Not tonight.”

Both men held eye contact for a moment, and then Rick nodded appreciatively. The Williams siblings hugged briefly before they went their separate ways; Tyreese toward the heart of the commotion near Woodbury’s Town Hall, and Sasha with Rick as the latter pair stepped through the gate.

Out onto the abandoned part of the street where the prison group had first took pause before entering Woodbury, Rick and Sasha looked out at the darkness before them. Unlike inside the town walls, there were no barrels filled with fire or tiki torches to light the way. There was just the moonlight overhead that did little to help them see with all the overgrown trees casting too many shadows on the road.

“Goddammit,” Rick growled under his breath and once again aiming his gun in front of him. “They could be anywhere.”

“Well, if they just left not too long ago and he’s wounded, then it shouldn’t be too hard to catch up to wherever they went.”

Rick cast a sideways glance at Sasha before looking back in front of them as he nodded. “I suppose.”

They walked side by side up the road, enveloped by the shadows, while just barely able to make out the abandoned homes on either side as their eyes adjusted to the darkness.

“Jo!” he called out, somehow hoping she was near enough, had hear him, and could, more importantly, respond.

Unfortunately, he was only answered with silence.

“Oh, wait, I have a flashlight,” Sasha remarked, moving to reach for it.

However, Rick held a hand out to her and stopped her. “No, I don’t want him to know where we are.”

“You literally just shouted out Jo’s name. I think the element of surprise is lost.”

“Sounds bounce of things. Voices can echo. He could think I’m in one place when I’m really in another, but a flashlight will be a dead giveaway.”

“Alright, fine.”

“Jo!” Rick called out again, just hoping any response was from Jo, or even The Governor, and not some herd of walkers he had unwittingly just alerted to their whereabouts.

After a few more moments of walking, Rick stopped dead in his tracks upon the sound of a gunshot buzzing not far off from his and Sasha’s heads. Crouching down behind some overgrown shrubbery, Rick tried to gauge which direction the gunshot had come from and if he and Sasha were even in the right spot for cover.

“Come to rescue your damsel in distress, Officer Grimes?” The Governor’s voice called out into the night.

Sasha nudged Rick and pointed toward the abandoned house a few feet away. As he turned to look over his shoulder and focus his eyesight, Rick began to make out a figure limping slightly on the large, wraparound porch.

“Aww, c’mon; don’t be shy,” The Governor continued. “I know you’re out there. I heard you calling for Jo.” Then, he added, for his own amusement, “I might only have one eye to see out of, but I still have two ears.”

Rick growled. “Is she alive?”

“Oh, hello. Thank you for joining the conversation.”

“Is she _alive_?” Rick repeated, more angrily.

The Governor sighed heavily. “Unfortunately.”

Rick, too, sighed, but his was out of relief. “Just let her go and I promise I’ll make your death quick.”

“Well, that’s hardly an incentive, is it?”

Rick furrowed his brow.

As haughty and as provoking as The Governor was coming off, there was a weary quality to his voice. Rick could easily assume part of it was from the gunshot he had received from Tyreese, but it seemed like there was more to it.

“You sound tired,” Rick quipped. Two could play at this game. “Maybe you should just call it quits.”

The Governor chuckled. “Oh, I’m as right as rain — just had a minor hiccup where our little lady is concerned.”

Rick’s relief about Jo’s well-being began to fade. Having had enough of the banter and the cat and mouse game, Rick stepped out from behind the shrubbery and fired his Colt at The Governor and scowled when he knew he missed.

It was just too dark to properly aim his gun.

The Governor fired back without hesitation, but his aim was also off. Whether it was from the darkness or something else entirely was not known. He did step down from the porch and began to make his way out toward the street and Rick couldn’t help but wonder if the man was suddenly suicidal. It placed him clearly into Rick’s line of sight.

Rick hesitated however, when a break in the tree coverage allowed some moonlight to filter down through the branches. The Governor stepped right into that small sliver of light. It wasn’t easy, but Rick could see there was blood saturating The Governor’s shirt and, from the way he was moving, it was from a wound in his chest and quite obviously which was making The Governor sluggish in his mannerisms.

Smirking, Rick pointed his gun at The Governor and was just about to take the kill shot. The Governor had even seemed to finally spot Rick there in the darkness, and was starting to raise T-Dog’s rifle, just as a crashing sound blasted behind Rick and Sasha.

They all turned their attention upon the military truck that had clearly just busted through the back gate and came to a stop in front of where The Governor was standing. Shots were fired from inside the vehicle that were aimed at Rick and Sasha; both of whom jumped and took cover behind the shrubbery. Although, the shots seemed to be more of a distraction so that the Hispanic looking man in the passenger seat could jump down out of the truck and help pull The Governor up into it.

Before Rick could get to his feet and pepper the truck with bullets, The Governor was safely tucked away into the truck and the Hispanic man slipped in beside him. The door wasn’t even closed all the way before the truck peeled off down the road, shrouded in darkness, with only the faint red of the taillights to pinpoint where they were.

“What the hell was that?” Sasha wondered, looking back at the broken gate.

Rick frowned. “The Governor’s escape plan.”

Standing up, he offered a hand to Sasha to help her to her feet as well before stepping toward the sliver of moonlight.

Looking up at the large, abandoned house, Rick hurried up the pathway to the front steps, taking them two by two as he walked up onto the wraparound porch. “Jo?” he called out, throwing open the screen door and entering into the front hallway. “Jo, are you—?”

A moan cut him off and Rick tensed, expecting a walker to pop out in front of him. However, a little bit of light from the moon, that wasn’t blocked by tree coverage, filtered into the room on his right, which looked to be some sort of living room. And there, on the floor, was Jo.

Rick went to her immediately, crouching down at her side as he holstered his Colt and pushed aside his rifle, which was still strapped across his chest. She was lying on her right side and as he rolled her onto her back, he saw the blood on the front of her shirt and panicked for a moment. Then, his eyes drifted to her right hand and how she was gripping her pocket knife as if her life depended on it, and it probably had. What was more was the fact that the small blade and her hand were covered in more blood.

“Jo…”

“Rick?” she spoke, trying to lift her head to look up at him.

“The blood—”

“It’s not mine,” she quickly assured.

“Thank god,” Sasha piped up from the archway between the hallway and the living room.

“He was gonna…” Jo trailed. “Again.”

Rick glowered, knowing what she was most likely alluding to.

“He didn’t,” Jo continued, sitting up with Rick’s help. “I had my pocket knife in my pants. He took my gun off me, after we got out of his apartment building. He kicked it away from me after we struggled for a bit. But he didn’t know about my pocket knife. So, I pulled it out and stabbed him in the chest.”

“Good,” Rick nodded.

“I don’t think I stabbed him deep enough, though,” Jo lamented. “He’ll probably live.”

“That’s okay,” he insisted. “Right now, all I care about is that you’re alive and you’re safe.” Setting his gun down on the floor next to them, he cupped his hands on either side of her face and kissed her lips.

When she winced at the gesture, Rick thought it was a mental reaction, considering what couldn’t happened between her and The Governor, but when he pulled back she was touching her bottom lip, which he finally noticed was puffed up, split and covered in drying blood. The Governor must’ve struck her in the face at some point and the pain was still very sensitive.

“C’mon. Let’s get you outta here and back to the others,” he informed. “The Governor just hightailed it away from Woodbury with two of his lackeys.”

Jo nodded. “Probably Martinez and Shumpert,” she responded. “His lapdogs are obedient to the end, apparently.”

Leaning forward, Rick wrapped his arms around her back and began to help her up to her feet. In the process, she ended up having to hop on one foot because placing her weight on both seemed to hurt. “You okay to walk?” he wondered, looking down at her feet.

“Sprained my foot, I think,” she shrugged, trying to downplay it as much as possible, as she rested one of her arms around his shoulder and her other draped over one of his arms. Jo looked him in the face. “I’ll be fine.”

“I’m just sorry we didn’t get to kill him,” Rick muttered.

“So am I.” Pressing her forehead to his, Jo nuzzled his nose briefly.

“I’m mostly just relieved you’re okay.”

“A little banged up.”

“Sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt, but we really should get back to the others,” Sasha spoke, looking a little sheepish.

Rick turned and looked over at the other woman and just gave her a nod. “Thank you again for having my back like you did,” he said. “It means a lot.”

“No problem.”

He gestured to Jo with a tilt of his head. “Mind helping me with her?”

“Sure.”

As Rick moved to stand on Jo’s right, Sasha walked up to Jo’s left. Both threw an arm over their respective shoulders and let Jo put her weight on them so that she didn’t have to step down on her left foot at all. The trio exited the abandoned house and made their way back to the damaged gate, stepping through into Woodbury and taking their time as not to rush Jo.

They walked down the road, where the smoke from the smoke bombs had cleared and a large mob of people seemed to be gathered at the other end in front of the town hall, all shouting and talking over each other in such a cacophony of voices.

One voice carried over the others: Andrea.

“Listen, I understand you’re scared, and you don’t know us. But you remember Merle, don’t you? He worked for The Governor and he’s trying to tell you the truth about that man,” she was saying. “What else can he say to get you lot to believe us when we say The Governor is a monster? He’s lied to you about the things he’s done and to whom he’s done them to.”

There seemed to be obvious dissention among the crowd as the trio got closer.

“But he’s kept us safe!” someone shouted.

There was an agreement of “yeahs” circulating the crowd, and Merle, who was standing there beside Andrea, rolled his eyes.

“He’s also murdered defenseless people,” Andrea continued. “Is that okay with you? Murdering? As long as you can live your peaceful little lives pretending the world beyond this town doesn’t affect you anymore?”

A few heads turned as Rick and Sasha approached with Jo.

“Maybe _she_ can convince you to listen, instead,” Rick called out, as he and Sasha brought Jo round to the front of the crowd to stand with Andrea and Merle. He caught the eye of Daryl who was standing behind the crowd with his crossbow lowered. Shane and Tyreese stood not far from the archer as well.

A murmur began to spread among the townspeople as they looked upon Jo. Sasha took her leave and moved around the crowd to join her brother at his side and make sure he was still physically okay. She knew he would need some sort of medical attention soon to tend to the gunshot wound to his arm.

“I think some of you might remember her,” Merle piped up, taking in the sight of Jo who managed to keep her head held high.

“Jo?” someone within the crowd asked. Who that someone was, no one could pinpoint.

She nodded in response. “I’m not dead,” she announced. “Nine months ago The Governor took advantage of me in the worst way. It left me pregnant as a result and when I decided I didn’t feel safe here anymore with Sophia, I broke into his apartment to get my things back that he had taken from me. That part of what he told you is true. I broke in, and I found my sword that I came here with. And then I found his dead daughter Penny chained in some room and I put her down.” Jo looked out at the sea of faces; thankful for Rick’s strong grip around her still. “He discovered me there and we fought and I took his eye out as he tried choking me to death. He would’ve killed me if I hadn’t told him I was pregnant. Instead, he locked me in the basement of one of the back buildings, just up the road, and I was there for six months, chained to a wall, sleeping on only a mattress with no blankets, eating off the floor like an animal and only having a pot to literally piss in.” Jo furrowed her brow and stressed, “Six months, and not one of you were the wiser, because The Governor, with all his charm, convinced you all that I had attacked him first and died from a fall down the stairs while trying to escape.”

Rick tightened his arm around her waist and let her lean into him while looking at the people of Woodbury. “Merle realized the truth about what had happened. He’d been told the same lie all of you had, except he knew Jo was still alive because he’d been given the occasional task to keep watch on her.” He cast a glance over his shoulder at the older Dixon and nodded. “Merle’s a good guy, though. He knew what was going on wasn’t right, and he made the decision to help Jo escape, and Sophia, too. My people and I found them a few days later; exhausted and hungry and, in Jo’s case, very pregnant. We took her in, we’ve cared for her, and we found shelter; a safe place. The Governor recently discovered it while out looking for Jo and chose to attack us; resulting in the deaths of three innocent, good people that were part of our family. He told us we had three days to give him Jo and her baby or he’d kill every last one of us.”

“Obviously, we couldn’t allow that,” Andrea offered up. “Jo didn’t deserve what was done to her. None of our people have deserved what was done to us at the hands of The Governor, and we’re sorry it had to spill over into your town and if you’ve suffered any losses tonight.”

“All we wanted was to give The Governor what he deserved,” Shane spoke up from the back. Several heads turned around to look at him. “We wanted him dead, and we won’t apologize for that.”

“Where _is_ The Governor?” someone else asked.

“He abandoned ship,” Rick informed. “He fired on us first and killed two more of our people. He took Jo as a hostage to get away. He fought with her, and she fought back. As you can see, she survived his attack on her. The going got too tough and two of his men took him away from this place and I doubt they’re coming back anytime soon, because they know The Governor’s time has come to an end, and that the truth…” he looked over the crowd, “will be set free.”

“We don’t want to fight any of you,” Jo assured. “That was never our intention. We don’t want a war. We don’t want anyone else to die. We just want to live our lives in peace, if that’s even possible anymore.”

“And we want to give all of you a choice as to what happens next,” Rick said, continuing on the same thought pattern. “We have a prison, about ten miles east of the river. There is plenty of space; we can make do if any of you want to come back with us. Or, you can stay here; fix your gate, which your friends Martinez and Shumpert destroyed when they burned rubber to get the hell outta here, and find someone more worthy to lead you, or make it a communal effort. Or leave altogether and strike out on your own, which I don’t necessarily recommend.”

“This is our home,” a female voice declared, rising above the others that began to murmur once again in unison. “You might have only come here to attack The Governor, but you killed some of our people, too.”

“We didn’t shoot first. We were only defending ourselves,” Andrea insisted. “A few trigger happy residents of this town chose to shoot first and ask questions later when all we were trying to do was gather you up to talk to you while Rick,” she gestured to Rick, so the people knew that’s who he was, “and Jo could confront The Governor. That was our only intention.”

“Either way, we lost numbers,” that same female voice protested. “I say the rest of us stay here. We can rebuild and make this place better than it was.” Finally she stepped forward out of the crowd and eyed Rick and Jo. She had brown hair, pulled back into a ponytail and looked to be only a few years younger than Jo. She also looked quite tough, like a soldier. “Now, I didn’t know you before you were apparently locked away,” she said to Jo, “and I’m sorry for whatever was done to you, but whatever your intentions were, they were half-assed, in my opinion.”

Merle smirked at the brunette and gave her a nod of his head. “Hello, again, Lilly.”

She nodded back at him out of respect for their previous association from when he was still a member of Woodbury, but then she eyed Rick. “I was never blind to the man The Governor was. I knew he had secrets he was keeping from us, but I never knew the details of those little trips he took outside these walls to find survivors. That’s what he claimed he was doing, but I always felt there was something off about it. I just didn’t question him. I’m sorry for what he did to Jo and I’m sorry for your people who died because of him.” Her demeanor seemed to soften. “I guess it all comes down to The Governor being the common denominator in all this loss and carnage. If it weren’t for him all our people would still be alive and I’m suggesting we call it a truce right here and right now.” Lilly offered her hand to Rick. “You agree to take your remaining people away and never come back here and we won’t retaliate in any way.”

Rick looked down at her hand; hesitating to shake it. “I can promise we won’t be back here, not ever, if I can help it,” he assured. “But we ain’t leaving until I know that everyone here is in agreement to stay behind. If no one wants to come back with us to our prison, to help build a community with us, to be like a family, then we’ll leave and never look back.”

In a flurry of motion, Lilly pulled out a revolver Rick didn’t realize she had been packing and pointed it directly at his head. Rick’s people instantly reacted in aiming their own weapons at Lilly from the respective places around the crowd. Jo, standing the closet, just glared at the brunette and reached her hand around Rick’s waist to grab the handle of his Colt in case she needed to use it and he couldn’t.

However, Rick held a hand up to ease his group off. “Let’s not do anything you’ll come to regret,” he said calmly to Lilly. “I got six people with guns and a crossbow aimed at your head right now and one special lady who’s pretty crafty with a blade and will cut you open at the drop of a hat.” The latter he was referring to was Jo; someone he actually had never seen in all her sword-wielding glory, but was bullshitting for the sake of keeping shit together at the moment. He crossed his eyes, looking at the end of the revolver’s barrel and slowly moved his hand toward it.

Lilly scowled and then dropped the gun. “Alright, fine,” she relented. She turned to her fellow townspeople. “Anyone who wants to leave, go get your shit.”

Shane walked around the edge of the crowd to sidle up beside Rick. “There’s a bus outside that back gate we came in, parked off to the side along with some other truck,” he said to Rick. “We can use that for anyone wanting to come with us.”

Rick nodded at Shane and just waited to see if there were any takers among the Woodbury residents.

“Well?” Lilly demanded.

 

* * *

 

In the early hours of the morning, just as the sun was beginning to rise over the horizon, the caravan of vehicles finally finished its trek back to the prison. It had taken longer to return because Rick and the others had been offered some much needed medical assistance from two of Woodbury’s doctors who hadn’t been hostile like Lilly was.

Tyreese had the bullet removed from his arm and was stitched up and Jo had her left ankle wrapped tightly with an Ace bandage. Both were given the same pair of crutches to share while their respective injuries healed.

Glenn had spotted the caravan from the main tower, hurried down the stairs inside it and then ran across the yard to move the RV out of the way. The sound of multiple vehicles approaching up the gravel road to the courtyard grabbed the attentions of those that had remained at the prison.

One by one they spilled out of C Block and out into the courtyard to see how everything had went.

Daryl’s motorcycle was the first through the main gate, followed by Hershel’s truck, then Shane’s Tucson and, lastly, a yellow school bus with metal paneling on one side.

That was enough to raise a few curious eyebrows. Ben was in the courtyard and had been the one opening the main gate for the caravan and ran up to Rick when the man climbed out of Hershel’s truck. The teen was looking anxiously around the vehicles for his father and Rick felt guilty having to give the kid the bad news. He didn’t know how to tell Ben that when they went back to get Allen’s body, they found it had apparently been run over by the military truck Martinez had been driving and the remains were then being devoured by two walkers that had been drawn to the commotion in Woodbury. There was no body to bring back for burial.

“What’s all this?” Lori asked Rick with an incredulous smile across her face, just as Shane hopped out of his car and ran over to sweep her up into a hug.

Shane was just so happy to be able to come home safe to her.

“Some people from Woodbury who decided they wanted to be here with us instead of back there,” Rick replied as he walked around to the other side of the truck to help Jo out. He held open her door and scooped her out like a groom about to carry his bride over the threshold before gently setting her down and handing her one of the crutches from the bed of the truck.

Unknown to the rest of the prison group, but T-Dog’s body was also in the back of the truck, wrapped in a couple of blood soaked bedsheets.

At the same moment, the door to the bus opened and Merle stepped out of it, calling after the people inside. “Everybody out,” he bellowed. “You’ve reached your final destination.”

“Well, damn, that doesn’t sound foreboding at all,” Andrea quipped sarcastically, as she walked past with a chuckle.

Sophia immediately ran over to an old woman climbing out of the bus and hugged her, causing some confusion for the prison group.

“Hey, Ms. McLeod,” she greeted. “Sorry I left Woodbury without saying goodbye.”

The old woman returned the embrace, just happy to see the thirteen-year-old. “It’s alright, child. I’m just glad you’re safe and you’re with your mother again.” She eyed Jo with a smile, still, oblivious to the fact that Jo wasn’t actually Sophia’s mother.

As everyone began to slowly filter into C Block to be led to where they would be staying in the other blocks that were secure, Carol approached Rick and Jo with Hope in her arms.

“Is everything taken care of?” Carol asked. “Did you kill The Governor?”

Rick shook his head and frowned. “He got away, but he’s in no position of power anymore, that’s for sure,” he replied, taking Hope into his arms and cradling the infant against his chest.

“Did we lose anyone?” Carol continued to question.

“T-Dog and Allen.”

The short-haired woman’s face fell. “Oh, not T-Dog.”

“We brought his body back. We’ll have a funeral for him later once everyone’s settled in,” he commented. “There was nothing of Allen to bring back, but I’d like that to be kept on the DL for now. I need to be the one to tell Ben about his father.”

Carol nodded. “Of course.” She then touched a hand down to Jo’s shoulder; noticing the crutch and the puffy, cut lip and the bruises. “You okay?”

“I’ll survive.” Jo smiled reassuringly.

With a knowing smile, Carol replied, “Yeah, you will.”

Without another word, the older woman took her leave of the couple and joined the others in heading inside. And, in no time at all, it appeared that only Rick and Jo were left out in the courtyard with Hope.

Turning to face her more fully, Rick smiled down at Jo and pressed his forehead to hers. “I know I said it already, but I’m so glad you’re okay,” he spoke. “For a while there last night when I was trying to find you, I was scared you were dead; that The Governor killed you. It was like what Morgan was saying after you zip-tied him and he was spouting off all crazy-like: all I saw was red. Everything was red. I couldn’t even think about anyone else. I—I didn’t even care if anyone else was alive. All that mattered to me was that you were.”

A warm smile made its way to Jo’s lips as she tipped her head up slightly to brush her nose against his. “And here I am,” she whispered. “Very much alive.”

“Yeah, you are.” Rick smiled back, hoisting Hope up a little in between their bodies. “I also have some good news.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.” He nodded and gestured for her to follow him over to the Tucson, which she did at a slow pace; hobbling with the crutch under her right left arm. Pulling open the back hatch, he revealed her short sword and handed it to her. “I had Shane go back for it.”

“Thank you,” she practically beamed. “It means a lot.”

“I know.” Then he added, with a chuckle, “Just don’t, you know, attack me with it if I every piss you off.”

“Oh, don’t worry. Attacking you with a sword isn’t the kind of attacking I had in mind for you.”

With a raised eyebrow, Rick leaned back in and placed his lips gently upon hers; knowing the cut she had there was still a bit sensitive. “Well, when you’re good and ready, don’t hesitate to attack me all you want.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may be asking yourselves, is that the same Lilly Caul from the comics who took over running Woodbury after The Governor, and the answer would be a resounding YES. :)
> 
> Thought I'd put a little twist on things.


	20. Decatur

_"I love you - I am at rest with you - I have come home."_ — Dorothy L. Sayers

* * *

 

Sometimes it felt like only a few days, and sometimes it felt like eons since the assault on Woodbury. However, it had actually been two months and there had been considerable changes within the prison. The most notable of those changes was the addition of a third of Woodbury’s population joining the sixteen at the prison, as well as one other person Daryl and Shane had found on the road while out on a run.

The latter was a man named Bob Stookey, who had been an army medic before the apocalypse, and his place amid the prison community was quickly elevated along with that of one of Woodbury’s doctor’s, a man named Caleb, who had felt that Woodbury didn’t need two doctors when the people at the prison and the people from Woodbury _going_ to the prison wouldn’t have a doctor of their own. He was soon referred to as Dr. S, due in part to plenty enough people finding difficulty in knowing or remembering how to pronounce his last name.

The prison, overall, truly began to feel like a home, what with all the people bringing life to it. One of the loveliest parts was the children and hearing them playing and laughing; subsequently bringing smiles to the adults who only wished that the children could grow up to live happy and healthy lives, and that the new world wouldn’t see them become too jaded.

One of the most subtle changes that had since taken place was Rick moving into Jo’s cell and making it _their_ cell that they would share with _their_ daughter.

And it was perfectly accepted by everyone else.

They didn’t even have to come right out and announce they were a couple, either. It was almost as if everyone had expected it to happen or that it was just the next logical step for the pair, whether or not anyone had been paying attention to the development between them.

What was more is that they weren’t sleeping on separate bunks, but sharing the same bottom mattress, despite the tight fit. It was actually quite comfortable to them, and something they quickly grew accustomed to. The extremely close proximity of their bodies while they slept at night had even proven beneficial to Jo’s mindset. Not once since Rick began sharing her bed did Jo have a nightmare involving The Governor. The one night she _did_ have one was when Rick had been taking watch and Jo had bolted upright, breathing heavily, as if coming down from a panic attack. The only remedy had been for her to apologetically wake Carol up and ask her to keep an ear out for Hope, and then she went to the main guard tower to join Rick and Glenn that particular night. And, after some light conversation between the three, and quiet looks exchanged between Rick and Jo, Glenn had decided to let the pair have some privacy by returning back into the prison.

As the weeks had worn on, and the community within the prison grew, Jo had found more of a calling for herself, once again by returning to her roots as a teacher. She began to gather the children in the prison library, every other day, for a couple of hours to hold little lessons. It was just the basics, really; reading, writing and math. History wasn’t important so much because if they ever wanted to know about things like the Revolutionary War or the Great Depression, all they had to do is open a book and read about it. She wanted to teach them things that they could apply to the new world.

Including Sophia, there were a total of eight school age children and they were all such wonderful children. What was sad to Jo was that, aside from Sophia, not one was one of the children she had been teaching in Woodbury before her captivity. All had joined the town just afterward, but getting to know them now was just as nice, and Jo found herself growing a little attached to them all, especially those without mothers or no parents anymore at all. And she wasn’t the only one who felt this way to the motherless and the orphaned. Lori, in particular, had taken a shining to the orphaned Luke who, she claimed reminded her a little of her son in his mannerisms.

Even though the children without parents were technically orphans, there seemed to be an adult counterpart who took them under their wing and became the pseudo parent that the child needed and that the adult also seemed to need as well.

All in all, it actually began to just feel like a normal life again.

The prison was secure and, with more people to help, its defenses were increased with better fortifications every day. Gardens were being planned for a section of the yard, with the goal of also finding animals like pigs and chickens, and maybe even a cow if they could find and wrangle one up, to raise and harvest for food. In the center of the courtyard, a kitchen was in the process of being constructed, there was an herb garden being started and the schematics for the irrigation system T-Dog had mentioned their first night in at the prison, while sleeping in the yard, looked like it was going to be a for sure thing. Not to mention, the Tombs had been secured once again. Rick and a few others were able to take out the herd that was developing, little by little and then block off where the walkers seemed to be getting in from. They were even able to more freely explore the administration building for supplies and whatnot.

However, despite all these great changes and development, the one thing that hadn’t changed or developed in the last two months was the level of intimacy between Rick and Jo.

She had told him they would take their relationship to the next level when she was mentally and physically ready. And, although she was physically ready after two months, she was not one hundred percent there mentally. And it really didn’t have much to do with The Governor anymore, either.

Sure they were all a little concerned that he was still out there, somewhere, possibly all healed from his wounds and maybe even plotting his revenge; it just wasn’t something that took precedence at the moment. At least, for Jo, she had seemed to have gotten beyond that part of her life. Instead, it was something else keeping her from going to that next place with Rick that she felt a little silly about, while feeling guilt for a variety of reasons.

She felt bad for Rick while he never faltered, not once, in being anything less than gentlemanly with her. There were times he thought she was giving him nonverbal signs that she was ready, only to be shot down with a subtle shove or a shake of her head, and he would back away politely and just smile reassuringly at her. Jo could tell he was a little frustrated, sexually, and she assumed he was taking care of things whenever he went off alone to the Shower Room or on watch alone. There were plenty of moments between them, when they managed to find alone time somewhere, where they found comfort in each other’s arms and against each other’s lips. The burning for each other began to quickly build up only for Jo to get anxious and stop anything before it truly got started.

It wasn’t just the guilt she felt for not being as ready as he had been for a while.

She felt guilt for the man she loved before him, that she had had been too selfish to put out of his misery and then just left him to rot, alone in the home they had planned to raise a family of their own in someday.

 

* * *

 

Jo was sitting on a blanket in the yard with her knees pulled up to her chest while a two and a half month old Hope lay beside her on her back, watching the clouds form different shapes as they passed along the blue sky. It was generally quiet, with minimal chatter coming from the courtyard and only one walker outside the outermost fence and which suddenly seemed distracted by the movement of a squirrel that had just darted through the grass and up a tree.

Dangling a set of multicolored, plastic toy rings above Hope’s head, one of the items Shane had found when they’d made the trek to King County, Jo listened to her daughter gurgle excitedly as she tried to swat at the rings which stimulated her senses.

The sound of the main gate clattering open wafted into Jo’s ears and she gave a brief glance over her shoulder to see Rick closing the gate behind him as he sauntered down the gravel road with that bowlegged strut of his that Jo loved so much.

She smiled over at him as he cut into the grass and approached her and Hope. “Morning,” she greeted.

It was, after all, still morning; according to her father’s pocket watch when she checked the time about forty minutes earlier.

“Morning,” he repeated and then crouched down beside her. Reaching a hand out, he rubbed his hand gently upon Hope’s stomach and grinned. “How are my two favorite girls?”

“Content,” Jo replied.

Removing his hand, Rick leaned over to her face and placed a kiss at the corner of her mouth. “Just content?” he asked when he pulled his face back.

“Well, there’s always room for improvement.”

Rick raised an eyebrow. “Did I do something upset you?”

“What—no.” Jo shook her head. “I just meant that…” she trailed off and then looked him in the eye. “I am perfectly happy with you, and I’m happy our daughter is healthy and that we’re safe and thriving, even. I guess I’m also feeling a little sad, too.”

Sinking down to sit down on the blanket with them, Rick stretched one leg out and propped the other up as he studied Jo’s profile. “What are you sad about?”

She opened her mouth to reply, but then looked down, feeling like somewhat of an idiot. “I been thinking a lot lately about…about the beginning, when this all started. That first night you moved into my cell and we were just lying there, finally getting a good night’s sleep, I woke up from this dream,” she began to explain. “It wasn’t a nightmare or anything like that. It was like a memory, but not. I was dreaming about Oscar, my husband, and I was standing there in our bedroom and he was dead already; just staring back at me with those blank, yellowed eyes and his skin was pale and falling off. It didn’t frighten me, it just made me feel…guilty. I mean, I left him behind.” She looked right at Rick. “I left him, locked in our bedroom, to wither away. I couldn’t bring myself to kill him and I know it probably sounds stupid but, by not killing him and then just leaving him, it’s like he’s still alive and I abandoned him like my mother abandoned my dad and me.”

“You didn’t abandon him. You were in a difficult position and this new world was still in its early days,” Rick commented, placing a hand on her knee. “You weren’t the person then that you had to become to survive, and that’s okay.”

“But he’s still locked in that bedroom. I know he is. I can feel it, if that makes any sense, and I feel guilty. I mean, I know he’s dead, and he’s no longer the man I married, just a shell of the person he was when he was alive, but he’s still my husband and I feel like I’m cheating on him with you.” She looked sheepishly at Rick and then down over at Hope. “I know that sounds idiotic.”

“It doesn’t,” he insisted.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to give you all of me yet,” she continued. “I want to, I really do. Before it was The Governor in my head, but now I think it’s my guilt for leaving Oscar behind and not putting him down when I had the chance.”

“What are you saying?” Rick wondered.

Jo shrugged. “I don’t even know.”

They fell quiet for a moment; staring either at Hope or out toward the fences before them. When Rick suddenly moved over closer beside her, he snaked an arm around her waist and she laid her head down upon his shoulder; grateful of the man he was.

“You said you lived in Decatur with Oscar?”

“I did,” Jo confirmed.

“Well, you know, that’s about the same distance from here as it was to King County,” Rick said, turning his head so that his nose brushed her forehead. “We could make that trip in a day; maybe two if we come upon any roadblocks.”

Jo lifted her head off his shoulder and looked Rick square in the eye. “Are you saying we should go to Decatur?”

“I’m saying we should go to Decatur so you could do _now_ what you couldn’t do _then,”_ he confirmed, “so you stop feeling guilty about something that you had no control over and allow yourself to live without any regrets.” He shrugged and looked over at the fence again. “Hell, we could leave this afternoon if you wanted.”

A smile crept up onto Jo’s lips, tugging the corners upward, as she reached a hand across her chest and then up to cup the opposite side of Rick’s face. “Are you being serious right now? Just like that—up and go?”

“Well, I could say I just want you to get rid of your husband so I can have you all to myself but that makes me sound like an asshole,” he quipped.

Jo shook her head, but continued to smile. For a briefest of moments she felt her heart flutter with anxiety over returning to her hometown and do what needed to be done, and facing the walker her husband had become. However, she had Rick right there at her side; the warmth of his body rivaling the warmth from the sun. Licking her lips, she pulled his face closer to hers and pressed her lips to his and they both just lingered there like that for a few moments. Rick removed his arm from around her waist and up to the back of her head to deepen the kiss and, for a few seconds, he forgot where he was.

Hope whimpering brought him back to reality, however.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” he cooed down at her once he pulled back from Jo’s face. “Is your mama and I not giving you enough attention?” Leaning forward, Rick reached out and scooped Hope up into his arms and placed the little girl — _his daughter_ — upon his chest. “Is that better?”

Hope replied by rubbing her face against his shirt a few times and then just lying there rather content to be in her daddy’s arms.

Jo smiled warmly at the two most important people in her life. She leaned into Rick’s side, resting her head down upon his shoulder again while placing a hand upon her daughter’s back just as Rick then covered her hand with his own.

“I can be ready in an hour,” Jo murmured.

Rick knew what she meant and smirked. “Alright,” he nodded. “We’ll need to pack up some supplies for the trip; some water, food and weapons, just in case we get delayed or run into trouble.”

“Should we bring anyone with us? You know—safety in numbers?”

Rick shook his head. “Nah, I think we’ll be fine.” After another moment of silence, he added, “But first, let’s just sit here a while longer.”

“I’m okay with that.”

Jo lifted her head off his shoulder long enough to look up at him, and he at her. Smiling back at each other, they leaned in for another kiss and then returned to her resting her head on his shoulder once more while Hope fell asleep on her daddy’s chest.

 

* * *

 

Shane’s Tucson was coasting northeast along Route 85 a few hours later, headed for Decatur. Inside the car, it was air conditioned, which was a luxury that was only experienced on the occasional run, and it made the drive very comfortable, considering the temperature had quickly risen to the high eighties by noontime. Rick was behind the wheel and Jo in the passenger seat; the two of them traveling alone with a single bag in the backseat stocked with a few extra handguns and ammo, a bit of food and some water in case they would be gone too long or ran into trouble on the road.

“This route’s pretty clear so far,” Jo commented, staring forward out the windshield.

“Yeah,” Rick agreed.

“We good on gas?”

Rick glanced at her briefly and nodded. “We should be fine.” He lifted his right hand off the wheel and gestured over his shoulder with his thumb. “We have that gas can to syphon from some other cars just in case.”

“Good.” After a few minutes more of silence, Jo turned and looked at Rick’s profile and then reached her hand out to place it gently on his leg. “Thank you for this; for suggesting this trip.”

He smiled slightly after looking down at her hand. “Well, we have the availability to do this and we don’t have the same worries we did before. There’s plenty enough people back at the prison to take care of things, plenty of people to keep an eye on Hope, as well as all the other kids — to keep ‘em safe. We can do things like this now.”

“Sort of like a vacation?”

Rick chuckled. “Yeah, sort of like a vacation.”

“Maybe next time our ‘vacation’ won’t include me going to kill my dead husband.”

Taking his eyes briefly off the road, Rick gave her a look of assurance and then removed his right hand from the wheel to cover hers which still remained on his leg. “Maybe we can aim for the beach; someplace like Savannah, if we ever have enough gas to spare.” Then, he added, “You ever been to Tybee Island?”

“Once when I was about fifteen,” Jo replied. “I went with a friend of mine and her family for a week during the summer. I remember there being this really cute guy, who worked at the hotel we were staying at, who was so tanned from the sun his skin was brown and he had eyes that were as blue as the water. I never had the nerve to talk to him, but that didn’t stop my friend and I from talking _about_ him.” Jo smiled dreamily at the memory. “Shit, he’s probably dead now.”

Rick smirked at her recollection and then shrugged at her last comment. “I’d say something more optimistic, but considering everything, you’re probably right. It’s a better chance that most people are dead now than alive. Even if your beloved teenage cabana boy survived the original outbreak, wherever he is now, it’s more probable that he _is_ dead. Probably bit and turned like almost everyone else.”

Their faces fell a little at the reality of it, but it didn’t upset them. It was just how life was now and there was no way of changing it; just surviving it as best as you could.

“When was the last time _you_ were at Tybee Island?” Jo asked.

“Carl was about six years old,” Rick recalled. “He was so excited to go see the ocean. Lori was still trying to unpack our suitcases in our hotel room and Carl wouldn’t stop pestering us, so I hurried up and slathered sunscreen all over him and got him into his swim trunks and then just took him to the beach. Lori was gonna meet up with us.”

Off Rick’s laugh and shake of his head, Jo raised an eyebrow and smiled at his reaction. “What? Did something hilarious happen?”

“Yeah,” Rick nodded. “I was in such a rush to get Carl ready that I never put any sunscreen on myself and it was, like, almost a hundred degrees that day, I swear to God.”

“Ooh, ouch.”

“I was red as a lobster and there wasn’t enough aloe vera in the entire state to soothe that pain,” he remarked. “Oh, I was a miserable prick for days. I couldn’t even get shitfaced to numb the pain at the hotel bar because I had a child to co-parent. I couldn’t let Lori do all the work.”

“Ever the good guy, huh?”

“I used to be.”

Jo frowned and gave his leg a squeeze. “Believe me, you still are.”

Rick caught her eye and held it for as long as he could before he felt the Tucson beginning to drift. They smiled a little at each other and, once again, fell into a comfortable silence for a little while longer.

Eventually they moved onto the 331 to avoid Atlanta as much as possible, and then up the 54, to the 160 and then nothing but backroads to avoid the interstates, which ended up taking longer. There were a few road blocks here and there and they had to backtrack once or twice while Jo marked down which paths they took on the map she had pulled out of the glove compartment with a pencil. She was feeling a different sense of guilt for this increasingly difficult trek to Decatur and the stress she felt Rick had to be feeling while maneuvering the roads, the blockages and even the occasional small herd of walkers.

“Do you want me to drive?” she asked.

“No, I’m good.”

“I’m familiar with this area now. We’re getting closer.”

Rick just nodded.

Looking down at the map again and then at a road sign they pass, Jo lifted her hand and gestured in front of them. “Turn right onto Kirk. If we continue going straight we’ll come upon Agnes Scott College and it was overrun when I first left Decatur. The numbers have probably grown since then.”

Rick nodded again and looked for the sign for Kirk Road and, turned right when he found the narrow, residential road.

Like most, it was overgrown and scattered with dead leaves from the previous autumn. The homes on either side of the road were still in near pristine condition, with the exception of a small few that had clearly been vandalized after the outbreak by scavengers. Though, from the overall appearance of this particular neighborhood, a person could temporarily forget that the apocalypse ever happened.

“Turn left onto the first side street coming up.”

He did, and when they came to an intersection, she urged him to keep going straight. They wove around a few other side streets before she leaned forward and stared directly out the windshield and a reminiscent smile crept onto her lips.

“Stop up ahead,” Jo announced. “The brick ranch with the green mailbox at the end of the driveway.”

Rick slowed the Tucson down to a crawl before bringing it to a complete stop in front of the house in question. “Is this your house?”

Jo shook her head. “Not exactly.” Removing her seatbelt and shoving the map and pencil onto the dashboard, Jo looked carefully out her passenger window and then opened the door.

Turning off the ignition, Rick followed suit; resting his arms on the roof of the vehicle with his door open. “Who lived here?”

“My dad.” Closing her door, Jo walked over to the driveway, stepping around a fallen tree branch that must’ve come down during the winter and remained untouched since.

Shutting his car door, Rick checked his Colt to make sure it was fully loaded and then joined Jo at her side as they warily made their way up to the small front porch. “This was your childhood home?”

“From the age of nine and onwards, yeah,” Jo answered. “This was my first stop after I left Oscar behind. I came here to check on my dad. We had been talking on the phone for days beforehand, and then the cell towers and landline phones went dead, but I couldn’t leave Oscar to check on my dad right away because Oscar was still so sick and I was too scared to leave, to be honest. It was scary outside,” she admitted. “After Oscar died, though, and I decided to make a break for it, I came here.”

Jo opened the screen door and let it rest against her as she turned the knob to the main door while Rick tried peering inside through the front window. Sheer curtains blocked his view of anything of interest so he turned his attention back to Jo who was frowning at the door that was failing to open.

“Is it stuck?” he asked, giving a brief glance behind them toward the street, just playing it safe and keeping an eye out.

“Shit,” she muttered. “I forgot. I locked the door when I left and I don’t have that key anymore, but I do know where the spare is kept.” Jo stepped away from the screen door, with Rick keeping it open while she walked over to a small rock sitting beside the cement stairs. Picking it up, she turned it over to reveal it was actually plastic with a false bottom. Sliding the small compartment open, she dumped a brass key with nickel plating into the palm of her opposite hand. “Ta-da.”

Before she placed the key into the lock, Rick grabbed her arm and got her to look up at him. “Is your father still in there?” he asked with concern and some curiosity.

Jo shook her head. “No,” she replied, unlocking the door and pushing it open. “I buried him in the backyard.”

Rick looked after her as she walked inside. Letting the screen door close gently behind him, he followed after her and found himself to be standing in a simple living room, covered in layers of dust. Absentmindedly, he let his fingers trail across the surface of the small table beside the door where pieces of mail lie unopened. Wiping his fingers off on his pants, Rick furrowed his brow and watched as Jo just stood in the center of the room, looking over to the couch where there were faint remnants of blood splatter on the wall above.

“Jo,” Rick spoke. “I don’t mean to come off as an asshole when I ask this but, how come you killed and buried your dad but not your husband?”

Jo looked over her shoulder toward him but not directly in the eye. “I didn’t kill him,” she informed. “Since I’d lost contact with my dad with the phones going down, I couldn’t ask him if he was okay here or tell him about how Oscar had died. But when I made the decision to leave, and when I came here, I found out why my dad never made the trek himself to come to me.” Jo gestured to the wall above the couch. “I came inside and found him dead on the couch right there; his gun in his right hand and his pocket watch in his left. On the coffee table was a picture of my brother and me and on his arm was a bandage. I figured he must’ve gotten bit and knew what was awaiting him, so he decided to take his life, literally, into his own hands. He chose the quick way out so he wouldn’t suffer like the others out there. He didn’t leave a note. Maybe he didn’t think my brother or I would be able to ever get to him. Not that it would’ve mattered. I know why he did it. He was gonna die either way and, even though it was a shock to find him like that, I was able accept it. It was his choice to make, and I respected it. I think that, after watching what happened with Oscar, I was glad my dad didn’t have to experience the same end, which I know is a bit hypocritical considering how I said I’d rather go if only given those two options we talked about a couple months ago.”

Rick walked up to Jo, placing a hand on the small of her back and continued to study the couch and the wall. “Aside from the dust and the smell of stale air, the place is clean, though.”

“I cleaned up. I couldn’t leave the place like that,” she clarified. “I took a sheet off his bed and pulled him down onto it and then went outside to the shed and got a shovel and just started digging. When I got deep enough, I dragged him outside and put him the ground. I buried him with the picture of my brother and me and a bottle of whiskey.” She smirked at the memory. “He wasn’t an alcoholic by any means, but he sure did enjoy his whiskey. His favorite kind was Wild Turkey bourbon whiskey but there wasn’t any of that here, so he went in the ground with some good ol’ fashioned Jim Beam.”

Rick made a face. “Never was a big fan of bourbon,” he commented with a tilt of his head.

“Neither was I.” She gestured back to the couch. “I got a bucket of water and some soap and with a bit of elbow grease, I cleaned the couch and the wall as best as I could and then I lit a fire in the fireplace and burned the rags I used. I even tidied up the other rooms a little. I don’t know why. I think maybe I was just trying to distract myself. But then, when I was ready to leave this house for good, I took my dad’s gun and his pocket watch with me.” Jo looked up at Rick. “I had that gun for two months before I fired the last few rounds left in it. I only ever used it as a last resort.”

They moved together into the kitchen and went straight for the cupboards to check for canned goods and anything else that was a nonperishable food item.

“So, you said you went to check on your brother after here but you couldn’t get to him?”

“Yeah, the entrance to his apartment complex was blocked by cars and walkers alike. If I would’ve even attempted to get inside, I would’ve been bit, no question. I just…I couldn’t take that risk.” Jo shrugged. “I mean, I don’t even know for sure he was inside. He could’ve gotten out. He could still be alive for all I know. Or maybe he’s dead. Like we were just talking about in the car, it’s probably more likely he’s dead. I mean, I would hope he isn’t, but I stopped thinking about it a long time ago. There was no point in it, I guess.”

“Nah,” Rick shook his head. “I think it’s okay to cling to that chance he’s alive. It’ll give you something to look forward to on days when you’re sad.”

Jo smiled and walked up to Rick, curling her fingers around his belt and pulling him closer to her. “I don’t really need to do that when I got you and Hope.”

“Good point,” Rick chuckled as he leaned down and pressed his lips against hers. It was a brief kiss but it spoke volumes between them. Pulling back first, Rick looked over Jo’s shoulder and nodded toward the hallway off the kitchen. “Your old bedroom down there?”

Jo narrowed her gaze at him. “Get your mind out of the gutter,” she teased.

“No, it’s not like that. I’m just curious to see your childhood room.”

Rolling her eyes, Jo gave his belt a tug and then led the way down the hall with Rick following behind her with a grin on his face. The first room they passed was a bathroom. On the left, the door was closed and at the end of the hallway was two doors perpendicular to each other, and also closed. The one on the right, however, is the one Jo opened. She pushed the door open and stepped aside so Rick could see in.

The walls were painted pink, the furniture was white and the rug was a faded shade of rose. Like any typical teenage bedroom, there were posters of bands or movie stars, there was a shelf with a couple of trophies and medals, and also the twin bed was bedecked with several stuffed animals that had seen better days.

“You really liked pink,” Rick deduced, stepping inside.

“I was a nine year old girl when we moved in here.”

Rick pointed at the poster of Leonardo DiCaprio above her bed. “I like the poster.”

Jo grinned as she looked where he was pointing. “I fell in love after seeing _Titanic_ , like most girls my age.”

“D’you ever have any boys in here?” Rick inquired with an impish grin.

“No,” Jo grinned back.

“Not even Oscar? You said the two of you started dating your Junior year.”

“Yeah, and my dad would’ve killed him if stepped foot inside here.”

Rick looked at the dresser and the mirror over it with pictures of a teenage Jo with her friends stuck to the glass with tape or other means, smiling at how fresh-faced she looked. “Maybe we should leave this room, then, outta respect for your father.”

Jo nodded and let out a slight chuckle. “Yeah, I guess so.”

Rick led the way back out and stood in the hallway waiting as Jo closed the door behind them, as if moving on from a chapter in the book of her life. The two of them returned to the kitchen and gathered up the canned goods, sticking them in a plastic bag Jo found from underneath the sink. Rick looked briefly out the window above the sink and noticed the slightly elevated mound of earth and the large rock at the head of it.

Turning to Jo, he touched his hand to her arm. “Why don’t you go check the bathroom or linen closet for toilet paper and stuff like that.”

Jo nodded and disappeared down the hall.

Watching her go, Rick then moved quickly, opening up the sliding glass door to the backyard. He closed the door behind him and walked over to the grave belonging to Jo’s father. He stood at the base, tilting his head slightly. He’d noticed some pictures on the walls, so he had been able to catch a glimpse of what her father looked like, so Rick was able to imagine the man standing in front of him instead of just the grave.

“My name’s Rick Grimes,” he said quietly. “I found your daughter in a serious situation about four months ago, give or take, and I just want you to know you raised a survivor. I know you were a great man, from everything she’s told me about you; a great father who’d do anything for his children, biological or not. I know what that’s like now. Jo had a daughter and her name is Hope. I delivered her, I’m raising her as my own, and I _love_ her as my own. I’d _die_ for her—for _both_ of them.” Rick blinked and briefly looked over toward the treehouse Jo had told him about, and then down to the grave again. “I just wanted to let you know that I love your daughter, too, and I’m gonna live the rest of the time I got left in this world loving her and protecting her and _our_ daughter. I want you to rest easy, wherever it is we go when we die, knowing your daughter and your granddaughter will be okay as long as I have anything to say about it.”

“Rick?”

Rick turned around, seeing Jo standing on the back patio with the sliding glass door ajar. “I was just…paying my respects.”

Biting her lips together, Jo gestured for him to come back inside. “We should go now,” was all she said.

Once back inside the house, they gathered up the supplies that could take away from her father’s house and then headed back out the front door, with Jo locking it back up. This time, however, she took the key with her.

“Don’t you want to leave it in case we ever come back?” Rick asked while watching her pocket the key.

“I won’t be back here,” she insisted, leading the way down the walkway and over to the driveway.

Rick just stood there for a moment, watching her head toward the Tucson. He took in their surroundings; noting one, solitary walker stumbling around in driveway, across the street and a couple houses down, but there was nothing else threatening in the immediate area. Descending the few concrete steps from the front porch, Rick cut across the lawn and walked around to the driver’s side door. Jo had already made it there first to the car and thrown her bag of supplies from the bathroom into the backseat, so Rick did the same once he was inside the car.

“You okay?” he asked, looking over at her as she buckled her seatbelt.

“Yeah,” she replied with a rueful smile when she looked back at him. “I just really miss my dad sometimes, and I wish he was still around. I wish he could know Hope. He was really looking forward to being a grandpa someday.”

Rick smirked and started the ignition. “That’d be nice. I hope _I_ can live long enough to be a grandpa someday.”

As he pulled away from the curb, Jo lifted a hand to the side of his face and toyed with the curls on the back of his neck. “You and me both.”

 

* * *

 

Twenty minutes of navigating a few main roads and side streets later, they made it to Jo’s neighborhood; pulling into the driveway of a slate blue, craftsman style home. Just by looking at the front of the house, they could tell it had been put through the ringer in the last year. The front door was open, the front, picture window was smashed and there were articles of clothing and furniture strewn across the porch and the front yard.

Jo climbed out of the car first, looking up at her home in disbelief. “It didn’t look like this when I left,” she commented, sadly. “People were here, scavenging.”

When Rick got out of the Tucson, he grabbed an extra gun from the bag in the backseat. Sticking it in the back of his pants, he tucked it under his shirt for safekeeping and then pulled out Jo’s sword which lay across the backseat under the bag. He walked around the front of the car and touched two fingers to her arm. When she looked back at him he handed her sword over, which she took and sheathed through one of her belt loops.

“I hope it was good people, and I hope they were able to get whatever they needed,” Jo continued, taking the higher road. She crouched down and picked up a few pieces of clothes, which were mostly just different shirts. “These are Oscar’s.” Bringing them to her nose, she smelled them. “They’re clean.” Tossing them to Rick, she smirked. “They’re yours now.”

“You want me wearing your husband’s clothes?”

“He has no use for them now, does he?” Looking away from him she walked up to the front porch and stared inside to the living room, considering that the door was open already and she could do so. She didn’t budge, however. She just stood there, staring inside, with her fists balled up at her sides.

Stepping up beside her, Rick took her left hand in his right and gave it a squeeze of assurance. “You don’t have to go in there,” he insisted. “I’ll do it for you. You shouldn’t have to.”

Lifting her eyes up to him, Jo shook her head. “No, it’s my responsibility,” she replied. “I couldn’t do it before. I need to do it now.”

Letting her step inside first, Rick still maintained his hold on her hand and look around at the interior. Despite the state of disarray it was in, it was a nice house, and decorated in a country chic style that seemed very Jo.

“For what it’s worth, it’s a nice house,” he complimented.

Jo smiled a little. “Thanks.”

While she moved on through to the dining room, Rick stopped to stare at the portrait above the fireplace. It was a wedding portrait, of Jo in her wedding gown and Oscar in his tux, standing underneath a willow tree while he was dipping her backward and kissing her. On the mantle were other pictures of family members, as well as a couple more of Jo and Oscar together. Rick moved closer to get a better look, and see what his predecessor looked like when he was alive, before he saw him now as a walker.

Rick couldn’t deny Oscar Moore had been a handsome man and, from the pictures, the pair had clearly loved each other. “Was Oscar from a Hispanic background?” he asked, noting Oscar’s darker skin tone, dark curls and light eyes.

“Biracial,” Jo replied. “His father was black and his mother was white. They met while serving in the air force together back in the late ‘70s. They retired from the service just before Oscar was born. His dad, Louis, was a local contractor, and his mother, Donna, became a stay-at-home mom and then opened up a daycare center out of their house after Oscar went off to college,” she explained further. “I think she was experiencing empty nest syndrome. Oscar was their only child.”

Rick nodded. “I had a brother.”

Jo stopped and turned to look back at him before reaching for the closed door off the dining room. “You did?”

“Jeff,” Rick spoke. “He was just a couple years younger, and best friends with Lori in high school.” Rick walked into the dining room, placing his hands on his narrow hips. “He was pretty much responsible for me and Lori meeting, and later on hookin’ up.”

Jo smirked. “Hookin’ up?” she repeated.

Shrugging, Rick reciprocated the smirk, but then grew a little serious. “I don’t know what happened to my brother, same as you. I asked Lori once, after I found her and Carl. She said she didn’t know, but Jeff had moved away after he graduated high school. Went out west; was a bit of a vagabond for a few years, but then he settled just north of Phoenix, in Prescott, Arizona. We grew apart, didn’t really talk much, mostly because I was angry at him for not coming home after Carl was born or showing much of an interest in being an uncle. And then I think _he_ was angry at me because Lori and I chose Shane to be Carl’s godfather instead of him.” Rick shrugged again. “But Shane was the one who was always there. He was the one who actively seemed to give a shit about my son. I used to think Jeff had a crush on Lori and that’s why he distanced himself after Lori and I got together. Kinda ironic, though, considering Lori ended up with my best friend, who’s always been like a brother.”

Jo looked down at the floor, smiling at Rick’s recollection, and then up at the door in front of her. “This is the master bedroom,” she informed, changing the subject to the matter at hand.

Rick nodded. “Alright.” Pulling out his Colt, he held it down at his side, but stayed put behind Jo, letting her take the lead in this like she insisted she needed to.

Removing her own gun with her right hand, she lifted her left up and banged on the door, and then waited; listening for movement inside the room.

There was nothing, though.

Jo glanced briefly back over her shoulder at Rick and then banged on the door again.

Still nothing.

“What if the people who ransacked this place accidentally released him from the bedroom?” Rick suggested. “What if he’s out on the streets somewhere?”

“Then we take a quick ride around the block, and if we see nothing, then this trip was pointless.”

Rick frowned. “This trip wasn’t pointless,” he contended. “You needed this trip, regardless of the outcome. We came here, and even if you don’t get to do what you intended to do, at least we can walk away with some supplies we’re gonna need back at the prison.”

Jo looked down at the ground while she banged a third time.

Nothing, yet again.

“Alright, this is bullshit,” she muttered.

Turning the knob, she pushed the door open and raised her gun, while Rick did same as he followed behind her. He almost smacked right into her when she stopped abruptly, and lowered her gun back down; staring down at the floor beside the bed.

There — lying on his back — was Oscar’s decayed corpse.

There was dried blood around his mouth but, more importantly, there was a gunshot wound to his head.

“Someone beat us to the punch,” Jo muttered without any emotion in her voice. She holstered her gun and crouched down at Oscar’s feet. Slowly, she reached out and wrapped her hand around his ankle, letting out a sigh. “I’m sorry, baby,” she whispered. “It should’ve been me to take care of you. I never should’ve left like I did.” Looking him over and frowning at how he looked, Jo eventually had to look away. “I hope you’re happy now, wherever you are.”

Rick stepped up to her, placing a hand on her shoulder. Jo reached back and covered his hand with her own, and then she got back up to her feet.

“It was probably the people who were here,” Rick remarked. “My guess is they came in here and found him, and probably unexpectedly so. Looks like he must’ve got a bite in.” He gestured to some blood on the floor. “Someone was bleeding as they left.”

The floors were dark, hardwood but there was a faint trace of a blood trail leading out of the bedroom and back out toward the living room.

“And either that person or someone else shot him,” Jo finished Rick’s train of thought. “At least he was already dead and couldn’t feel any pain. And now I kinda hope that whoever he bit was someone bad. To know someone died because I didn’t put Oscar down when I had the chance…”

Rick snaked a hand up the back of her head and turned her to face him. “Don’t go there. Whoever was here, and whoever Oscar bit…that’s not on you. That’s just how this world works now and that person was probably gonna get bit eventually, anyway.”

Jo nodded and leaned into to him, which resulted in him then pressing his lips to her forehead. They just stood there for a moment in silence until he heard her trying to stifle her tears. Holstering his own gun, Rick brought both of his arms up to freely wrap around her shoulders and pull her in for an embrace, letting her know it was alright to cry.

Her tears didn’t last long, probably because she had already cried enough for Oscar over the last year.

She lifted her head and took a step back from Rick while keeping her eyes focused on his chest.

“Will you help me bury him?”

Rick studied her face when she finally met his gaze, and he nodded. “You know I will.”

 

* * *

 

An hour later, Rick had thrown the last bit of dirt onto Oscar’s grave as Jo walked over with a large cross. He watched as she knelt down at the head of the grave and stuck the base of the cross into the ground so that it stood upright.

As she stood back up, she wiped her hands on her pants and came to stand beside Rick. “It was a wedding present from his aunt. We had it hanging on the wall of one of the upstairs bedrooms. I couldn’t think of anything better to use,” she commented.

“It looks nice,” Rick said with a nod. Looking upward at the sky, Rick pointed toward the sun. “Sun’s getting lower. We won’t make it back to the prison before nightfall.”

“Okay.”

“We’ll have to stay here for the night.”

Jo looked up at him and shook her head. “No, I can’t stay here. I wouldn’t be able to sleep,” she said. “Too many memories.”

Rick watched how insistent her expression was and shrugged. “Alright, then one of these houses next door or across the street,” he suggested, looking between the homes on either side of hers. “They seem empty, but we’ll check them out to make sure. Then, tomorrow, we’ll head on out back home.”

Jo nodded. “Alright.”

Rick left the shovel beside the back door before they went back inside the house. Jo went into her closet and found some of her clothes still remained, along with some of Oscars. She tossed it all, including some undergarments, into a garbage bag for either her or the others back at the prison to wear. She gathered what was left of toiletries into another bag while Rick went through the kitchen and the pantry looking for food supplies, but the house was virtually cleared out by whoever had come through before them.

After taking what they gathered out to the car, they headed back inside for one, last sweep. Rick tried drawers, looking for batteries or flashlights; anything like that while Jo took some picture frames off the mantle and removed the backs. She slid a couple of the pictures out and then just tossed the empty frames onto the couch.

Rick didn’t ask which pictures they were; he just let her do her thing.

When they were both done, they returned to the car again with what little bit else they removed from the house, which included some throw blankets, and then closed the car doors and stepped down to the end of the driveway together.

“Which house?” he asked.

Jo smirked, pointing at the yellow bungalow up the road. “I always liked that house.”

“Sounds good enough for me.”

Together they made the trek up the block from her house, with their weapons unsheathed and ready to use. They walked up the driveway as quickly and as stealthily as possible when they noticed two walkers in another driveway two houses down. Once up onto the front porch, they crouched down behind the white railing and waited, trying to see if the walkers had noticed them while simultaneously trying the doorknob to the house. Finding it to be unlocked, they breathed a sigh of relief and then hurried inside, shutting the door quietly behind them.

They were greeted by a very quaint living room with a large picture window that Jo moved to close the curtains on before they made their way around the downstairs to make sure it was secure. When they determined it was, they moved upstairs and checked the two bedrooms and the Jack and Jill bathroom, which were also clear.

Returning back downstairs, they barricaded the front and the back doors with bulkier pieces of furniture in case anything or any _one_ tried to get in while they were asleep. Also, for the sake of if they needed to leave in a hurry, they decided to stay in the downstairs master bedroom, which they would’ve chosen regardless of a safety issue because it was the only bedroom that didn’t have a twin bed in it.

“I gotta admit,” Rick said. “I’m looking forward to sleeping in a real bed tonight.”

“Me, too.” Jo smiled up at him and then looked at the kitchen as her stomach growled. “I don’t know about you but I’m getting pretty hungry. How about we find something to eat before calling it a night?”

Rick placed a hand onto her back between her shoulder blades and nodded as he walked with her into the kitchen. Jo stepped over to some cabinets near the stove, standing on tiptoe to get a better look, while Rick looked inside the cabinets on either side of the sink, but then stopped as soon as he glanced out of the window above the sink.

Nudging Jo, he gestured for her to look outside into the backyard. When she did, they were both staring out at about ten walkers huddled over a body, devouring the internal organs of some unfortunate soul who had to have been killed while the two of them were at her house. The body and everything about it just looked too…fresh.

Jo grimaced. “And there goes my appetite.”

Rick pulled a can of white potatoes and a can of tuna fish down from the cabinet he’d been looking through and set them both down on the counter. “Well, I got these. We’ll take them into the bedroom and stay away from the windows,” he suggested. “We can eat later when our stomachs bounce back.”

Jo presented a single can of fruit cocktail. “This can be dessert,” she joked. “And since the water was turned off in this area just before I left, and since we left our water bottles back in the car, we can drink the water the fruit's been marinating in.”

“Living the high life, you and I,” Rick commented while cracking a smile.

They gathered up the three cans, grabbed a can opener from a drawer, along with a box of matches that had been lying out on the counter, and then walked toward the downstairs master bedroom, which was pretty small. Then again, a master bedroom in a bungalow style home wasn’t going to be too big to begin with.

Rick walked over to the window at the front, which faced the street, and pulled the curtains closed and then pulled closed the curtains of the window on the side of the house. Over at the dresser, Jo set the canned goods down and then began striking matches to light some of the candles they had noticed earlier during their initial sweep of the downstairs. She left two candles on the dresser and then one on each nightstand on either side of the bed, which provided the right amount of light for them. Rick closed the bedroom door and began to rifle through the drawers, not knowing what he’d find except for clothes, and he would be right. Most of the drawers seemed empty, though. Whoever owned the house probably cleared out as much as they could and left or someone else came through and took what they needed.

“Anything good in there?” Jo asked sitting down on the edge of the bed.

Rick shrugged and looked up at his reflection in the mirror above the dresser. “Just some underwear, a bra…” he trailed, and then opened the next drawer and let out a laugh. Pulling out a small plastic bag, he turned toward Jo and shook the bag. “Wanna party?”

Jo laughed. “Is that pot?”

“Yeap.” Rick pushed aside some socks, looking back down into the drawer. “There’s a pipe in here, too.”

“Let’s leave it for the next person who comes to this house. They might need it more than us,” Jo remarked. “We don’t really need to be off our game.”

Rick nodded and put the baggie back in the drawer and closed it with his hip. As he turned to look back at Jo, he smiled at her and then walked up to her, standing between her legs. Slowly, he placed his hands upon her shoulders and leaned down to kiss her forehead. Jo reacted by placing her hands on his waist and just smiling at his loving gesture.

“You doing okay?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Thank you again for today; for bringing me here and helping me out. It means a lot.”

“I’m sorry about Oscar; that you couldn’t be the one.”

Jo shrugged. “Shit happens, right?”

“Yeah, it does,” Rick agreed. “I’m sorry about your dad, too. I wish I’d been able to meet him.”

“I wish you could’ve, too. He would’ve liked you.”

The two of them smiled at each other as Rick pushed some hair out of her face. He leaned down again and kissed her nose and then cupped the sides of her face as he moved to her lips.

“I love you,” he whispered into her mouth.

As he pulled back, Jo found her voice. “I love you, too.”

She watched as he stepped away, he gestured to the en suite bathroom off the bedroom. “I’ll be right back.”

Jo just nodded and watched him go, closing the door behind him. Once she was alone in the room, she turned and flopped down onto the bed, lying on her stomach and staring at one of the nightstands. Tilting her head, she glimpsed the drawer and curiosity got the better of her as she crawled up the mattress and reached her hand out. Pulling open the drawer, she propped herself up on her elbows and peered inside and rifled through some papers and pushed aside a remote that was probably meant for the small, flat screen TV that was mounted in the corner on the other side of the room. But then she found something of interest, removing it and holding it between her index and middle fingers.

And it was at that moment that Rick walked back out of the bathroom and caught sight of what she was holding.

Rick raised an eyebrow at her. “Did you just find that or did you have that on you this entire time?”

“Just found it.” Jo sat up and nodded to the drawer. “There’s a few of them in there.”

Subconsciously licking his bottom lip, Rick reached out his hand, palm side up and Jo set the little plastic, square package in his hand.

“For a minute I really thought you might’ve nicked this from Glenn and Maggie, or from Shane and Lori.”

The item in question that lay in his hand was an unopened condom.

“Nope,” Jo assured. She looked up at his face, watching his features as he stared between the condom and the drawer, and finally to her with a small smile. As he moved to put it back, Jo grabbed his wrist and stopped him. “Don’t.”

“What?”

“We’re gonna need it.”

Glancing down at her hand on his, Rick slowly lifted his eyes to her face and narrowed his gaze curiously at her. “Are you sure?”

Climbing up to kneel on the mattress and then sit back on the heels of her feet, Jo nodded. “The Governor doesn’t haunt me anymore, and I am officially widowed. I have no ties left to that which was holding me back from you; from letting me live my life with you.” Reaching her hands, she began to undo his belt for him and he just watched; possibly a little dumbstruck. “I’m ready, and I’m tired of holding back.”

Pushing her hands away, Rick set the condom down on the nightstand for a moment as he finished undoing his belt. He then slid the belt with the holster attach through the loops of his jeans and set it all to the ground before reaching out and grabbing the bottom of Jo’s shirt and lifting it over her head for her.

And, then, it was a flurry of movement between them.

Rick began to quickly undo his shirt while Jo sat back on the mattress to pull her pants off. Once she was sitting there in just her underwear and bra, she leaned forward to reach for his jeans and help him pull them off; revealing he was commando underneath and already erect.

“Well, hello,” Jo quipped. Sliding over to the edge of the bed, she dangled her legs over the side and then looked up at Rick as she casually wrapped her hand around his cock, stroking it leisurely at first.

His hips bucked briefly at the initial gesture. He didn’t know what to do with his hands right away but then ended up cupping one side of her face just as she lowered her head and swirled her tongue around his tip and along the slit. As she began to take him more fully into her mouth, both of Rick’s hands made their way through her blonde tresses and he all he could do was stare down at her in amazement before closing his eyes and just focusing on that delicious pressure that was gradually building at the base of his spine. He knew it wouldn’t take long to get there because his legs were already starting to turn to jelly.

“Shit, Jo, I’m gonna…I’m gonna…” he couldn’t even get the words out. He just let out a guttural moan before spilling into the warmth of her mouth.

He bucked again and his body shuddered. Rick had to take a step back as Jo lifted her head and wiped the corners of her mouth. After briefly running his hands down his face, Rick leaned down and held her face in his hands and kissed her, tasting himself on her lips. With equal parts love and lust in his eyes for her, Rick pushed her back against the mattress and leaned over her to unclasp the front of her bra and slide it down off her chest, watching with an impish grin as her breasts spilled out.

Tossing the bra to the floor, he climbed over her slightly and kissed her again but then lowered his mouth to one of her breasts, taking the nipple gently between his teeth, but careful not to suck on them, because she was still breastfeeding and he knew they were still sensitive. Plus, he didn’t really want to accidentally imbibe breastmilk. He did, however, swirl his tongue around those buds while sticking a hand inside her panties and rub her clit with his thumb while inserting one finger into her warm folds, pumping it slowly in and out.

Rick looked up, watching her face make the cutest and elated expressions with the things he was doing to her. That was enough to fuel his fire right there. The way she bit her bottom lip as she began to writhe under his ministrations was like heroin to him. When her breathing began to hitch and little pants of breath escaped her lips, Rick inserted a second finger and began to pump faster.

“Oh, god…Rick…”

Rick grinned and removed his fingers, which brought a disgruntled whimper from her, but she was soon sated again when he climbed off the bed and knelt on the floor, between her legs. He reached up and pulled her panties off, tossing them to the floor with the rest of their clothes and then grabbed her legs and pulled her closer to the edge of the bed so he could rest her legs over his shoulders. Spreading her legs a little farther apart, Rick pressed his mouth against her mound and dragged his tongue along her opening, lapping up her wetness. He returned the same two fingers inside of her while continuing to orally bring her to a different edge.

When Jo came, her body went rigid at first and then shuddered while she cried out. For a moment, if felt like she had gone blind, until the world around her began to come back into focus. She lifted her head to look down and see Rick licking her clean while staring back at her with those bedroom eyes of his.

When he climbed back up her body, eyeing her like a lion in in the African grasslands that was stalking an antelope, he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight before kissing her. Like him before, she tasted herself on his lips, and then opened her mouth more to him so that his tongue could have easier access to hers; all the while his erection prodded against her belly.

Placing a hand to his face, Jo pushed him away long enough for her to sit up and grab the condom off the nightstand and then tear the package open with her teeth. She removed the condom and did the honors of rolling it down over his stiff length while he lay back upon the bed and let her.

Looking each other in the eye for the nonverbal sign to continue, Jo locked her hands with his while she climbed up into his lap. She removed her hands from his and raised her hips to position him at her entrance, and she suddenly felt like there were a hundred butterflies dancing around inside her stomach just before she lowered herself onto his strained erection. Once he was completely buried within her, she sat still for a moment, allowing herself to adjust to him and nearly coming again from the feel of him practically pulsing.

Then, slowly, she raised her hips and sank back down; the be-all and end-all of taking their relationship to the next level.

Rick grabbed her hips firmly in his hands and thrust up into her while she rolled her hips and began to ride him at a gradual pace. She hunched forward, placing one hand upon his chest and another upon his shoulder to brace herself while biting her bottom lip; all of which was a glorious sight for Rick to watch. Her hair fell over her shoulders and covered her eyes, obscuring his view of her face, so Rick brought his hands up to brush her hair back and pull her down so he could kiss her. In the process, she laid down upon his chest, snaking her arms around his neck while his went around her back and up to the back of her head to keep her there while their bodies rocked together as if they were made for each other.

Lowering his lips from hers and burying his face into the crook of her neck, Rick held tight onto her and then rolled her over on the bed, on which they were lying sideways on, so that now he was on top. Rick lifted his head and looked down at her, at how her hair splayed out around her head upon the mattress, and smiled. She arched her back and raised her hips up to meet him as he thrust down, harder and faster. Jo lifted her legs up and wrapped them around his waist, pulling him closer to move deeper within her while he buried his face into her shoulder. He muffled his grunts and groans against her skin and reveled in the sound of her more languid moans and tiny mewls of pleasure.

As her walls began to tighten around him, Jo began to dig her nails into his back, eliciting a slight hiss from his lips. Both of their breaths came out shorter and shakier the closer they got to their respective orgasm, of which Jo reached first.

In the moment of release, Jo’s body stiffened and her inner walls tightened around him like a vice before her entire being tremored uncontrollably. She dragged her fingers up into his curls and buried her face into his shoulder this time as he nipped at the skin of hers.

A few thrusts more and Rick felt the familiar tingling at the base of his spine, which quickly shot out in every direction like fractured lightning bolts. With a ragged sigh, he allowed his orgasm to envelope him; his body shook and he collapsed completely down upon Jo with all his weight, pinning her to the mattress, but she didn’t seem to care. In fact, she seemed to love it, as she kept her body wrapped around him as if she was afraid to let go.

Completely spent, they just laid there together for a few moments, trying to come down from that little death.

Eventually, however, Rick rolled off of Jo and the two of them lay side by side, staring up at the ceiling.

Reaching his hand down between them, Rick curled his fingers around hers and turned to face her. “That was worth the wait,” he remarked.

“Yeah, it was,” she agreed, feeling satisfied, complete and tired. As a smile crept onto her lips, Jo turned her head and looked back at Rick. “Make sure we take the rest of those condoms home with us tomorrow morning.”

“Believe me, I won’t forget.”

They both fell quiet, basking in the afterglow until a giggle from Jo interrupted the silence.

“What?” Rick wondered.

“I was thinking about how true Decatur’s motto suddenly is.”

Rick furrowed his brow. He was sure he’d heard it before, but couldn’t remember it at the moment. “What’s Decatur’s motto?”

“Everything’s greater in Decatur.”

They looked each other in the eye again, and then they both chuckled.

Reaching an arm out, Rick pulled her up against him to then lie partially on top of him. Smiling down at him, Jo rested her head on his chest and he grabbed the comforter beneath them and pulled it up to wrap around their bodies, holding her against him.

“I love you,” she murmured as her eyes drooped closed.

“I love you, too,” he replied, placing a kiss to her forehead and then leaning his own back down against the bed.

 

* * *

 

The next morning, Rick and Jo were on the road back home to the prison. They were still within the Decatur city limits, maneuvering the side streets once again, with a backseat and trunk area filled with a few bags of supplies they’d salvaged from her father’s home, her own with Oscar, and the home they’d spent the night in. There was also the bag they had brought with them, filled with some food, water, weapons and ammo; but only the food and water they ended up requiring.

They rode in virtual silence most of the trip back, with Rick reaching over to her side and holding her hand, while they occasionally shared the same knowing look with each other. Although, when they were no more than fifteen minutes from the prison, Jo pulled her hand back and asked for Rick to stop the car. When he did, he looked curiously at her and then knitted his brow together when she climbed out of the Tucson to go stand along the side of the road.

Climbing out as well, Rick walked around the front of the car to join her at her side and place a hand upon her arm to make sure she was alright.

“I’m perfectly alright,” she assured. “I just needed to bury something else before we got home.”

Rick looked down to see her twisting her wedding ring off her finger and then crouch down to the ground where she began to dig a hole in the dirt. Smirking a little, Rick followed suit and knelt down next to her and help.

“I forgot to bury it with Oscar,” Jo remarked. “I think I was just distracted.”

Placing the ring in the hole, she made the move to cover it up when Rick grabbed her hand and stopped her. Confused, Jo glanced up at his face and raised an eyebrow at him before realizing he was twisting off his own wedding ring. He never knew why he still wore it, considering he and Lori hadn’t been together as man and wife for almost a year. Even Lori had taken hers off a while back.

He wasn’t Lori’s husband anymore and she wasn’t his wife. Their son was dead and gone. That chapter of his life was long over with and he was starting this new one with Jo and with Hope.

Placing his ring with hers in the hole, Rick pushed the dirt back over it and then wiped his hand on his pant leg. Placing his hand then upon the small of Jo’s back, he stood up with her and kissed her temple first before bringing his lips to hers.

“Ready now?” he asked.

Jo smiled. “I am.”


	21. Closer

_“Since you cannot do good to all, you are to pay special attention to those who, by the accidents of time, or place, or circumstances, are brought into closer connection with you.”_ — Saint Augustine

* * *

 

It was morning, it was quiet, and it was considerably warm already. Inside the prison, it was the kind of warm where sleeping with a blanket was just out of the question unless you wanted to wake up soaked to the bone in your own sweat and just be generally uncomfortable.

For Rick and Jo, however, it was a temporary necessity.

Inside their cell, which was draped closed with a blanket for privacy, the two of them moved together under a different blanket, to obscure what was going on in case anyone poked their head in if either of them were needed by anyone else for whatever reason.

Rick lay on top of Jo, buried between her legs, as they moved together in a rhythm they had perfected in the last five months since their first time together in Decatur. In that frame of time, they had also perfected keeping quiet whenever they made love in their cell, and this time was no different. His mouth covered hers and any moans or whimpers were easily muffled as they kissed, although he occasionally stuck his face down into the pillow her head rested upon and muffled his own groans that way. As he swiveled his hips in that way that made her toes curl every damn time, Rick knew she was incredibly close to finishing and it brought a smile to his lips.

Looking her in the eye, he watched her knit her brow and bite her lip as she let her cry of elation become swallowed up by his lips upon hers again. Wrapping her legs around his, her entire body shook underneath him as that strong, lovely sensation claimed her yet again. With a happy, little mewl she began to relax but still held on tight to him with both her legs and her arms as he thrust down into her a few more times until he peaked. When he did, he buried his face into her shoulder and let his body shudder slightly as his orgasm enveloped his senses.

Once they both had come down and just laid there for a few moments, Rick pulled out and rolled over to share their narrow mattress. Beads of sweat were rolling down his forehead and down along his temples, which he quickly wiped away before sitting up and tossing his bare legs off the side of the bed. Disposing of his condom into their small waste bin in the corner, Rick smirked when he felt Jo’s hand rest upon his upper back and then trail its way down his spine to that spot just above his ass.

“What’s on the agenda for today?” she asked. “Tending the crops as usual, Farmer Rick?”

Rick twisted around slightly at the waist and looked down at her with an amused grin. Leaning down, he placed a kiss on her lips and then nodded. “That’s the plan,” he confirmed. “What about _you_? Are you gonna be tending to the _children_ as usual, Headmistress Jo?”

Jo chuckled heartily as she sat up on her elbows. “Nah, that was yesterday. Today Carol’s heading up ‘story time’ in the library.”

Rick nodded again. “The kids seem to be really interested in that lately.”

“Yeah, tell me about it. They seemed more excited about that then school time. Then again, I’m sure kids throughout the centuries have always preferred story time to school time,” Jo remarked. She snaked her left hand around his back and pulled herself closer to him so she could place a kiss a on his right arm. “I know _I_ did.”

Looking down at her, Rick let his eyes linger along her bare shoulders and then to her breast which weren’t as full anymore. She was no longer breastfeeding; her supply had gone dry two months before, and now Hope, who was seven and a half months old now, was strictly on a diet of formula and whatever canned baby food they had been able to find. Though, with the crops that had been growing, Carol and some of the other ladies, who had a keen talent for canning, were able to create some fresh, homemade baby food for Hope to eat.

“Goddamn, you’re beautiful.”

Jo smiled at his compliment; something she never tired of hearing. “So are you,” she replied, pulling herself up even more.

As he smirked modestly, Rick looked away from her and over at the blanket covering the entrance to their cell just as Jo maneuvered herself up to sit in his lap and then wrap her arms around his shoulders. He brought his attention back to her when she pressed her face into his neck and reveled in the scratchiness from his beard tickling the side of her face a little. Rick reciprocated the gesture by wrapping his arms around her waist and holding her close. When she gave a slight roll of her hips down against his, he pulled back and looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

“Again?”

Jo lifted her head and grinned back at him. “Again,” she nodded.

Shaking his head with a quiet laugh, Rick maintained one arm at her waist as he lifted her up with him long enough for him to reach into the discreet box on the small table protruding out of the wall and pulled out a new condom. Without warning, Jo snatched it from his hand and ripped the packaged open with her teeth and Rick just sat back enough, watching her with a sly smile, as she did the honors.

 

* * *

 

After Rick and Jo had finally gotten dressed for the day and then grabbed a quick bite to eat, Jo had gone and checked in on Sophia, who was now sharing her cell with Hope instead of her mother, while Carol had since taken over Rick’s old cell. The idea was that Sophia was a growing girl at fourteen years old now and shouldn’t have to share with her mother anymore, and so she could have her own space and privacy. Going through puberty was hard enough, let alone going through it in post-apocalyptic world and sharing a bunk bed with your parent. Despite enjoying her privacy, Sophia had also gotten used to there being someone else in her cell with her and was actually the one who asked Rick and Jo if they wouldn’t mind it if Hope stayed with her. She had claimed she never got to have a sister of her own and thought of Hope in that way anyway, and she enjoyed helping take care of the little girl. Plus, Sophia said Rick and Jo should be able to have their cell to themselves. The couple consented and they were able to enjoy their own privacy while able to rest easy knowing that their daughter was only a few cells down if they were needed.

Seeing that Sophia and Hope were both still asleep, Jo went upstairs to the upper level of cells and poked her head into Lori and Shane’s cell, which was currently only being occupied by Lori, as that couple in particular were going through a trial separation of sorts.

In the last couple of months, Lori and Shane had been arguing and no one ever knew what the underlying problem was and no one wanted to get in the middle of it or be nosy. When Shane had essentially moved out and come downstairs to take up temporary residence in Hershel’s old cell, which had been vacant ever since Hershel died, Jo had taken it upon herself to check on how Lori was doing one evening when she heard the brunette crying. After wiping her tears and putting on a brave face, Lori quietly opened up to the blonde that she and Shane were on outs over children; he wanted them with her and she didn’t, regardless of whom with. Losing Carl and choosing to end her other pregnancy after Carl died had been enough. She didn’t want to go through that again; to carry life and bring it into this world. Shane had argued that if Jo was able to do it with Rick, then they could do it together, but Shane just couldn’t see things from Lori’s point of view, or he was refusing to. Either way, it had put a wedge between the couple. Lori had nothing against anyone else who was able to bring new life into this world; it was just something she couldn't put herself through, but she was perfectly content helping with the children in the prison who didn’t have any parents at all or, at the very least, a mother of their own anymore.

It had been about two months now, and Lori and Shane couldn’t seem to get past the issue.

“Hey,” Jo greeted, when she noticed Lori was already up and was brushing her dark hair.

Lori turned and smiled. “Hey, yourself.”

“Rick went out to play farmer again and the kids are still asleep, but when they’re up Carol’s doing her story time thing with them, so I’ve got downtime,” Jo informed. “Wanna play some cards?”

Dropping her brush down into her lap and raising an eyebrow, Lori’s smile widened. “We could make it interesting. Loser does the other’s laundry for a week.”

Jo chuckled. “Deal.”

As both women eventually made their way to the Common Room with Rick’s pack of playing cards, Shane had woken up and simply nodded respectively at the pair before heading outside where Daryl was loading up the bed of one of the group’s newest trucks alongside Andrea.

“Heading out soon?” Shane asked the archer.

“Yeah, in a few minutes,” Daryl replied. “Gonna check out that Big Spot. Wanna join us?”

Shane began to nod. “Who else is coming?”

“Me, Andrea, Sasha, Glenn and Zach…and Bob just asked to come along. Says he’s been here months and doesn’t feel like he’s pulling enough weight. Feels bad or some shit.”

“He’s a medic,” Shane scoffed. “That’s plenty of weight and he’s better off here.”

“That’s what I said, too, but he was damn insistent, so I said okay.”

“Whatever.”

Both men shrugged and smirked at each other as they turned and looked over at where Bob was standing with Sasha, helping her load up the back of the Tucson.

Daryl let out a chuckle and pointed at the pair. “I think that’s the real reason he wants to go.”

“What— _Sasha_?”

“I think he’s got moon eyes for her, but she’s got moon eyes for Morgan.” Daryl shook his head. “It’s a fuckin’ romance novel around here.”

“Yeah, for some, maybe,” Shane retorted, ruefully.

Down in the yard, Rick stood alone amid the crop, finishing up with tilling the soil in preparation for planting more seeds. He pulled earbuds out of his ears from the MP3 player he’d found weeks earlier, that ran on AAA batteries, and looked out toward the area between the outer and inner fences that ran the expanse of the yard. A few from the prison group were dispatching with the growing numbers of walkers that had built up over night. Up until then, the sounds of Johnny Cash and ACDC had been filling his ears and letting his mind wander pleasantly but, when he removed the earbuds, the sounds of snarling walkers and their skulls being punctured before they fell quickly reentered his ears.

Setting the hoe against the pig pen, Rick turned and looked back toward the courtyard where people had since begun to putter around when he noticed Morgan sauntering down the gravel road, putting on some fingerless gloves and flashing a smile at Rick.

“Morning, Rick,” Morgan greeted.

“That it is,” Rick replied.

“I brought those onion seed packets you wanted to plant. We get these in, we can harvest them as soon as about three weeks.”

“Sounds good to me.”

Morgan pulled two packets out of his pocket and placed them in Rick’s hand. “How’s ol’ Bessie?”

“Who?” Rick furrowed his brow, placing the onion packets in his own pocket.

Gesturing toward the pig lying on its side in the mud, Morgan smiled. “Bessie.”

“You named the pig?”

“One of the kids did, actually.” After a moment, he added, “She sick or something?”

Rick shrugged. “I have no idea. She was moving slow yesterday and she’s been like that since I got out here earlier.”

“Do we bother using her as food and just focus on the piglets, or do we see if this is something she gets past?”

“I say we wait it out. If she’s still like this tomorrow, we should consider just putting her out of her misery. If she _is_ sick, we won’t eat her,” Rick replied. “Don’t want to risk making anyone sick.”

As Morgan nodded, Rick turned and looked to see Daryl coming down the gravel road on his bike, followed by Shane and Andrea in the truck, and then Sasha driving the Tucson with Zach and Bob in tow. Both men walked over to Daryl as he came to a stop to talk to Rick.

“You headed out now?”

Daryl confirmed with a nod of his head. “I’m gonna go check out the Big Spot. The one I was talking about, just seeing.”

“Yeah, I got to go out and check the snares. I don’t want to lose whatever we catch to the walkers.”

Throwing a look to Shane in the truck, Rick then looked back at Daryl who smirked and reached out his hand to pat Rick’s stomach before starting the engine of the bike again. Rick smirked and hurried over to the outer gate, which had since been rigged up with a pulley system which involved metal doors and sharpened wooden spikes set up like Czech hedgehogs on either side of the doors to impale walkers. It was not an easy feat either, opening the gates, so Morgan assisted.

As the gate doors opened up, a few walkers were pushed back and impaled, allowing Daryl and the others to ride on through. Before the gate doors could be closed, Hershel’s old truck came driving up from the opposite direction, headed toward the prison. Inside the cab was Merle and Tyreese, with Merle the one behind the wheel.

As soon as Merle and Tyreese slipped in through the gate, Merle pulled the truck over and waited for Rick and Morgan to close the gate. Merle put the truck in park and stuck his head out the window, looking over at the group’s leader as he walked over.

“How’d it go?” Rick asked.

“No sign of him. We checked up near Hampton and just outside McDonough. Nothing.” Merle wiped itched his nose. “Thinking maybe we’d make a trip down to Macon either tomorrow or a few days from now.”

Rick cocked his head to one side and winced. “I dunno,” he remarked. “That’s seventy miles of walkers. We haven’t branched out that far, in that direction.”

“You never had any trouble heading to your hometown or to Jo’s hometown,” Merle commented. “Plus, me and Tyreese here — who’s built like brick shithouse, ‘mind you — can handle any walkers and any un-neighborly types. Ain’t nothin’ gonna bring us asunder without our permission.”

Rick smirked. “Well, as long as you’re so sure.”

Tyreese leaned forward. “I’ll walk back up.” He gestured with his thumb over to the space in-between the fences where the walkers were still being put down by some of the group. One in particular was Karen, a former Woodbury resident who Tyreese had developed a relationship with the last couple of months. “I’m gonna help out over there.”

Merle followed Tyreese’s line of sight and smirked. “Yeah, I bet you are,” the redneck teased. “You go get yourself some of that chocolate cinnamon swirl.”

Rick chuckled and shook his head, patting Merle’s door. “Glad you both made it back. Daryl and the others just took a run to a Big Spot not too far from here. They should be back in a few hours.”

With a nod, Merle ducked back into the truck and took his foot off the brake as soon as Tyreese was out and off with a crowbar he picked up from the bed of the truck. Then, up the gravel road back into the courtyard the older Dixon drove as Rick and Morgan returned back over to the animals and crops.

“So, you’re gonna check the snares?” Morgan questioned.

“Yep,” Rick nodded.

“Want company?”

“Nah, I can manage on my own.” Rick pointed to the depleting herd along the fence. “Those’ll be taken care of soon enough. I’ll have no problem going out.”

“But if something happens while you’re out there—”

“—Then I got my gun and my knife,” Rick assured. “You can get started on planting those onions, though, if you want.”

Morgan shook his head and smiled before bowing in front of Rick. “Yes, massa. Right away, massa.”

“Oh, don’t start that shit,” Rick retorted; taking the onion seed packets back out of his pocket and throwing them at Morgan’s chest as they both laughed.

As Morgan picked the packets up, he looked up the gravel road toward the prison and smirked. “Looks like _your_ massa has arrived,” he joked.

Looking over his shoulder, Rick spotted Jo approaching and he grinned. He ignored Morgan’s comment and began to meet her halfway. “Hey,” he greeted, touching a hand to her elbow and leaning in to kiss the corner of her mouth.

“Hey,” she replied. “I noticed some of the vehicles missing. Was there a run?”

“Yeah, Daryl wanted to check out a Big Spot. A few went with him.”

Jo nodded. “Ahh.” Glancing over at Morgan she waved. “Morning, Morgan.”

“Morning, Jo.”

Turning her attention back to Rick, she grabbed his hands and nodded over at the fences. “That’s a lot of walkers.”

“Yeah, but they’re almost all taken care of,” Rick insisted. “I was just about to get ready to head out into the woods and check the snares before any walkers get to them first.”

Jo nodded again. “Mind if I join ya?”

Rick hesitated but, when he looked down at her and how she smirked back up at him, he caved. “Yeah, I don’t see why not. You armed?”

“I’ll head back and get my sword and my gun.”

“Alright.” As Jo turned around to walk back up the gravel road, Rick took off his farming gloves and smacked her ass with one of them. When she let out a small, playful yelp, Rick simply chuckled and turned back to find Morgan staring back at him with a knowing look. “What?”

“Your massa has ya whipped,” Morgan teased some more. “Pussy-whipped.”

“Shut your hole or I’ll tie you up to a tree outside the fences,” Rick lightheartedly threatened as he threw his gloves at his friend.

 

* * *

 

As they moved through the trees with the quietness of a mouse, Rick and Jo approached one of the snares only to find that the rear half of a deer was hanging from a rope with its intestines and other internal organs either dangling down or completely fallen to the ground below. Meanwhile, the front half with the head was on the ground, a couple of feet away, beside more internal organs. Both halves were covered in flies and smelled terribly.

Bringing a hand to her nose, Jo grimaced. “Walkers?”

“Looks like,” Rick replied, making a nauseated face as well. “No use to us now.” He gestured ahead. “Let’s check the others.”

As they continued a few more yards, with birds chirping beautifully in the trees overhead, Jo sidled more closely up next to Rick and nudged his arm with her elbow. When he glanced down at her, she wasn’t looking at him, but she was wearing a smirk that suggested she was up to something.

“What?”

“Nothing,” she shrugged.

“Liar.”

Jo chuckled. “Alright, well, maybe I’m thinking about how peaceful it is within these trees and how interesting it’d be if we could secure off a section and, oh, I dunno…make the most of our time out here.”

Rick stopped walking and grabbed her wrist, pulling her up against him. Without any warning, he leaned in and kissed her fully on the lips and then backed her up against a tree trunk. Pressing his groin into hers, he began to snake his hands up into her hair, while his tongue began to investigate the inside of her mouth and his ears let the sounds of her tiny sighs and mewls become better music than the songs on his MP3 player.

However, just as she began to clamber for his belt buckle, the sound of an animal grunting in pain and then the sound of a branch cracking nearby pulled Rick’s attention away from Jo. He lifted his mouth from hers and leaned back, and then abruptly covered her mouth with his hand when he saw a figure stumbling through the trees.

With his free hand, he put a finger to his lips and then used the same finger to point at what he saw. Jo turned around and saw the figure as well, as it dropped to its knees beside what looked to be a wild boar, and pushed quietly up off the tree and gestured for her and Rick to move along, silent as the grave.

“Wait,” the figure spoke, causing both Rick and Jo to stop in their tracks.

They turned and looked to see the figure wasn’t a walker, as they had been assuming, but a living, breathing human woman, covered from head to toe in dirt and grime.

“Please.” She stood up, holding out a hand to them. “Please?” she continued, looking completely forlorn and desperate. “Please help me.”

Neither Rick nor Jo made a move to respond in any way, shape or form.

“I know you don’t know me. Okay, I know that. But can you please help me get this to my husband?” the dirty woman, with an Irish lilt, pleaded with them. “We haven’t eaten in days.”

Rick looked away from the woman and instead to Jo who looked more sympathetic. Jo’s expression was enough to soften Rick from his more apprehensive state. Taking a few steps forward and removing his gloves, which he had put back on before he and Jo came into the woods, Rick opened up the shoulder bag he had on his right shoulder, with the strap crossing his torso and the bag resting on his left hip. Lifting the flap, he shoved in his gloves and then he removed one of the two, tinfoil-wrapped packages of food meant for him and Jo.

“Here,” he said to the woman, handing the sandwich over. “Go ahead.”

Warily, the woman reached for the package and took it, graciously. “Thank you,” she replied, as tears welled in her eyes.

To Jo, it looked as if it had been a long time since the other woman had either seen another living person or experienced the kindness of strangers, or both.

“Do you have a camp around here?” the woman inquired.

“Yeah,” Jo replied, stepping up beside Rick.

“Could we possibly come back with you? We’ve been doing… _very badly_ on our own.”

Rick looked briefly at Jo and then back to the woman, nodding slightly. “I’d have to meet him,” he informed. “I need to ask him some questions, both of you.”

“What questions?”

“Just three. When we get there,” he answered, as she nodding; understanding his request. “You have a gun on you?”

The woman shook her head.

“Can I make sure?”

As the woman nodded, Rick moved around to stand behind her and patted her down in a very police procedural kind of way. The entire time, however, the woman looked nervous and scared to even breathe wrong in Rick’s presence. Jo wanted to speak up and tell the woman it would be okay, but she just kept quiet and let Rick head this all up. When it came down to it, he was the one who made all the final decisions as to who they let back into the prison with them. In fact, there had been plenty new additions over the last five months since their trip to Decatur.

As Rick got up from patting the woman down, holding a knife he had taken off of her, he turned and stood in front of her while maintaining eye contact with her. “Look, I don’t know you, so I’m just gonna tell you this: you try anything — _anything_ — you’re gonna be the one who loses.”

“I don’t have anything else to lose,” she insisted, in a voice barely above a whisper.

“No,” Rick gave a nod of his head. “You do.” Holding out her, he gestured for her to take it back. “Go ahead.”

Slowly, she returned her only weapon back to its sheath before turning to lead the pair away with her. Rick smirked, but on the apprehensive side, at Jo, taking her hand in his and giving it a brief squeeze before they followed the Irish woman.

As the sun tried its best to filter its light down the canopy of trees, birds continued to chirp and cicadas buzzed from the heat.

After not even fifty feet of walking, Jo spoke up finally.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

The woman turned around and smirked a little shyly. “Clara.” She then looked between Jo and Rick. “Is that one of the three questions?”

“No, I was just wondering what we call you.”

“Oh.” Clara continued forward. “What are _your_ names?”

“I’m Jo, he’s Rick,” Jo replied.

“It is very nice to meet you both, under the circumstances.”

“You don’t exactly sound like you’re from Georgia,” Rick commented, joining the conversation.

“What—oh. I’m not. I’m from Ireland; County Tipperary. It’s about halfway between Limerick and Kilkenny. I don’t know if you’re familiar with either of those places.” Clara shrugged at her own comment. “My husband, Eddie, and I — we were going to Puerto Vallarta for our honeymoon. When they shut down the airports, our connecting flight never connected. They wouldn’t let us leave the terminal, so we slept next to these huge marble sculptures from Zimbabwe. Then, on the fourth night, the things just came through. There were a lot of us,” she said, stopping momentarily and looking sadly at Rick, “and now it’s just Eddie and me. And I wouldn’t have made it if it wasn’t for him. And it isn’t that he saved me over and over again or that he showed me the things that I had to do or to be willing to do. If he wasn’t still here I—I couldn’t be. I just—I couldn’t.” Clara simply shrugged her shoulders and averted her eyes nervously as she turned around and continued to walk forward.

“What were they?” Rick asked, not moving.

“What?”

“The things you had to be willing to do?”

Clara stopped and looked back at him. “Um…eating whatever we could find — animal carcasses and rotten fruit — and leaving people behind. Hiding from people who needed my help,” she answered, as a few tears fell from her eyes. “Unlike you.”

“This is not charity. You have to have numbers,” Rick remarked, moving again, with Jo in tow. “People are the best defense against walkers or people.”

“We help each other,” Jo added.

“You call them walkers?” Clara questioned with a hint of amusement in her voice.

Rick looked over his shoulder at Jo, and smirked. “I saw one of those sculptures at the airport once,” he said, looking back forward at the direction they were headed. “My favorite was the kids playing leapfrog.”

“Mine, too,” Clara agreed. Then, “What Eddie and I had to do—did you do things like that? Did you? Do you think you get to come back from them?”

“We hope so,” Jo said, placing a hand on the small of Rick’s back while he eyed Clara.

“Yeah?” The Irish woman sounded a little less sad, but still somewhat nervous. “I hope we answer your three questions to your satisfaction.”

 

* * *

 

Eventually, the three of them came out of the woods to a small clearing where a campsite with a small tent was set up.

“Just ahead,” Clara announced. She began to walk a little faster while Rick and Jo hung back, taking in their surroundings. “Eddie. Oh, thank God you’re still here. This is Rick and Jo. They’re gonna help us. Everything’s gonna be okay. Everything—” she was saying as she knelt down in front of a wooden crate.

As Rick approached the tent and looked inside, Jo moved closer to Clara with her hand on the hilt of her short sword.

Without provocation, the Irish woman jumped up, turned around and sprang at Jo with a shrill scream of attack. Clara pinned Jo to the ground and sank the blade of a much larger knife than the one Rick had found on her into Jo’s left shoulder; the same place Morgan had stabbed Rick seven months earlier.

Jo let out a scream of pain and Rick was on Clara in an instant; ripping the black-haired woman off _his_ woman.

“Damn it!” Rick growled, tossing Clara to the ground like a sack of coal before dropping to Jo’s side. He pushed aside the shoulder of her shirt and inspected the deep wound as blood rolled down her shoulder in all directions and soaked her shirt. “Shit, shit, shit.”

“Fuck, it hurts,” Jo groaned.

Rick glared in Clara’s direction and then grabbed Jo’s right hand and made her press it down upon her left shoulder. “I know it hurts, but keep the pressure there,” he insisted, anxiously, before getting to his feet, pulling out is Colt Python and pointing it down at Clara.

“I wanted to take the boar,” Clara was whimpering from the heap Rick had left her in. “I just knew—I knew I’d get you here so much quicker. He’s starving. He’s slowing. He needs something alive. Please, I told you, I can’t be without him. And so I kept him.”

“So you thought trying to kill me and _my wife_ was the way to go about it? We were going to help you and bring you back with us. We were gonna give you a safe place to call home, you crazy bitch.”

“I—I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to, but I had to. I can’t let Eddie die again. I can’t be without him,” Clara sobbed, getting up to her knees. “I can’t do things like this. And—and you have to do things like this. Let me be like him. Don’t stop it. Don’t end it after.”

“No.”

“Let me be with him.”

“No!” Rick shouted as Clara plunged her smaller knife into her abdomen.

Dropping his gun, he stepped away from her as she toppled over onto the ground to await death like an old friend. He looked at Jo who was craning her neck in pain to see what was going on and decided to walk back over to her and check on her instead.

She was his priority, not Clara.

“Did you—”

Rick shook his head, crouching down beside her. “She did it to herself.”

“She wants to be with the man she loves,” Jo commented, still _somehow_ more sympathetic than Rick in regard to the Irish woman. “I get that.” Then, with a pained shrug as Rick helped her upward into a sitting position, she added, “I could’ve been her.”

“Yeah, but the point is, you’re not,” Rick replied, pulling a handkerchief from his back pocket and pressed it to Jo’s wound as she winced and hissed at the gesture. “You’re a fighter and survivor. She isn’t.”

“Hey,” Clara called out in a quiet voice, whimpering from her self-inflicted pain. “What were the questions—the three questions?”

Rick eyed Jo who gave a nod of her head, assuring him she was okay. Getting up to his feet, he crouched down next to the dying woman. “How many walkers have you killed?”

“Eddie…Eddie killed…killed them all,” she replied, with labored breaths. “Until—”

Rick looked down at the ground. “How many _people_ have you killed?”

“Just me. Just me.”

“Why?”

“You don’t—you don’t get to come back. You don’t get to come back from things,” Clara trailed. “You don’t…”

And then, silence.

The Irish woman took her last breath and Rick looked up, rocking back on the heels of his feet, clearly more affected and sympathetic than he had previously led on. Tears brimmed his own eyes over this sad, desperate woman at his feet, Rick wiped his face with the back of his hand and holstered his gun before slowly getting back up to his feet and returning to Jo’s side.

“Is she dead?” Jo asked, curiously.

Rick nodded, and they both looked over at the burlap sack that was moving beside the wooden crate. Neither felt the need to investigate, because they knew the head of Eddie was inside.

Reaching forward, Rick wrapped his arms under Jo’s torso and helped her up to her feet and then threw her right arm over his shoulder while and held her up with his left arm around her waist.

“C’mon,” he muttered. “Let’s get you back to the prison so Dr. S can take good care of you.”

Jo rested her head down on his left shoulder. “You take good care of me, too.”

“I didn’t do so well today.”

“These things are bound to happen,” Jo insisted as they began to walk away together, and away from Clara’s body.

 

* * *

 

The trek back through the woods wasn’t too bad. There had been only two walkers Rick and Jo happened to cross paths with, and Rick was able to easily take care of them after propping Jo up against a tree. They walked past the boar from earlier which was finally dead, but neither of them bothered to bring back with them; mainly because Rick could only focus on making sure they got Jo to the medical attention she needed and as quick as possible. Her skin tone was looking a little pallid from the blood loss and she moved a little slower, but there was no doubt she would survive. It wasn’t a mortal wound. It was just a deep one that could become more serious unless it was treated properly.

When they returned, wandering out of the woods and made their way to the outer gate, Rick had to shoot at a few walkers that had gotten too close. He couldn’t set Jo down anywhere and keep her unprotected while he stepped away to use his knife, so the gun was the easiest option. Of course, the sound drew more walkers over and Rick only had six bullets, so he had to swipe Jo’s gun from her holster and continue firing her six rounds.

The noise from both guns warranted the attention from inside the prison as well, as Morgan and Tyreese both came running down the gravel road to open the gate for the couple. As soon as the entrance was opened, Tyreese stepped around them to block them from approaching walkers, smashing one in the head with his trusty hammer before corralling Rick and Jo back inside as Morgan pulled the gates closed behind them.

Even though the bleeding had slowed due to coagulation, Jo had lost enough blood that she was feeling lightheaded and weak-kneed. She stumbled in her footing and looked wearily up at Rick as he looked down at her with deep concern as well as love for her on his face.

“What happened?” Morgan demanded, touching a hand gently to the top of Jo’s shoulder.

“Was it a walker?” Tyreese wondered, wide eyed and fearing the worst.

The way her shirt was, the wound wasn’t visible unless you pushed the material off her shoulder. All that was noticeable was the slash in the material and the large bloodstain all over it and her shoulder and running down her arms, as well as on Rick’s hands. For all Tyreese and Morgan could tell, Jo could’ve been bitten and that was a terrifying thought.

Not just because she was one of their own, but because of the position she held among the group now.

Rick was the leader.

There was no question about that.

Their _president,_ if you will.

And Jo was his lover, his girlfriend…hell, his common law wife, even. So, if Rick was their president, Jo was their First Lady.

If Rick was their king, she was their queen, and if the queen died, Tyreese and Morgan didn’t want to think about how badly their community would handle that, let along the king.

“No, it wasn’t a walker,” Rick assured.

Bending at the knees, Rick placed one arm around Jo’s back and the other under her legs as he hoisted her up into his arms like a groom about to carry his bride across the threshold. If she weren’t as weak, Jo might’ve protested. However, she was in no position to contest the gesture and just let it happen as he carried her up the gravel road with Morgan and Tyreese in tow.

The second they were through to the courtyard, there was flurry of commotion.

Lori, who was pruning some herbs, dropped her pruning shears and ripped off her gardening gloves as she ran over to Rick like a bat out of hell. “Oh my god, what happened?”

“She got stabbed. She’s lost blood,” Rick replied, keeping it short. The details could be hashed out later. “Get Dr. S and have him meet us in our cell.”

Lori nodded and ran off, but not before letting her hand linger, sympathetically on Jo’s arm.

Every door Rick needed to get through was opened for him and Jo by other people, bending over backwards to help, if they weren’t stepping aside to give them space. He hoisted her up a little more to get a strong grip on her as he made his way inside of C Block; through the Common Room and then to his and Jo’s cell, where he gently laid her down upon the bottom bunk.

Crouching down at her side, Rick brushed some of her hair off her face and kissed her forehead. When she smiled lazily up at him he just pressed his forehead to hers. “You’re gonna be okay,” he insisted.

“I know,” she remarked. And then, in the best British accent she could muster, she added, “Tis but a flesh wound.”

Despite the situation, Rick lifted his head and chuckled down at her. “This ain’t exactly Monty Python.”

“It got you to crack a smile for half a second, though. You keep looking at me as if I’m gonna die,” Jo replied, seriously. “Morgan stabbed you in the same place and you lived to tell the tale.”

“That’s because you were able to disinfect my wound with whiskey and stitch it up right away. I didn’t lose the same amount of blood you have.” Placing his right hand to the left side of her face, he dragged his thumb lovingly along her cheek and maintained eye contact with her. “I have every right to look at you this way.”

Jo just looked back at him, her smile back up at him returning, but a little more subtle this time around. “You said I was your wife.”

“What?”

“After Clara stabbed me, when she was trying to explain why she did it, you referred to me as your wife.”

Before Rick could respond, Dr. S and Lori were darting into the cell behind Rick.

The doctor knelt down beside Rick and leaned forward to pull down the shoulder of Jo’s shirt and inspect the wound for himself before determining his next course of action. “What happened?” Dr. S inquired, looking down to dig through his medical bag. “How did she get stabbed?”

“We came across a woman in the woods we thought needed help,” Rick began to explain, watching as the doctor pulled out a knife and cut open Jo’s shirt so he had better access to cleaning and treating the wound. “We followed her back to her camp, where she said her husband was. She seemed harmless enough, but as soon as we got there I knew something was off. I couldn’t find her husband anywhere, and that’s when she attacked Jo.”

“She was too far gone,” Jo commented. “Her husband was already dead, and turned. She couldn’t accept being alone in this world without him and it messed her up.”

“Did you kill her?” Lori asked, her arms folded across her chest.

Rick shook her head. “She killed herself, and we left her,” he answered. “She wanted to turn so she could be with her husband.”

“If it weren’t so sad and pathetic, and if I hadn’t been stabbed, I’d almost think the whole thing kind of romantic,” Jo quipped, her eyes following Dr. S’s hands as he poured water onto a rag and began to clean the blood away from her shoulder gash. “Now Rick and I have matching war wounds.”

Rick shook his head and did his best not to smile, but failed. “Would you stop being so easy-going about this. An inch or two lower and you could be dead by now.”

“But I’m not,” she winked. “I’m still here; alive, but not so much with the kicking at the moment. So, I guess you’re stuck with me a little while longer.”

“I’m good with that.”

Lori sank down to sit at the end of the bed; placing a hand upon Jo’s ankle and then remove her boots for her while Dr. S dabbed the wound with rubbing alcohol. As Jo hissed from the sting, Lori stopped bothering with the boots and braced her hands on Jo’s shins, to keep Jo from possibly thrashing at the pain. Lori shared a glance with her ex-husband, who had moved out of the way to give the doctor more room, before looking over at Jo instead.

“I know I won that card game earlier and the deal was you would do my laundry for a week, but since I won, I think I can decide whether or not to relieve you of that chore,” Lori remarked, “and I am hereby relieving you of my laundry duty, as well as yours.”

“You don’t have to—” Jo began to protest.

“This is not open for discussion,” Lori interrupted. Successfully removing Jo’s boots and setting them on the floor at the end of the bunk bed, Lori looked back at Jo and smirked. “You’ve been badly hurt and you’ve lost blood. You need to rest for a couple of days, at least.”

Without saying anything else, Lori stood up and decided to make her exit then; leaving Rick and Dr. S alone in the cell with Jo. While the doctor began to process of stitching up the wound, Rick leaned as close as he could toward her without getting in the doctor’s way. When the pain from getting stitched back up, paired with the blood loss, became too much for Jo’s weakened state to handle, she passed out; causing Rick to having a brief moment of panic rip through him.

Sensing the concern, Dr. S glanced at Rick. “She just blacked out,” he reassured. “She’s better off not having to be awake for this.”

After only a few minutes more, the good doctor was finished. He cleaned the wound once more of excess blood that had seeped out as the wound was closed, lathered some antibiotic ointment over it and then added a bandage to protect the wound.

“Tell her I’m sorry about her shirt when she wakes up,” Dr. S eventually continued.

“I don’t think she’ll care.” Offering his hand to the doctor, Rick shook it firmly and nodded. “Thank you.”

Dr. S smiled. “Just doing my job.”

Both men stood up, looking at each other with smirks on their faces.

“I dunno,” Rick shrugged. “Sometimes I think you do more for all of us than anyone else.”

“Maybe I should ask for a raise,” Dr. S joked as he gathered up his medical supplies back into his bag. “When she does wake up, just make sure she stays hydrated and fed. She’ll need to build her strength back up.”

“Oh, I will,” Rick assured.

As soon as Dr. S left the cell, Rick turned back and looked down at Jo. He grabbed an extra blanket from the top bunk and covered her chest to protect her dignity from anyone who might walk by and peer in to check on her. He then leaned over her, brushed his right hand lovingly against her face and placed a kiss to her forehead again before deciding to take a seat on the floor; leaning against the wall and just watching her sleep.

 

* * *

 

Rick didn’t even realize he had fallen asleep until he heard someone calling his name.

Lifting his chin up from his chest, he turned to his right and looked up to see Shane standing there, covered in sweat and a decent amount of blood splatter.

“I heard about Jo,” Shane commented, gesturing to the still sleeping blonde.

Rick blinked a few times and rubbed his eyes before following his friend’s gaze to the woman he loved. “Dr. S took good care of her,” he replied. “She lost a lot of blood.”

Shane’s gaze traveled to Rick’s hands and shirt, which were covered in blood, the same as his. “Sounds like we both had a trying day.” Then, “She’ll be okay, though, right?”

Rick nodded. “Yeah. She just needs to keep hydrated, eat and rest for a couple days.” Bringing his thumb and index finger to the bridge of his nose, he pinched it momentarily before looking back at Shane and accessing his friend’s appearance a little better. “Who’s blood are _you_ wearing?” he asked, growing concerned.

“Mostly walker,” Shane answered. He pointed at the splatter at the base of his pants. “That’s from Bob.”

“Is Bob alright?”

Shane shook his head. “Shelving fell down and trapped him and a walker bit him right in the neck. Sasha and I went to help him but there wasn’t anything we could do.” Shane rubbed his head and then scratched at his own growing stubble. “Sasha just pointed her gun right at him and pulled that trigger, after putting down that walker. It was crazy. Fuckin’ bodies were dropping through the ceiling and falling to the floor like rotten tomatoes. Fuckin’ disgusting ass shit. Roof must’ve been water-logged. And then we could tell it was about to completely give. It was groaning and bowing downward, and then a goddamned helicopter crashed through. The rest of us got out of there in time, but we didn’t walk away empty-handed. We still got some supplies.”

Rick leaned his head back against the concrete wall and stared up toward the top bunk. “Shit.” After letting out a sigh, he asked, “But everyone else is okay? No one else got bit or killed or badly injured?”

Shrugging, but then shaking his head, Shane replied, “Nah, well, Zach might’ve twisted his ankle a bit, but we’re otherwise in one piece.” Then, he smirked. “Maggie kicked me in the shin after Glenn told her what happened; took it out on me for her boy toy nearly getting turned into a pancake by a helicopter, as if I was directly responsible.”

Rick nodded. “She’s lost all her immediate family and her left arm. Glenn’s all she really has left,” he commented. “Can’t blame her for getting upset.”

Shane chuckled. “Heaven help us if she outlives him.”

Frowning, Rick tilted his head to one side as he brought his knees up. “That’s not something to joke about.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Imagine losing Lori.” Rick pointed at Jo. “I could’ve lost Jo today and I don’t know how I would’ve handled that. I think I would’ve gone a bit crazy and lashed out on people who had nothing to do with her death, if she’d died, and I don’t think I would be very consolable.”

Shane pursed his lips and looked down at the floor; the image of Lori obviously present in his mind, causing him to tense up and visibly sour. “Yeah,” was all he could manage.

Rick nodded and rubbed his chin. “How’s Sasha…after having to…”

“She seems fine. It’s kinda poetic in a way, though.”

“How do you mean?”

“Apparently Bob had a thing for Sasha. That was his reasoning for going today, I guess. Some big romantic gesture in showing he was tough enough to go on a run or some shit and maybe get close with her. I dunno.”

“I doubt there’s anything closer than the person you love putting a bullet in your brain so you don’t turn.”

“Well, it’d probably pack more of a punch if he knew she liked him the same way.” Shane crouched down and whispered, in case anyone was listening, “Daryl thinks Sasha has eyes for Morgan.”

Rick smirked and shook his head. “Did this prison suddenly turn into ‘The Love Boat’, and I’m just not aware of it?”

Shane shrugged. “Hey, these are crazy times and people will find love wherever they can.”

“I suppose so.”

Both men simultaneously looked over at Jo, while Shane’s eyes wandered away to stare at the ground.

“I wish it weren’t so hard sometimes.”

“That _what_ was hard?”

“Love,” Shane replied with a limp hand gesture, still keeping his eyes on the ground. “I wish it was easier.”

Rick snickered. “It’s never easy.” He seemed to know what Shane was getting at; referring to him and Lori, and their issues that had them temporarily separated from each other. “The two of you have something together that I never did with Lori,” Rick said, not bothering to beat around the bush. “You have an open line of communication and you’re not afraid to speak your minds to one another. I think that’s why the two of you work better than Lori and I ever did or could. I kept shit in and Lori wanted to talk things out all the time, but I didn’t want to, or when I finally did, she was too mad at me to talk. But you know all about that.”

Shane nodded, and then chuckled a little as he lifted his gaze up to Rick. “Yeah, you never had a problem talking about everything with me while we were working.”

“I’d told you everything since we were kids. It was easier to do.”

“I hope we can work through this shit soon,” Shane commented, steering the topic back to him and Lori. “I just want to be a dad someday and I can’t picture anyone other than Lori being the mother of my children. I mean, shit…she almost was, back at Hershel’s farm. Or, well, it was most likely mine. No offense or anything.”

Rick shook his head. “None taken. I’m past that now.”

“She’s scared of having a baby,” came mumbled Jo.

Both men snapped their attentions to the waking blonde, who was rubbing her eyes with her right hand.

“Why is she scared?” Shane asked.

“She had a C-section with Carl, and with or without an actual doctor, she’s scared of attempting a natural birth; of having to have another C-section in this world should she have another baby. She’s scared to die while trying to bring a baby into the world, and she’s scared of the kind of life any child she would have now would have.”

“Yeah, but you’re doing it.”

“I didn’t have a choice. I contemplated ending my pregnancy, but then the pregnancy was the only thing that kept me alive when the Governor locked me away. It was my only bargaining chip, but by that time I had fallen in love with the prospect of actually becoming a mother. I worried about the life Hope would have and I still do, every day, but I choose to just focus on the now, and not so much on the later. None of us might have a later, anyway.” She gestured to her left shoulder. “Case in point.”

“How you feeling?” Rick asked.

“Tired, sore, but still alive.”

As Rick got up and crouched down beside her, Shane pulled himself up to his feet.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Shane remarked.

“She’s not adverse to loving and raising one of the orphaned children here as her own,” Jo added quietly. “I think she’s taken a special liking to Luke.”

With an appreciative nod for her being so candid with him, Shane exited the cell and walked away.

Rick focused his attention fully on Jo, moving to sit down on the mattress next to her as he ran both hands through her hair and leaned down to kiss her. “Bob died today,” he said as he pulled back.

Jo frowned. “Did he?”

“Yeah,” he nodded. “Shane was just telling me. Some shelf fell on him and a walker got him right in the neck, so Sasha shot him to put him out of his misery and keep him from coming back.”

“Didn’t he really like her?”

Rick chuckled a bit ruefully. “If you knew that, too, I wonder now if Sasha did.”

“I doubt it,” Jo said, trying to sit up and wincing as she went. “She only has eyes for Morgan. Even though he wasn’t the most together when we brought him back here, he has that air of togetherness that women find attractive. He’s more like a gentle Great Dane, and Bob was this wide-eyed puppy dog around her and I think, personality-wise, Morgan is more to her liking.”

Rick helped her sit up and then just shook his head. “This prison really _is_ turning into ‘The Love Boat’, isn’t it?”

“Hey, that was a good show,” Jo replied with a grin, followed by another wince.

Rick grabbed two pill bottles and a water bottle off the small table protruding from the wall. He handed the water bottle over to Jo while uncapping the pill bottle. “Dr. S left this for when you woke up.” Dumping one pill out into his palm from the first pill bottle, he handed it over as well, watching as she twisted the cap off the water bottle. “This one’s for the pain, I think.”

As Jo took the pill, she placed it on her tongue and swallowed it back with a swig of water. “What’s the other bottle for?”

Rick lifted it up and looked at it. “Oh, wait, no. That was for the infection. This pill is for the pain,” he corrected, twisting the cap off the second pill bottle and removing a small capsule.

Jo took it from him and swallowed it back just the same as the other one. “I’m hungry.”

“I haven’t eaten since this morning, either,” Rick commented. “Stay right here and I’ll bring something back for both of us.”

Jo nodded and watched him get up and leave the cell. Once he was completely out of sight, she swiveled her hip and tossed her legs over the edge of her bed. People were walking in and out of the cell block, but none poked their head into her cell to see how she was doing. Possibly, they had been asked to keep their distance so she could rest. That seemed like the likeliest of situations.

Jo, however, didn’t want to sit still and be kept away. She was injured but it was only a shoulder wound. It wasn’t like she lost a leg. She was up and active shortly after giving birth. This really was just a flesh wound in comparison to her.

Standing up, she wavered slightly, nearly falling back down onto the mattress, but then she managed to keep her balance as she slowly stepped out of her cell and then down a few cells to look for Sophia and Hope, but neither girl was in their cell. Instead, Jo turned around and made her way out to the Common Room, where she found Merle, literally scratching his balls, while Carol obliviously went about sorting through the supply of rice and dry pasta they had stored on a shelving unit against the wall.

“Look who’s up an’ at ‘em, again,” Merle commented with a smile, quickly withdrawing his hand away from his crotch.

Jo merely smiled back in response.

“How ya feeling?” he asked, garnering the attention of Carol, who stood up from her crouched position and turned around.

“I’ll live to see another day,” Jo replied.

“That’s the spirit.”

Carol walked over to Jo and gave her a hug. “I was so worried for you,” Carol remarked. “I’m glad you’re doing better.”

“Thanks.”

“Sophia took Hope outside for some fresh air. We all just decided dinner tonight would be a sort of memorial dinner for Bob,” Carol informed. “He’s been our first loss in almost three months, plus, considering the position he had here as a medic, the loss is hitting a lot of us hard.”

“You, too?” Jo questioned.

Carol shrugged. She didn’t seem too sad. “Everybody dies eventually. Some just sooner than others. All we can do is carry on with our own lives and continue to protect our loved ones as best as we can.”

Jo nodded and then parted ways from the pair in the Common Room to head outside to the courtyard. When she was out the door and making her way to the outdoor kitchen, she found Rick approaching her with a plate stacked with some smoked venison from the deer Daryl had hunted and killed the day before.

“I was just bringing this to you,” he commented. “You should be resting.”

“But this dinner is for Bob, and everyone is out here.”

“No one expects you to join. They know what happened to you today,” Rick insisted. “You need to rest. You lost a lot of blood.”

“I felt worse after giving birth to Hope and I was more active then,” she retorted. “I’ll be fine.” When he didn’t seem convinced, she placed her hands to his arms and leaned up on tiptoe to kiss him; a gesture he quickly and easily reciprocated. “I’ll go to bed early tonight and sleep in tomorrow, how’s that?”

“I can live with that.”

The pair smiled at each other and he led her over to one of the tables. Tyreese and Karen got up and offered their seats to Rick and Jo, who accepted them graciously, and the former found seats a table over with former Woodbury resident Ryan Samuels and his two daughters Lizzie and Mika. At the table Rick and Jo sat at, Glenn and Maggie were already eating. Both couples greeted each other with smiles and the younger pair offered up the same comments as everyone else; that they were over the moon that Jo was okay and would heal from her injury just fine.

Glenn and Maggie were doing just fine, as well, in the grander scheme of things. The engagement ring on Maggie’s finger served as her wedding ring as well. The couple had considered agreeing to marry each other to have also been their wedding as well. They didn’t need to go through some convoluted ceremony with the rest of the prison group present. All that mattered as that they had decided they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together. The ring was the symbol of their bond and that’s all that was needed to them in this world. Also, Maggie was no sporting a bayonet-esque prosthetic over her left arm that Merle had been able to complete with the help of Ryan Samuels, who had been a mechanic by trade in the world before, and had remained a bit of a tinkerer even after the collapse of civilization.

Maggie seemed happy enough now, having been able to finally get past the brutal loss of her father. Feeling more useful with her prosthetic helped as well. She was able to go on runs every once in a while or could use her prosthetic to help remove walkers from the fences when they began to build up. It brought that _joie de vivre_ back into her life.

As more and more people seemed to gather around the outdoor kitchen for dinner, the chatter increased as well.

“Has anyone seen Patrick?” Zach asked.

Patrick was a boy in his late teens with glasses, but he was also the closest to Zach in age, and the two tended to chum around as friends.

“He wasn’t feeling well earlier,” Carol answered. “I think he went to go lay down.”

Zach nodded, accepting the response and returning to his own meal.

“Listen, I know everyone’s already started eating or is already done eating, but maybe we can still say grace, or a prayer of some sort for Bob?” Morgan suggested, setting down his fork.

Everyone seemed to look around at each other, but no one said anything.

Rick looked at Glenn and both seemed to silently agree that if Hershel was still with them, the older man would definitely have some comforting words to say.

What transpired next was a bit of a surprise, but offered the comfort many seemed to need.

“Just a closer walk with Thee. Grant it, Jesus, is my plea,” Maggie began to sing. All eyes were either on her or down at their plates as they listened in silence. “Daily walking close to Thee. Let it be, dear Lord, let it be.”

As she continued, Karen joined in from the other table. “I am weak, but Thou art strong. Jesus, keep me from all wrong. I’ll be satisfied as long…as I walk, let me walk close to Thee.”

Suddenly more people began to sing along, as Rick and Jo looked at each other and shrugged, choosing to join in as well. After all, they’d been raised in southern, Christian homes. They obviously knew the song well enough, same as everyone else.

“Through this world of toil and snares, if I falter, Lord, who cares? Who with me my burden shares? None but Thee, dear Lord…none but Thee.”

Rick reached his hand across the table and gave Jo’s a squeeze. Glenn wasn’t singing but he just watched his wife with love in his eyes for her. Meanwhile, Shane and Lori exchanged awkward glances from across the outdoor kitchen before looking away from each other altogether as Andrea looked on from where she sat, while singing along with everyone else.

“When my feeble life is o’er, time for me will be no more. Guide me gently, safely o’er…to Thy kingdom's shore, to Thy shore.”

Maggie stopped singing and everyone else with her. There were no more verses to that hymn and silence returned.

“To Bob,” Daryl announced, raising a water bottle.

Everyone else followed suit, lifting their bottles or cups. “To Bob.”


	22. Infected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter shares a title with the episode it corresponds with, mainly because I couldn't think of a different title. So, yeah. R&R, my pretties. - Holly

“A lost but happy dream may shed its light upon our waking hours, and the whole day may be infected with the gloom of a dreary or sorrowful one; yet of neither may we be able to recover a trace.” — Walter de La Mare

* * *

 

Another morning had broken.

Rick had woken up just before sunrise when he heard the faint babbling of Hope coming from a few cells down. It had immediately brought a smile to his face and caused him to sit upright in bed. He was currently occupying the top bunk once more, but only because he wanted Jo to be able to have enough room to get some proper rest without them both squeezed into the bottom bunk like usual. Quietly as possible he had climbed down and made his way out of his and Jo’s cell without waking her up, before stepping just as quietly past the other two cells before reaching Sophia’s.

Pushing back the bedsheet, Rick poked his head inside and was instantly greeted by the toddler’s smiling face as she was sitting up in her playard while Sophia continued to sleep. Smiling back, Rick had reached in and picked his daughter up into his arms and rested her on his hip as he brought her out to the Common Room where he prepared a bottle for her, along with some canned peaches he poured into a bowl and then mashed up with a slightly bent spoon.

After Hope was fed, he changed her diaper and then just walked around the cell block with her, kissing her forehead and whispering how much he loved her against her ear. In response, Hope laid her head down upon his chest and welcomed his arm around her when he held her close.

There was no doubt, that if Hope could already talk, she would tell her daddy that she loved him, too.

A short while later, Sophia woke up, possibly sensing Hope was no longer in the cell with her. She got up out of her bed and padded out into the cell block, where she found Rick seated in a chair holding his daughter and she approached the pair with her arms extended.

“I’ll take her now, if you want,” Sophia offered.

Rick nodded. “Yeah, thanks.” He placed one more kiss upon his little girl’s head before handing her over to the fourteen-year-old.

As he watched Sophia walk back to her cell with Hope, Rick walked away in the opposite direction and peered briefly into his own cell to check on Jo. Seeing she was still asleep, he decided to make his way outside to the courtyard.

Only Merle was up and outside, that he could see; removing supplies from the bed of Hershel’s old, blue truck to the back of the newer truck.

“You headed back out already?”

“Yeap,” Merle replied, not bothering to turn around and look at Rick.

“How come you ain’t taking the blue truck?”

“Won’t start.”

“Is it out of gas?” Rick wondered.

“Got a half tank in it. Battery’s shot to shit. Tyreese and I had to jump start it yesterday before we got back here and it took forever. I checked the date on the battery and it’s near ten years old.”

“Shit,” Rick muttered, placing a hand upon the tailgate. “It’s like seeing an old friend die.”

“Like losing Hershel all over,” Merle agreed.

“Technically this was never Hershel’s truck. It belonged to Otis.”

“That the guy that shot your boy?”

Rick nodded. “One in the same.”

Merle nodded as well as he finally looked over at Rick. There was no point continuing with that subject; it was better to leave the past in the past.

“What about Tyreese?” Rick inquired. “I thought you and him were going back out together?”

“Meh,” Merle shrugged. “I stopped by his cell and he weren’t alone, if ya know what I mean. Didn’t want to wake him and his little caramel chew.”

Rick chuckled. “I suppose he’ll be thankful, but you shouldn’t head out alone.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Well, just be safe.”

Merle smirked as he climbed into the newer truck. “Yes, daddy.”

In response, Rick smirked as well and just shook his head. He watched as the older Dixon started the newer truck up and began to drive off through the main gate into the yard at a slow pace; clearly not in much of a rush. Rick casually began to trail after the vehicle, closing the gate, which Merle must’ve opened, behind him as he veered off into the grass to make his way over to the pigs to feed them. That was when Rick noticed Zach, waiting at the outer gate so he could open it for Merle. Rick wondered if the younger man had been on watch.

Rick wasn’t really sure anymore with who was on watch duty and when. Considering there were now upwards of fifty people living at the prison, there were plenty enough people to take on the task, while also too many to constantly keep tabs on. As long as someone was up in one of the guard towers that was all that really mattered.

As Rick began feeding the pigs a mix of vegetables that were no longer ideal for human consumption and worms that had been cleared from the soil, he noticed “Ol’ Bessie” the pig was where he’d last seen her the day before; only she was no longer breathing and a few flies were flying around her or crawling in and out of her mouth, signifying she was clearly dead. As he frowned and moved to inspect a little more closely, and just as Zach had closed the outer gate following Merle’s exit, several gunshots coming from the prison rang out into the air, echoing off the buildings surrounding the courtyard.

Whipping his head around and standing upright, Rick turned his body completely and tensed up. His heart rate immediately quickened and he could practically feel all the blood leaving his face as he dropped everything he was doing and began to run up toward the main gate. Zach began to run up the gravel road, following behind the prison leader with the same sense of concern written all over his face.

“Help! Help!” came the cries of twelve-year-old Lizzie Samuels, as her younger sister Mika followed behind; both girls fleeing from the direction of the inner courtyard.

“Cell block?!” Maggie shouted, appearing out from the guard tower closest to the outer gate.

“I don’t know!” Rick shouted back as he pulled the main gate open. As he ran into the courtyard, he was met by Glenn running from the direction of C Block alongside Carol and the Samuels sisters.

“Walkers in D!” Glenn informed, clearly panicked.

Rick nearly froze. Jo and Hope were the first images in his mind and his worry for them skyrocketed. “What about C?”

“Clear,” Sasha announced, coming out from C Block with Daryl and Tyreese in time to hear Rick’s question. “We locked the gates to the Tombs. Morgan’s on guard.”

“It ain’t a breach,” Daryl insisted as he ran past Rick. He followed Sasha and Tyreese, with his crossbow in hand; leaving Rick dumbstruck by the chaos beginning to unfold.

Hesitating for only half a second, Rick reached into his holster for his Colt and then ran after the others to head toward D. C Block was where the woman he loved and their child were, but as long as he knew the area was secure, he could focus on the other block without distraction.

As soon as Rick and the others were inside D Block, the screams and snarls condensed in just the one area were almost deafening.

Rick pushed one of the D Blockers out of his way as he aimed his Colt at a walker and pulled the trigger. A couple of other shots were fired, and not by him. One woman was on her knees, screaming bloody murder, as a walker hunched down over her trying to claw at her face. Out the corner of his eye, Rick watched Daryl nail that particular walker through the skull with one of his bolts, while Rick focused his attention on another woman cowering and covered in blood.

“Are you bit?”

The woman nodded her head and removed her hand from her shoulder to reveal a fresh bite wound and the culprit was clearly that first walker Rick had just put down.

Angry at the entire confusing situation, Rick grimaced and told the woman to just stay put.

As people began to flee down the stairs from the upper level, he temporarily holstered his gun and checked each person individually, though not thoroughly, to see if they were bit. There wasn’t time to be thorough. He had to base it on their verbal answers and hope they weren’t hiding any bites from him. When he felt they were okay, he let them pass and had them exit D Block altogether.

Daryl grabbed up Luke, Lori’s favorite, from being bitten by a walker while Carol corralled Molly, one of the other children, into one of the cells with her. Glenn was busy slashing a walker in the head with a Gator pro machete while Tyreese ran over to an old woman and pushed her inside her cell just as a walker was about to descend on her. He took the walker out with a quick bash to the skull with his trusty hammer and then turned to make sure the old woman was okay and unbitten. Once she nodded she was fine, she reached out her hands to Carol and Molly who were trying to find an empty cell to hide in.

“Carol, in here!” Tyreese called out, as the grey-haired woman and child ran up to her.

Tyreese shut the cell door behind them, closing them in and telling them to stay there and be safe before turning to run off and take care of a female walker chowing down on Ryan Samuels’ arm, but Glenn got there quicker, shoving his Gator pro straight into the back of the female walker’s head. As soon as she dropped to the ground, Sasha ran over and picked Ryan up and got him up to his feet.

“Let’s get you into your cell,” Sasha spoke gently, as she looked at her brother, who offered to do the honors.

Tyreese, the much larger person, would have no problem at all carrying the weight of the bitten man.

While the Williams siblings saw to Ryan, Rick had taken Luke from Daryl and carried the child out of D Block to safety; returning shortly after, just in time to see Zach, who Rick hadn’t even realized was present during the melee, stomp down on the skull of a walker crawling toward him.

“Are we clear in here?” Rick called out to everyone.

“I think so,” Zach replied.

Daryl carefully began to ascend the stairs to the upper level, following after Glenn, while Rick followed after him in order to make sure D Block was indeed secure. Just as Glenn opened one cell door, a walker came stumbling out and a tussle ensued. Daryl raised and aimed his crossbow, calling for Glenn to duck, as he shot a bolt into the walker’s head.

“Thanks,” Glenn muttered, checking himself to be certain he wasn’t bit or hurt anywhere.

Rick walked over, pushing back the sheet covering the door into the same cell and looked to take in the sight of the walker at their feet.

“Oh, it’s Patrick,” Daryl commented. Then, looking around at the carnage, he added, “That’s all of ‘em.”

Inside the cell they were standing in front of, a blonde woman, who had previously been a resident of Woodbury, lay dead from a bite wound to her neck which had clearly been administered by Patrick’s reanimated corpse.

“I got it,” Daryl insisted, stepping inside the cell and firing a bolt at the woman’s head at close range.

Shortly afterward, once the chaos had dissolved, there were nothing but questions racing through everyone’s minds as they walked throughout D Block, putting down any victims that had been bitten and were dead, but hadn’t reanimated yet. Ryan Samuels and the woman Rick had spoken to both had bite wounds they wouldn’t survive. They were bitten in places that couldn’t be amputated to stop the spread of infection. It would just be a waiting game until the infection claimed them, and then someone would put them down before they came back.

The woman was hysterical over her impending doom, whereas Ryan, who had two daughters to think about, was relatively more calm and accepting of his fate; although, that wasn’t to say he wasn’t still in shock over it. All he truly cared about was that his children would be looked after when he was gone. Tyreese and Sasha were sitting with him, both assuring him there were plenty of people who would do him proud by taking his girls under their wing. Tyreese had then gone off to get Lizzie and Mika, bringing them round to say their goodbyes to their father, which was heartbreaking.

Meanwhile, Dr. S was looking after those who were injured, but not bit while Rick and Daryl continued to inspect each cell. In the very last cell on the upper level, a walker inside approached the closed door, staring blankly back at Rick, who grabbed the walker by the shirt. Rick pulled him close and jammed his knife into the walker’s skull and then let him drop. Dr. S was called up to inspect the confusing situation of how someone had turned while locked in their cell.

“No bites. No wounds,” Rick remarked, completely exasperated. “I think he just died.”

“Horribly, too,” Dr. S commentated. “Pleurisy aspiration. Choked to death on his own blood. Caused those trails down his face.”

Rick looked at the doctor. “I’ve seen them before on a walker outside the fences.”

“I saw them on Patrick, too,” Daryl added.

Dr. S gestured to the dead man’s face. “They’re from the internal lung pressure building up — like if you shake a soda can and pop the top. Only imagine your eyes, ears, nose, and throat are the top.”

“It’s a sickness from the walkers?” Zach questioned.

Rick turned around; again, not realizing the younger man was still there.

“No, these things happened before they were around,” Dr. S asserted. “Could be pneumococcal. Most likely an aggressive flu strain.”

“Someone locked him in just in time,” Zach quipped.

Daryl shook his head. “No, man. Charlie used to sleepwalk. Locked himself in. Hell, he was just eating barbecue yesterday. How could somebody die in a day just from a cold?”

Rick frowned. “I had a sick pig. It died quick,” he informed, referring to Ol’ Bessie. “Jo and I saw a boar in the woods yesterday. I think it was sick, too.”

“Aren’t pigs and birds how things like this spread in the past?” Glenn asked.

“Maybe we got lucky,” Dr. S spoke, with a hint of hope in his voice. “Maybe these two cases are it.”

Zach scoffed, his tone the exact opposite of the doctor’s. “When was the last time you’ve seen anyone get lucky? Bugs like to run through close quarters and it doesn’t get any closer than a bunch of people living in a prison together in a world already filled with the undead.”

Glenn sank back against one of the walls, dipping his head down to his chest. “That means all of us in here,” he said, as Rick got up to his feet, “we’ve all been exposed…to whatever this is.”

 

* * *

 

Out in the courtyard, a short while later, Rick came sauntering through from the inner courtyard as Jo wandered out from the entrance to C Block. She squinted from the sun; raising her hand over her eyes as she noticed him walking unknowingly toward her with his shoulders slouched.

“Rick,” she called out, hurrying over to him.

He looked up at the sound of her voice and quickly held a hand up to her. “No, hey, you might wanna stay back,” he attempted to warn as she ran unabashedly into his arms, and he didn’t have the willpower to rebuke the gesture. Truth was, he was more than happy to have her there and revel in the fact that she hadn’t been one of the unlucky ones like those in D Block. “Jo,” he uttered, whispering her name into her ear like it could cure anything.

“All those gunshots and screams, and you never came back to our cell,” she mumbled against his chest. “I got scared that something might’ve happened to you.”

Rick sighed but he had to force her out of her arms and to stand at a further distance from him, which he could tell confused her. “It’s okay,” he assured. “I’m here, I’m fine, but you gotta back away.”

Jo knitted her brow together. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked, just as Shane came out of C Block.

“What happened in there?” the other man inquired, nodding in the direction of D Block, just as Owen’s mother was carrying his body, covered in a sheet, out toward the yard to possibly attempt to bury him.

All three looked briefly after the woman before Rick tore his gaze away and looked over to his oldest friend. “Patrick got sick last night. It’s some kind of flu. It moves fast,” he explained. “We think he died and attacked the cell block.”

“Oh my god,” Jo remarked.

“Fuck,” came Shane’s more blunt reaction, while running a hand through his hair. “That’s a shame. He was a good kid.”

“He was,” Rick agreed. “We lost a lot of good people.”

“What about the others, like Glenn and Carol?”

“They’re okay, but they were in there. You shouldn’t get too close to anyone that might have been exposed, at least for a little while.”

Shane nodded and backed away without hesitation, unlike Jo, who did hesitate. “Jo, c’mon,” he urged, looking back and forth between the couple. He could tell the two wanted nothing but to comfort each other; to embrace and just be close during a time like this. However, if Rick was infected with whatever flu claimed Patrick, there was no way they could let Jo get infected as well. Not when she had a daughter who needed her. “C’mon,” he repeated.

With a nod of his head, Rick silently told Jo it was okay; to just go with Shane.

Pulling her eyes away, Jo turned to the best friend of the man she loved and allowed him to lead her back into C Block; leaving Rick to walk off solemnly toward the yard.

 

* * *

 

While Jo had obediently returned with Shane to their cell block, she couldn’t bring herself to get near her daughter. She may not have been in D Block with the others and been directly infected, but she _had_ embraced Rick, who _had_ been infected, even after he tried warning her away, thus raising the possibility that she might’ve just brought the infection with her.

Before she could even get close to Sophia’s cell, Jo turned away and wouldn’t even allow Shane to touch her when he asked what was wrong.

“I hugged Rick,” she explained. “If he’s been infected, then I could be, too.” Jo gestured toward Sophia who was standing in the doorway of the teen’s cell with Hope in her arms. “Keep an eye on them for Carol and me.”

Shane readily accepted the task and nodded. “You got it,” he said, understanding that she was taking her leave from C Block.

Jo didn’t even bother to gather any belongings from her and Rick’s cell. She simply turned around, wrapping her arms around her chest as she wander into the Common Room and avoided the likes of Lori, Andrea and Morgan who were watching after her with confused gazes and trying to call out to her to know what was wrong and what had happened.

As Jo exited C Block, she could hear Shane approaching them to explain.

Back out into the courtyard, Jo sauntered over to the main gate and grabbed a shovel hooked onto the fence. Once she had it in hand, she continued out into the yard where she spotted Rick looking in on the pigs while Owen’s mother, a woman Jo had never remembered the name of, knelt over the body of her son, crying.

“Rick,” Jo called out, causing him to turn abruptly to look back at her.

“I thought I said not to get too close?” He held a hand up to her as if he could will her back.

“That ship sailed when we hugged, didn’t it?” she questioned with a shrug and a rueful smirk. “If you’re infected, you already passed it to me and I’m not going to stay in C Block and give it to anyone else, most of all not to Hope and Sophia.”

Frowning, Rick looked down at his feet, but nodded while silently cursing himself for condemning her to whatever fate might possibly befall them if they were, indeed, both infected. “I’m sorry,” he murmured.

“This is none of your fault, so don’t start with any of that nonsense,” Jo remarked, setting the spade of the shovel down upon the ground. “You said a lot of people died. That means a lot of graves are gonna need to be dug.”

“They are.”

“We should get a jump start on that,” she added. Then, nodding over toward Owen’s mother, “And we should start with Owen.”

“You’re still recovering from a serious wound and some blood loss, if I recall.”

“And I survived it.”

“You shouldn’t be overexerting yourself right now,” he insisted. “You could make yourself more susceptible to getting sick.”

“Well, I can’t very well just stand around and wait to get sick or not.”

“And _I_ can’t very well stand around and let you _make_ yourself sick.”

Jo narrowed her eyes at Rick as the corners of her mouths raised slightly in a ghost of a smile. “You gonna tie me up and stop me from trying to help?”

Looking over her head and tilting his own a bit to the left, a smile appeared briefly upon his lips. “If I was gonna tie you up for anything, you can be sure as hell it wouldn't be from helping to dig graves.”

“Sex jokes at a time like this? _Really_ , Officer Grimes?” Despite herself and the situation at hand, Jo found the ability to let her smile become bigger. Maintaining her hold on the shovel in her right hand, she walked up Rick and he seemed to catch on.

He met her halfway; throwing his arms around her as she rested her head against his chest once more, and he, in turn, rested his head upon hers.

“You’re gonna be the death of me, woman,” he remarked, pressing his lips into her hair.

“I hope not.”

Rick snickered. “Dying in your arms; I can’t think of a better way to go.”

 

* * *

 

Barely two hours later, after a meeting had been called in the library among the prison’s Council, which included Rick and Jo who weren’t present for the meeting, Daryl came out to join the couple to help dig graves, while informing them that a decision had been made to move anyone showing signs of the new infection to A Block. It would be a place for them to go, so they wouldn’t pose a threat to anyone else and where Dr. S could take care of them.

Rick nodded at this development; agreeing that was the best course of action before the three of them returned to grave digging.

“Should you be doing this?” Daryl asked of Jo. “You were just hurt yesterday.”

Jo smirked. “We already had this conversation,” she said, gesturing between herself and Rick. “I’m fine.”

“Yeah, but what about being near us? We were in D Block…”

“And she hugged me before I could warn her away,” Rick added. “She might very well be infected, too, now, so she’s staying away from C Block until this all hopefully blows over.”

“And if it don’t?” Daryl looked between the pair.

“Then we should probably dig extra graves ahead of time, shouldn’t we?”

Both Rick and Daryl looked at Jo. It was a pessimistic comment, but it wasn’t completely illogical. None of them were sure how many more might die because of this infection, so it would possibly be beneficial for them to get a head start on more graves, to save time later.

While Daryl dug a grave by himself, and while Rick helped Jo dig another, Maggie suddenly shouted from over at the guard tower she had exited. She had been informed, earlier, of what happened in D Block and that Glenn had been exposed and also that she would need to maintain her distance from her husband, so the only thing she could do to keep herself busy was to maintain watch.

Now, however, something else seemed to be wrong.

“Rick! Daryl!” Maggie called their names in a panic.

When the three of them looked to where Maggie was gesturing, they each dropped or toss their shovels aside.

“Oh, shit,” Rick muttered as he tore off toward the space in-between the inner and outer fences; the latter of which was beginning to buckle under the weight of a new herd of walkers.

“The noise drew ‘em out and now this part’s starting to give,” Maggie explained after she led the trio to the outer fence.

The sound of her frantic shouts had drawn a few others out of the courtyard and down the “in-between” to assist as well; namely Glenn, Tyreese and Sasha. Each person grabbed a sharpened pole, their own crowbars or blades before they followed the young brunette to take out the buildup of walkers.

Side by side Jo stood with Rick as they looked briefly at each other before ramming their melee weapons through the chain-link and into the skulls of the snarling undead. It was crazy, and the day was becoming gradually more and more stressful, but being together like that was oddly comforting. Taking care of this particular threat together seemed perfectly natural and in the craziness of it all, they were able to share a loving smile with each other.

Then there was Maggie who fell back onto the ground after yanking her bladed prosthetic out of a walker’s skull. She practically skidded further away when she realized Glenn was reaching out to help her up.

“Don't,” she warned. “We're supposed to stay away from each other.”

“Are you seeing this?” Sasha called out to the others from down the fence. Rick and Daryl peered over to what had grabbed her attention, and what it was were rats; dead and decapitated at the base of the section of fence. “Is someone feeding these things?”

“Heads up!” Daryl warned as the weakest part of the fence began to buckle under the weight of the cumulative walkers.

“This part of the fence, now!” Jo shouted, jamming a sharpened, wooden pole through a walker’s eye socket.

“Hold on, hold on. Hey, hey, hey,” Rick muttered, panic rising in his voice as the fence bowed even more. “It's gonna give! It's gonna give!” One walker nearest him on the other side of the fence was so decayed and getting pushed so badly against the chain-link by the other walkers, that its face was actually being pushed through the chain-link like dough through a cookie cutter.

“Everybody back!” Jo declared.

The fence looked like it was about to fall down on top of them and that it would be a complete loss.

The first thing that came to Rick’s mind when he looked at Jo was to get her free and clear from the fence. Grabbing her arm, he pulled her back from the fence with him, as the others followed suit while Maggie and Glenn still tried to hold out for a little while longer in pushing back to keep the fence up longer.

“Come on, back, now,” Daryl barked.

As everyone took a step or two back up against the inner fence, which was the last line of defense against the outside and the yard where all their crops and animals were, Rick looked over his shoulder and then seemed to appear somewhat defeated.

“The fence keeps bending in like that those walkers are coming over it,” Sasha worried.

With a sigh, Rick caught Jo’s eye briefly before turning his gaze over to the archer.

“Daryl, get the truck,” he spoke. “I know what to do.”

Daryl didn’t even have to be told exactly what Rick’s plan was; he just nodded obediently and took off back toward the yard and then up through to the courtyard while the others walked away as well. There was nothing they could really do other than whatever Rick had up his sleeve.

As they walked in terse silence, Jo pulled at the side of Rick’s shirt. “What are you gonna do?”

“Something I wish I didn’t have to,” he replied vaguely. Once they were all at least back inside the yard and not in the space in-between the two fences, Rick threw an arm around Jo’s waist and pressed his lips to her temple. “Take the others and secure yourselves into the courtyard for now, in case this doesn’t work out as I plan.”

“Rick,” she muttered his name as concern dripped from her voice.

“It’s okay. Just go.” Before Jo could take more than five steps away from him, he reached out his hand and grabbed her wrist. “Actually, sorry…I’m gonna need someone the open and close the gates.”

“Alright.” Jo turned her head toward the others. “Ty—”

“No,” Rick cut her off. “You can manage it, I think.”

With a faint smile and a nod, Jo corralled Glenn, Maggie and the Williams siblings back up the gravel road to the courtyard as Daryl came driving down past them in the a jeep with the trailer hitch, but veered off the gravel road and into the grass where Rick was beckoning him. Once Jo closed the main gate behind the other four, she turned around to see Rick loading all the pigs up into a box they had on the trailer hitch, with Daryl’s help, before Daryl climbed back into the driver’s seat. As she approached to two men, Rick gave her a nod and she ran off toward to open the outer gate using the pulley system they’d rigged up. It wasn’t exactly an easy task, and she hoped she didn’t pop a stitch in her shoulder, but she managed.

Taking a step back, she watched as Daryl backed onto the gravel road and led him and Rick, who had climbed up into the trailer with the pigs, outside the fences. Once they cleared the metal doors to the outer gate, Jo hurried back into the yard and yanked the chain-link gate closed.

Jo stood there, watching, as Daryl circled the jeep around so that the trailer hitch faced the herd on the fence.

“Ready?” Daryl asked Rick, who was gripping onto the side of the trailer hitch with one hand and holding the box in place with the other. As the walkers sensed their presence there, they began to step away from the fence and stumble over in their direction while Rick watched and hesitated to move. “Let's go.”

Standing up, Rick leaned down and grabbed a piglet out of the box. As the young animal squealed and squirmed in his arms, Rick pulled out his knife and cut deep into the animal’s side, by its leg. Warm blood squirted out, spraying slightly onto Rick’s arm before he dropped the piglet onto the ground. He then turned around and beckoned at Daryl. “Go!”

Daryl drove a few feet away from the walkers now descending down upon the helpless piglet; both men watching, as well as Jo from the chain-link gate and the others from up at the main gate in the courtyard. The coast seemed clear on the outer fence and Jo slid the gate open after beckoning the others back down from the courtyard.

“Alright!” Rick called out to Daryl, holding a hand up to signal for the other man to stop the jeep. “Hold up!” More walkers were approaching them again as Rick grabbed the second piglet from the box and cut into its flesh and releasing it onto the ground, the same as the first. “All right, go. Go!”

As Daryl pulled the jeep further away, Sasha and Glenn came running down first from the courtyard to join Jo and the trio slipped through into the in-between, grabbing large but narrow trunks from young trees they had been using as braces for the outer fence. They began propping them back up in place while the walkers tore into the second piglet and while Rick reached for the third piglet.

When the jeep slowed down, Rick cradled the young animal in his arms as he sliced into it. This time the blood sprayed up at him, covering his face and his shirt, causing him to wince, before dropping the piglet down into the tall grass.

Rick then sat back, feeling defeated, as Daryl pulled the jeep away and they both watched as the piglets were devoured by the distracted walkers.

It was the point; to lure the walkers away from the fence with live bait so they could secure the fence without the weight of walkers on it. But now there was a different weight, and it was weighing on Rick’s shoulders.

 

* * *

 

Once the fence had been secured again, Rick and Daryl had taken out a few more walkers that had followed after them, while the others had returned to taking out those that still remained at the fence, though not all of them. They had moved onto to different sections of fence and were no longer weighing down on just one spot in particular. They were much more spread out that the concern for the fence had dissipated. Thanks to Rick’s quick thinking, albeit at the loss of the piglets, their defenses would continue for the time being.

As soon as Daryl drove the jeep and trailer hitch back into the yard, Rick had hopped off and stalked over to the pig pen without missing a beat. Daryl hesitated, preparing to park the vehicle right there on the gravel road leading up to the courtyard, but off a knowing look from Jo, he continued onward with a nod to her.

Maggie walked off alone back up the gravel road, leaving Glenn behind with Sasha and Tyreese so she could maintain the distance she needed to keep so she could avoid the possibility of getting infected. So far, only two people were showing signs of the infection that anyone was aware of; the old woman Tyreese had saved earlier in D Block, and David, a generally new recruit into the prison group from Jo’s hometown of Decatur. Everyone hoped the numbers didn’t grow and this was just a fluke of an illness, and that it would pass quickly with no more causalities.

Jo turned her attention to Glenn, Sasha and Tyreese as the trio headed back toward the courtyard as well. Because they had possibly been infected, they would be staying away from C Block and find somewhere else to sleep; possibly in D Block once it was all cleaned up. There was also Dale’s RV which was still an option, although it was no longer parked down at the outer gates and was instead back up in the courtyard, behind the school bus that had been used to bring the Woodbury residents to the prison. Also, there were the offices in the administration part of the building, and a few of them had sofas in them. The point was that there were options.

Jo had gone up to the courtyard as well, letting Rick have a moment alone at the pigpen. She could tell by how the muscles in his shoulders tensed up and the way he gripped the wooden fence of the pigpen, that he needed to sort through some things in his head. Plus, her stomach was growling since she hadn’t eaten yet that day. There was some deer jerky that was stored in containers at the outdoor kitchen that she decided to help herself to, and found an unopened bottle of water as well. Taking a seat at one of the tables, she ate in silence for a little bit as she watched Zach helping Daryl carry bodies wrapped in sheets and load them up into the trailer hitch behind the jeep.

The fence might be secure, but they weren’t done with burying those who died in D Block earlier. Both men were wearing scarves around their faces and gloves on their hands. Jo wanted to cry for the losses, but no tears would come. She just continued to sit there, stone-faced.

Shortly thereafter, Lizzie and Mika came walking through the courtyard. While Lizzie continued on through to the yard, Mika spotted Jo and just stood there looking at her. When Jo felt a pair of eyes on her, she turned and smiled at the girl.

“Hey, honey,” she greeted. “I’m sorry about your dad.”

Mika nodded. “Thank you.”

“Do you want to come join me and have some jerky?”

The girl hesitated. “I don’t want to get too close. I might be infected.”

Jo smirked. “Well, you’re in luck. I might be, too.” She waved the young blonde child over. “C’mon.”

With an appreciative smile, Mika walked up to the table Jo was at and sat down perpendicular to her. As Jo pushed the container with deer jerky over, Mika smiled even more and took the biggest piece inside she could grab and then let out a brief giggle when Jo teasingly made an exaggerated surprised face.

“Thank you,” Mika said again, placing the jerky to her lips.

“You’re welcome.” Casting her eyes toward the yard, she saw that Lizzie had gone toward the inner fence and was staring directly at the walkers on the outer fence while Rick had begun to pull pieces of wood off the pigpen. Jo frowned. “How is your sister handling things?”

“She’s okay, but she’s not okay.”

Jo smiled sadly. “I can understand that. You girls loved your father and now he’s gone, and it’s not going to be easy, but you girls will be okay in time,” she said. “You’re lucky to have each other.”

“I know,” Mika replied. “I’m scared though. What if I can’t always protect Lizzie?”

“Protect her?” Jo was confused. “There are plenty of people in here that can protect you both. You can count me as one of them.”

“But Lizzie is different. She doesn’t always understand certain things.”

Before Jo could ask what Mika meant, Carol wandered through the courtyard and greeted both Jo and Mika.

“Where’s Lizzie, sweetie?”

“At the fence with the walkers,” Mika answered.

Carol sighed and parted ways from the pair at the outdoor kitchen. Again, Jo was going to say something to Mika, but the girl jumped up quickly and took an extra piece of jerky.

“Can I give this to Lizzie?”

Jo nodded. “Of course.”

Without saying anything else, the ten-year-old went off, following after Carol to go approach her sister, and once again Jo was alone at the outdoor kitchen. Taking a swig of water from her bottle, she placed the lid back on the jerky container and set it aside as she got up to her feet. She looked back toward C Block and felt an aching pang in her chest; wanting to hold her daughter and just see her in general. She couldn’t take the risk just yet. In a day or two, if she showed no flu signs, then she would go to her daughter again and, when she did, she would kiss and cuddle the hell out of her, as she was sure Rick would do the same if he was given a clean bill of health, too.

Bringing her green eyes over to the yard once more, she saw Carol standing between both of the Samuels sisters at the fence, but what held Jo’s attention the most was Rick really getting into ripping the boards off the pigpen. It looked almost therapeutic.

As Daryl and Zach came back outside with two more bodies wrapped in sheets to place upon the trailer hitch, Jo sauntered through the main gate and down the gravel road until she deviated into the overgrown grass and up to the pigpen with her water bottle in hand.

“You should hydrate,” Jo suggested, holding the bottle out toward him.

He looked up at her with a rather serious gaze before tossing a section of the pigpen on top of a couple wooden pallets that had been used to make up the pigpen. Off the clatter of wood on wood, Rick shook his head and waved her off.

“I’m fine.”

“That’s nice. Now do as I say and hydrate,” Jo pressed.

Rick stopped what he was doing and stared at her. “I said I’m fine.”

“Do I really need to tell you a third time?”

“Do I really need to tell you I’m _fine_ a third time?”

Jo narrowed her gaze at him. He could be upset all he wanted about everything going on. Hell, _she_ was. But she was also still making sure she was taking care of herself and she definitely wasn’t being snippy with him like he suddenly was with her.

As she watched him turn away from her, Jo pursed her lips together in a frown and uncapped the bottle of water and shook the water out at him, splashing him with it.

“What the fuck,” he grunted, swatting at the water as if it was a bug flying around him.

Initially glowering at her, his expression softened when she reached up and dumped the remainder of the bottle’s contents over his head, and he couldn’t deny the coolness felt wonderful streaking through his scalp and running down his face and the back of his neck. Letting out a sigh, he looked down at the ground and grabbed the bottle from her hands before tossing it toward the pile of wood that was building up.

“You’re welcome,” Jo bit out as she turned around and began to walk away from him.

Before she could even take three steps in the opposite direction, Rick’s hand was around her wrist and he was pulling her back toward him. She looked down at how his thumb rubbed gently over her knuckles and then she brought her gaze back up toward his face.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I’m just…frustrated with,” he made a lame hand gesture with his free hand, “things.”

Jo shrugged, looking away. “I figured. However, just because you _have_ a dick, it doesn’t mean you should _act_ like one; at least not to me.”

A sheepish smile toyed at the corners of his mouth. “Sorry,” he repeated, trying to hold her gaze. “On top of frustration, I’m tired, I’m hot and I’m covered in pig blood. Though, I know that’s not an excuse to act like what I got.”

Jo tried to play it off as if she was pissed at him, but the way he tried to get her to look back at him, and the way his grip loosened on her wrist so that he could snake that same hand around her waist and pull her closer, gave way to her own smile.

“Apology accepted.”

As they both smirked briefly at each other, Rick brushed his lips against her cheek before sliding them over to the softness of her own lips.

When they parted, Jo gestured to the pigpen as a whole. “Do you think the pigs are behind the infection?”

Rick shrugged; taking a few steps back to grabbed more boards off and tossed them to the pile. “Either they gave it to us or we gave it to them. Whatever the case may be, we need to stay away from everyone who was in C Block for a little while.”

“I know.” Then, “It’s starting to kill me that I can’t go near Hope.”

Grabbing up a gas can, Rick’s shoulder slouched. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Me, too.”

“As long as she’s safe, though.”

“Exactly. That’s what matters.”

Emptying the gas onto the pile of wood, Rick pulled a matchbook out of his back pocket, striking one of the matches against a wooden post still upright in the ground before tossing it onto the pile. After a brief moment, flames rose up; engulfing the dry boards.

Rick and Jo stood side by side, watching the orange flames grow and flicker. Placing a hand to the small of his back, she curled her fingers around the material as a mix of sweat and water from the bottle dripped from his hairline and rolled down his nose before falling to the ground below.

“Jo.”

“Yeah?”

“Yesterday when I told that woman...Clara…when I said you were my wife…” Rick trailed, looking at the ground, but more in her direction. “It was a Freudian slip. I said it because it’s how I think of you.”

Jo bit her lips together, curling her fingers tighter around the material of the back of his shirt. “Okay,” she didn’t know what to say to that. She hadn’t expected him to broach the subject at all again, to be honest.

“I want you to be my wife for real,” he continued, still not looking at her, but instead the flames. “I want to be your husband, and…I mean…I appreciate the simplicity in how Glenn and Maggie went about it, but I want to do it right. I—I mean, I don’t have a ring to give you, so I can propose properly, and if you were to say yes, I’m not saying we gotta do the white wedding ceremony type of thing, but I would like to do it with our friends, our _family_ , present. I wanna declare that I’m yours and you’re mine in front of everyone in an official sense.” Rick finally lifted his head and turned to look at her. “Oh, wait…”

As he abruptly jerked away from her, Jo was left standing there dumbstruck in regard to everything he had just admitted to her. She brought her gaze over to follow him as he crouched down next to a blue toolbox and opened it. He pushed some tools aside, causing metal to clank against metal before standing back up while fiddling with something in his hands.

When he was done doing whatever the hell it was he was doing, he took her left hand in his and presented her with a black twist tie, twisted into the shape of a circle.

“It’s not gold or silver or even platinum, and there may not be a diamond in it, but, for now, this is the best I can do until I can find you something better that you deserve, because you deserve the best,” he commented, setting the twist tie engagement ring in the palm of her hand. “I’d get down on one knee and do this the old fashioned way, but I want us to be equals in everything, and also my knees are a little sore today.”

Jo chuckled and enclosed her hand around the makeshift ring. “Good line.”

“It’s true, though,” he insisted. He took a half step closer to her, placing his hands on each of her elbows and then pressing his forehead down against hers. “I love you, Joanna Moore, and I want to spend the rest of what time we got left on this world with you, and only you. If we get to grow old together and become grandparents someday, that would be even better. I want to try and make this world a better place for our daughter with you, and I want to spend every hour of every day loving you if you’ll have me.”

Slowly, Jo nodded her head and then proceeded in slipping the black twist tie ring around her left ring finger. “I’ll have you,” she confirmed. “Name the time and place.”

Rick smiled and bent at the knees slightly so that his face was more level with hers before leaning in and kissing her; all the while the flames from the fire were growing higher. “Well, hopefully this sickness will blow over in a few days,” he remarked. “How about one week from today, we gather everyone up in the courtyard, with you holding some wildflowers and we can have Shane do the honors of marrying us.” Rick shrugged. “He was an officer of the law. It seems right that he could do it.”

“And what if we both get sick and are about to die?”

Rick knitted his brow together. “Pessimist,” he teased. Then, “Well, then, I guess we’ll marry ourselves on our deathbeds, won’t we?”

Jo grinned and wrapped her arms around Rick’s waist, leaning her face against his chest. “I look forward to marrying you, Rick Grimes.”

As he responded by wrapping his arms around her waist as well, and then kissing the top of her head, he was a little caught off guard by Jo pulling back and ripping his shirt open and then pulling it down off his arms.

“What—?”

Instead of verbally answering him, Jo simply yanked his shirt completely off and tossed it into the fire.

“It was ruined; covered in pig blood,” she finally responded.

Rick simply nodded and turned to watch his shirt go up in flames with the wooden boards.

“You need a shower, and not just because of the blood,” Jo added. “You’re starting to stink, too.”

“Yeah, well, you don’t exactly smell like roses, either,” he jabbed right back.

They both smiled at each other and turned around at the same time to look over at Daryl and Zach lining the bodies up next to where they were going to be digging more graves, just as Glenn was coming into the yard with Sasha to help continue the digging.

“There’s enough people helping out over there,” Jo remarked. “One of them can keep an eye on this fire so you can clean up.”

“Will you be joining me?”

“I agreed to marry you, didn’t I?”

Rick just looked down at her and clasped his hand around hers. “You did.”

“I am.”


	23. Lazaretto

_"In nature we never see anything isolated, but everything in connection with something else which is before it, beside it, under it and over it."_ — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

* * *

 

Rick stood under the spray of the shower head as the water matted his hair down around his face and rolled all the way down his body. Taking a step forward, he reached for Jo, who stood just as equally naked in front of him with her back against the cool tile of the wall. He placed his hands on her hips and leaned down to placed her mouth upon the patch of skin where her neck and shoulder met and the tiny sigh that came from her lips was such a lovely and comforting sound to him.

With a slight bend of his somewhat achy knees, Rick hoisted Jo up in his arms and pressed her back up against the wall as he lowered her down onto him so that their bodies could connect in the most primal of ways. His back hunched as he buried his face in her neck and while she let him pound his frustrations out into her. All Jo could do was wrap her arms tightly around his neck and her legs just as tightly around his waist to hold on and keep from falling; all the while trying to keep her eyes from completely rolling into the back of her head from how deep he was able to go and how amazing it felt when he rolled his hips that way she liked.

The only issue about having sex in the shower at that particular moment wasn’t that anyone could walk in, because they hadn't locked the door to the Shower Room from the inside, but instead because they didn’t have a condom on them and they weren’t ready for any new “developments.” So, when Rick was close, he had to pull out and finish the old fashioned way by taking care of it himself, and once he finished, he knelt down in front of Jo and orally helped her finish. When she did, Rick felt like she might rip his hair from his scalp just from how tightly she had her fingers gripping the wet curls on his head.

Afterward, Rick stared up at her with a smile and got back up to his feet, encircling his arms around her waist. The two of them just stood there, moving underneath the showerhead to share in the water falling down over them as they reveled in their post-coital embrace.

“I thought you said you weren’t going to get on your knees because you wanted us to be equal,” Jo teased, her lips brushing against his bearded jaw as she placed a few kisses there.

“Some things are worth kneeling for,” he replied, turning his face so that his lips met with hers in a hungry kiss that practically set his skin on fire.

“I couldn’t agree more,” she murmured into his mouth.

A moment later, they finally finished cleaning up, but it almost seemed pointless because they were low on clean clothes and had grabbed what they could on their way to the Shower Room. In fact, Jo wasn’t even wearing her own clothes. She was borrowing some from Karen so that she didn’t have to risk going into C Block. Rick stuck with the same black jeans and went commando again while finding one of his old, ratty shirts hanging up on a laundry line that someone had cleaned for him. Plus, there was the fact that it was so hot out that sweat began to form on their bodies no sooner than they were dried off from their shower.

As they made their way back outside, Rick’s path was blocked by Tyreese.

“Rick, you got a minute?”

“Yeah, I do, what’s up?”

“Karen’s sick now. I just brought her flowers and heard her coughing. We already lost twelve people today and I just found out from Dr. S that David and Mrs. Richards died of this infection in A Block. A couple others aren’t doing so hot either, and I can’t lose Karen the same way,” Tyreese spoke, his eyes wide and stern. “I don’t want to lose her at all.”

Because Tyreese had just come from someone already coming down with the infection and Jo having not been as exposed to it, Rick subconsciously stood between the other man and his soon-to-be wife, in some sort of attempt to keep her risk of getting sick low.

“I’m sensing you need me to do something?” It was both a statement and a question.

Tyreese nodded. “Well, yeah. The medicine we got here isn’t enough, and we only have Dr. S doing all the medical work, what with not having Bob around anymore, God rest his soul. We need help. Something we can't do here alone.”

“What are you suggesting?”

“I’m suggesting we go to Woodbury. They had another doctor there, they might have the kind of medicine we need for whatever kind of infection this is.”

Rick looked down at the ground and scratched at the back of his head. “I’m not so sure we’ll be welcomed back there. Last time we were at Woodbury, we took a third of their population and were expressly warned not to show our faces around there again.”

That reply didn’t seem to sit well with Tyreese. “If Jo was the one that needed that medication or medical attention you wouldn’t hesitate to go,” the larger man practically growled as he got closer to Rick’s face.

Holding his hands up to keep a distance between them and so that this confrontation didn’t escalate, Rick looked Tyreese in the eye and held his gaze. “Okay,” he muttered, caving slightly. “But we don’t exactly have daylight on our side anymore, and I don’t want anyone going outside these fences at night.”

“We did it the last time we went to Woodbury.”

“That was when we were under threat of attack.”

“We’re under threat of attack now!” Tyreese shouted. Then, lowering his voice slightly when he caught Jo’s eye, he added, “Except the threat is inside these walls and the help we need is out there.” He pointed out toward the direction of the woods beyond the yard. “You’re the leader here, Rick. Step up to the damned plate and lead us.”

Without another word, Tyreese stormed off, back toward A Block, presumably where Karen was now, but not before purposely bumping shoulders with Rick. Because Tyreese was the much larger man, Rick stumbled back slightly from the gesture and Jo’s hands went up to Rick’s shoulder blades, feeling as if he was about to fall back against her.

Clenching his jaw and pursing his lips together, Rick exhaled through his nostrils, which were flaring slightly from the slight altercation between him and Tyreese. He turned around and looked back upon Jo, placing a hand on her good shoulder.

“I think Woodbury might be a good idea,” Jo commented, catching Rick off guard. “It’s not the same there anymore. It can’t be; not with The Governor gone from there. They might be able to help us, but I also agree with you that it shouldn’t be done tonight. It’s getting late. But it should still be done.” Off Rick’s reluctant nod, she added, “We’ll wait until morning and see where we’re at with this infection. We lost David and Mrs. Richards, I think, because the medication we do have didn’t have enough time to get into their systems. But if we start early, at the first signs of even a cough, we could buy ourselves some time. And I doubt everyone who gets this infection will die. I mean, look at the world now. Not everyone died from the outbreak for God knows what reason. Some people were immune to dying right away, even if we all happen to carry the infection with us. It hasn’t killed us and this sickness might not either.”

Rick nodded again. “You’re right.”

“I know I am,” Jo smirked. Placing her hands on either side of his face, she kissed him briefly on the lips. “You should get something to eat. It’s been a long, tiring day and I haven’t seen you eat or drink once.”

Despite the seriousness of the mood, Rick was able to find some humor as he leaned forward to whisper in her ear, “Oh, I think I had plenty to eat a little while ago.”

As soon as he pulled back, Jo slapped him playfully on the arm, and as he moved to walk away from her, she reached the same hand out and pinched his butt. Rick threw a look over his shoulder at her and she just remained there, smiling back at him.

 

* * *

 

Bright and early the next morning, Rick and Jo woke up together in Dale’s RV. In the front, on the table which had been lowered down into bed form, Daryl was snoring away.

The trio had decided to make use of the RV for someplace to sleep while avoiding C Block, and not wanting to occupy D Block, which was basically ground zero for the infection. And now, as sunlight broke through the blinds in the back bedroom, Rick blinked rapidly and rolled onto his back as much as he could without falling off the bed; an art he had mastered from sharing a twin-sized mattress with Jo for more than half a year.

“Morning,” Rick whispered when he felt Jo stirring.

“Morning,” she repeated.

“I gotta get up and check on how things progressed through the night,” he informed. “You can stay here. Sleep a little longer.”

“Nah, I’m up.”

As Rick sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed, he reached for his gun belt and holster, and then began to put it back on as he stood up. Jo rolled over onto her back, now taking up the entire mattress by herself and stared up at him, just watching him in silence. Feeling eyes upon him, however, Rick turned and looked down at her.

“You feeling okay today?”

“Yeah,” she replied with a nod.

“Not feeling congested or feverish or anything like that?”

“No. Are you?”

“No,” he shook his head. Crouching down between the twin bed they shared and the other twin bed they’d left empty, Rick held onto her left hand. Turning it over and looking at the black twist tie engagement ring he’d given her, he then brought the back of her hand up to his lips and kissed it. “I think we’re gonna be okay.”

“Me, too.”

“For fuck’s sake, shut up,” Daryl groaned from the front of the RV. “Ya’ll are like a goddamned Lifetime movie and some us took a late watch last night.”

Rick caught Jo’s eye and smirked. “Sorry, brother,” Rick remarked as he released Jo’s hand and stood back up.

As Jo got up as well, she followed Rick out of the back bedroom and into the front of the RV where Daryl was lying sprawled out with his right leg dangling off the side. Rick leaned forward and purposely swatted at Daryl’s leg and the archer pulled his arm from off his face from where it was covering his eyes to stare up at the couple staring down at him with grins.

“We’ll leave you alone to catch up on your beauty sleep, princess,” Rick quipped as he continued on for the RV door.

In response, Daryl lifted the same arm up and flipped Rick off. Only Jo saw the gesture, however, and she chuckled at it as she exited the RV with Rick.

Out into the early morning sunlight the engaged couple stepped, each simultaneously lifting their hands to shield the offending light from their eyes. They continued onward through the courtyard, noting more people braving it and coming out of their respective cell blocks to start their day; some attempting laundry and some starting to prepare some food at the outdoor kitchen. What truly caught Rick and Jo’s attention was Tyreese digging a grave out in the yard.

Fearing the worst, considering the confrontation from the night before, Rick made a beeline for the larger man and Jo was hot on his trail.

“Tyreese,” Rick called out. When Tyreese stopped digging momentarily and turned to look at the approaching pair, Rick asked, “Karen…is she—?”

“This isn’t for Karen,” Tyreese clarified. “Not yet anyway.”

“Who is it for?” Jo wondered.

“Ben,” he answered, returning to his digging. “He died an hour ago.”

“Is Karen doing any better?”

“She hasn’t gotten worse.”

“Do you still want to go to Woodbury?” Rick asked; his hands on his hips.

Tyreese stopped again. “I do,” he nodded, looking back up at Rick and Jo.

Rick nodded. “Alright. Council meeting in fifteen minutes.”

Stepping away from Tyreese, Rick gestured for Jo to follow as they made their way back into the courtyard. Carol was at the outdoor kitchen with Lizzie and Mika and he told her the same thing; meeting in fifteen, and to spread the word to the other council members.

As they made their way toward the direction of the library, where meetings were held, Sasha came stumbling out of D Block, coughing hard and looking considerably pale. They didn’t approach her and she just held up her hands. “I need to see Dr. S,” she informed. “I’ll be okay.”

She looked anything but okay as she slowly made her way to A Block. Rick and Jo watched after her with deep frowns, and as they turned back toward the inner courtyard, they practically ran right into Glenn.

“Hey, council meeting in fifteen minutes, alright?” Rick said to the younger man.

Glenn nodded. “We need to discuss doing more than just digging graves,” he remarked. “Walkers, people…we can deal with that, but this…we’re not prepared for this.”

“I know,” Rick assured. “And we’re gonna talk about our options so we can keep the grave digging to a minimum.”

After parting ways with the younger man, the couple finally made their way inside the prison and after a few twists and turns around some hallway, made it to the library where they took a seat at one of their usual tables and waited for the others to trickle in.

Carol arrived first and sat down, and was soon followed in by Glenn, Tyreese, Daryl, and even Shane, Morgan and Andrea braved it and joined; albeit the latter three wore scarves around their faces, to play it safe.

“How’s Hope?” Jo asked.

“She’s fine,” Andrea replied. “Lori and Sophia have been taking good care of her.”

“We’re all doing fine in C Block,” Shane commented. “We just want to know what’s going on. We’re in the dark over there. Who have we lost?”

“I checked in with Dr. S earlier,” Carol informed. “It’s spread. Everyone who survived the attack in D Block has come down with the infection. But we need to figure out what to do to stop this.”

“There is no stopping this,” Tyreese muttered. “It’s gonna run its course. We can’t prevent it, but we can treat it. I know we can.”

When Rick caught Tyreese’s eye, he spoke up, “Tyreese suggested to me that we reach out to Woodbury. Dr. S is doing all this on his own with no other help, and Woodbury has that other doctor. Who knows, maybe they have more by now.”

“We didn’t exactly leave that town on the best of terms last time,” Shane commented.

“I know that, but we’re desperate here. We gotta try anything.”

“We need better medicine. What we have left, Dr. S is using up,” Carol added. “I’m helping him where I can. Hershel taught me a few minor things that I’ve been able to put to use, but better medicine and better medical care in general would be ideal.”

“What if Woodbury won’t help us, or they don’t have what we need?” Shane questioned. “Hell, what if they’re all dead?”

“We’ve been through every pharmacy around here and then some,” Daryl said, sitting backwards in his chair.

“There’s a veterinary college not too far from here, at West Peachtree Tech,” Morgan piped up. “I noticed it on a map a few months ago. It might be someplace not too many people would’ve thought to raid for medication.”

“Animal medication?” Shane scoffed.

“I had a sick cat once, and the veterinarian I took her to mentioned that the medication most animals are on to combat their illnesses are similar to what humans take,” Andrea said. She shrugged. “It’s worth a shot.”

“So, we have two options,” Glenn commented. “Woodbury or a veterinary college.”

“That college is about fifty miles away. Too big a risk before, but ain’t now,” Daryl remarked, abruptly standing up. “I’ll take a group out. Best not waste any more time.”

“I’ll go with you,” Morgan said to Daryl, and stood up as well.

“Me, too,” Andrea offered.

“You two haven’t been exposed yet. Daryl has,” Jo noted. “You get in a car with him—”

“It’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Morgan remarked. “If I’m gonna die, it’s gonna be doing good in this world. And if that good is sticking my neck out to get medication for the sick people here, to give them a fighting chance, then I’m gonna stick my neck out as far as it can go. And if I _do_ die, at least I’ll get to see my boy and my wife again, and I’m okay with that.”

“I was already suicidal once, why not a second time,” Andrea quipped.

Tyreese leaned forward and addressed everyone. “Aren’t we gonna try for Woodbury? Who’s gonna go there? _I’m_ prepared to go.”

“Take Zach,” Rick offered. “It’s closer and it’s not as risky as going to the college.” He looked around the table. “We’re spread pretty thin right now. Merle’s out and we need some able bodies here to maintain this place.”

“You ain’t gonna come?” Tyreese almost seemed offended.

“He’s got a daughter in C Block he shouldn’t be leaving behind during this outbreak, and he can’t take her with him either,” Carol cut in. “I couldn’t leave either without Sophia, and I’m not in a position to take her anywhere with me right now, regardless of the fact that I’ve been exposed.”

“Fine. I can bring Sasha with me,” Tyreese suggested.

Rick, Jo and Glenn looked between each other.

“Sasha’s sick, too, Tyreese,” Jo spoke. “She was coming out of D Block a little while ago and went to see Dr. S.”

“And you’re just telling me this _now_?” Tyreese jumped to his feet and Jo leaned back in her seat as if she thought he might lunge across the table at her.

As if sensing the same thing, Rick did the opposite of Jo and leaned forward, placing the palms of his hands on the table and flashing an unyielding gaze with the larger man. “Whether we told you three minutes ago or at the end of this damned meeting won’t change a thing. Sasha’s sick and that’s unfortunate, but there’s nothing you or I or _any_ of us can do until we can get the proper medication to combat the symptoms of this infection,” he spoke authoritatively. “Now, you’re gonna wanna reel yourself back in. I know you’re going through a rough spell with the two people you care most for in this world being in the way they are right now, but that doesn’t mean it’s okay to jump down everyone’s throats.”

Tyreese looked down at the ground and nodded solemnly before sitting back down. “I’m sorry. I’m just worried.”

“We all are,” Jo assured.

Rick sighed and looked around the group. “There are other precautions we need to take.”

“Like what?” Carol wondered.

Rick looked at the grey-haired woman and leaned back in his chair, dropping his hands onto his legs. “There’s no telling how long it’ll be before Daryl and his group return. I think it might make sense for us to separate the most vulnerable,” he recommended. “We can use the administration building. Separate office, separate room.”

“Who’s the most vulnerable?”

“The children.”

“What about the old?” Glenn inquired.

Daryl frowned. “Are there any of them left? Didn’t we just lose Mr. and Mrs. Richards?”

“There’s a few left, like Ms. McLeod, for starters,” Carol replied, catching Daryl’s eye as she spoke.

“I think that question answers itself,” Shane remarked. “They’re old; they’re the weak link in the chain. If they die, and I’m not trying to sound like an asshole about it but, would it really be that great of a loss for us, in the long run? I mean, it’s not like they actually contribute to anything going on in this prison.”

“If you’re lucky enough to live to be their age, I pray none of the children grow up with the same mindset, or else you’re screwed,” Carol retorted, causing a smirk to appear on Daryl’s lips.

Shane eyed the woman across the table from him. “I’m just saying, I think our priority should be the children, and then the able-bodied, and then the old.”

“Let’s just worry about the kids first, shall we?” Jo spoke, standing up from the table but gripping the edge with her hands. “The two groups can go their separate ways in search for meds, and possible medical help,” she eyed Tyreese, “while the rest of us keep the wheels moving here. Shane, you can go back to overseeing C Block. Carol, you can continue to help Dr. S as best as you can, but make sure you’re taking precautions not to get too run down and wear a scarf over your mouth and nose or something. Glenn, I know it’s not your favorite task in the world, but we’ll still need someone on grave duty. I’ll wrangle up the kids who’ve been exposed but aren’t showing symptoms of the infection and take them to the administration building, and Rick will oversee everything else.” Jo looked around at all the faces staring back at her. “Are we good?”

Carol smirked. “Yes, ma’am,” she replied and saluted.

Jo rolled her eyes and placed a hand on Carol’s shoulder as the older woman stood up to take her leave from the meeting. When Jo looked over at Shane, he looked as if he wanted to either get argumentative or laugh. She couldn’t really tell.

“Your woman knows how to crack a whip, Rick,” Shane jested, glancing amusedly at his oldest friend.

Rick reached a hand up and lovingly placed it on the small of Jo’s back. “Yeah, she does.”

 

* * *

 

A couple hours later, after Jo had taken the children to the administration building, she had joined Rick out in the yard to check the cistern.

“It’s getting low,” Jo remarked, struggling with pumping the water in.

“Let me have another go at it,” Rick suggested.

“The whole line’s mudded up. The end is dragging the bottom again. We’ll have to go out there and clear it. Set the bird, go out through the tombs, and swing around through the forest route.” Jo gestured toward outside the fences.

“We got enough for now. That’s tomorrow’s problem.”

“Probably doesn’t help that we wasted some water having sex instead of just outright showering,” Jo quipped. “We should probably stop doing that.”

Rick smirked. “Yeah, that’d be the responsible thing to do.” He kicked the pump gently with his foot. “This can wait, though.”

Jo shrugged. “I don’t think it can. I mean, five more people have come down with the infection since Sasha went in. There’s not a lot of us left. What if you get sick? What if I do?”

“What if we get in trouble out there and don’t come back?” Rick parried. “Let’s get this up to the people who need it. Let’s get what we have to get done first.” Picking up a metal bucket, he dumped the little bit of muddy water that was occupying the bottom, while Jo picked up a full, capped container of water that they would be able to use. “Jo.”

“Yeah?”

“I love you.”

Jo smiled back. “Love you more.”

“Highly unlikely,” Rick bantered; emitting a low chuckle.

“Wanna fight me over it?”

“Maybe later.” He stuck out a hand and slapped her ass. “Clothing optional.”

Jo let out a laugh as she shook her head and began to lead the way back toward the courtyard.

Considering everything going on, they were glad they could still joke around with each other; that they had something to smile and laugh about. That they still, God willing, had their health and the health of their daughter to keep them going. Also, that they had love; because love was a mighty fierce thing to live for and they sure as hell had plenty of it.

 

* * *

 

A short while later, as Jo was crossing through the courtyard with a scarf wrapped around her face and carrying a basket of dirty laundry, she spotted Carol coming from A Block, dressed similarly with a scarf over her face. When Carol pulled the scarf down and nearly collapsed onto the stairs outside A Block, Jo set the basket down and walked over to the older female.

“Carol, are you okay?”

“Physically, yeah.” She looked up at Jo and frowned and there were fresh tear stains on her cheeks. “Lizzie’s in there.”

Jo’s shoulders slouched. “Oh, God. Does Mika know?”

Carol nodded. “Mika sent her here.” Letting out a sigh, she added, “I just…after their dad died and Sasha put him down, I promised those girls I would take care of them, like they were my own, and now Lizzie’s sick and I feel like I’m failing Ryan already and it’s only been a day.”

Jo crouched down at Carol’s feet, placing her hands on the other woman’s boots. “We can’t stop this from happening. We just gotta do whatever we can and hope for the best,” she commented. “We gotta hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”

Outstretching her right arm, Carol placed a hand down on Jo’s shoulder and smiled appreciatively. And then, slightly amused, she let out a small chuckle.

“What?” Jo inquired, raising an eyebrow. She stood back up and leaned against the building.

“I was just thinking back to before the prison, when we were at Hershel’s farm and how Rick slipped back into his leadership role again after he lost his son. This was when he and Lori were still, more or less, husband and wife, and because of his position in the group, she was basically our First Lady to his president, if that makes sense.” Off Jo’s nod, Carol continued. “Now, I love Lori. I adore her and she is possibly one of my best friends here, but she could not light a fire under anyone’s ass if she tried. When she would attempt to rally us into some task, everyone would just sort of nod their heads but then do whatever it is they were going to do anyway. But, now, you’re a different story. It was like what Shane said earlier; that you know how to crack the whip. You speak and people will listen to you, and they’ll do whatever you ask them to without argument.”

“Well, after spending ten years teaching eight year olds, a few adults are no trouble,” Jo joked.

“Seriously, though.” Carol wiped something from her eye; possibly a dried tear, possibly dirt. “If Rick is our president, you are the First Lady. You’re the queen to his king.”

Jo shrugged. “Behind every great man is an even greater woman?”

Carol nodded. “Yes, definitely,” she chuckled. Then, after a few moments, she sighed. “Oh, it’s sure nice to laugh. We rarely get those kinds of moments these days.”

“Yeah. It helps, that’s for sure.”

Gesturing over to the basket Jo had set down, Carol knitted her brow together. “That all _your_ laundry?”

“No, I went into D Block and gathered up all the dirty clothes I could find,” Jo replied. “I figured that whoever manages to survive this infection should be able to return to their cells and have clean clothes waiting for them. Or they can have something clean to change into while they’re inside their quarantine.”

“That’s a nice gesture.”

“Yeah.”

“How’s your shoulder?”

“Better,” Jo nodded. “Though, I might need to have Dr. S give it a once over to make sure it’s healing alright. I can manage putting on a new bandage myself later.”

Suddenly, Carol shook her head very rigorously. “You can’t see him.”

Jo frowned; confused. “Why not?”

Looking around, Carol leaned forward and replied in a low voice. “He’s sick, too.”

“Are you shitting me?” Jo questioned. “What are we going to do if he dies from this? We don’t have any other doctor.”

“He’s showing me as much as he can, while he can,” Carol explained. “I’m wearing this scarf and wearing gloves. I’m doing what I can to keep myself safe, and I know it’s a risk, but I can’t _not_ help these people; especially now that Lizzie is one of them.”

“But what if _you_ get sick?”

Carol shrugged. “Hopefully either Daryl’s group, or Tyreese and Zach get back soon enough with the medication we need.” After a moment, she added, “Can you not tell Rick about this right now? I don’t want to worry him with anything else just yet.”

Begrudgingly, Jo nodded. “Alright, I won't, but you have to promise me you’ll let me know if things take a turn for the worse in there.”

“I promise.” As Carol moved to stand back up and return the scarf over her mouth and nose, she cocked her head to the side and pointed at Jo’s left hand. “What’s with the twist tie?”

Jo looked down at her hand and then smiled as she lifted it up. “It’s my engagement ring.”

Carol seemed dumbfounded at first, but then her blue eyes widened. Even though her mouth was hidden by the scarf again, her smile was evident in her eyes. “You and Rick?”

“Yeah,” Jo nodded, almost embarrassedly.

“When did _this_ happen?”

“Yesterday evening.”

“Oh my God,” Carol exclaimed. “I’d hug you but you don’t need any more of a risk of getting sick right now. So, uh…” she threw her gloved hands up and wiggled her fingers. “Congratulations!”

Jo snickered and shook her head. “Thank you.”

“Well, I should, uh…get back inside,” Carol announced. “Tell Rick I said congratulations.”

“I will.”

Jo watched as Carol took her leave and ducked back inside A Block before turning back to grab up the basket of dirty laundry and return to the task at hand.

 

* * *

 

Some time after, Rick was walking through the administration building, checking on the kids when he passed Maggie looking particularly distraught.

“Maggie?” he called out as he was about to round a corner.

“Oh, uh, hey.”

“You alright?” Rick tilted his head, trying to get a better look at her in the dim lighting of the hall.

Biting her lip, she scratched at her arm, just above where the prosthetic latched on. “Glenn has it,” she replied. “He went to A Block a while ago, and I’m scared he won’t come out.”

“Hey, it’s gonna be okay. There’s no need to be upset,” he assured. “Daryl’s group or Tyreese will come back with the meds and we’ll take care of everyone.”

“I can’t lose Glenn, Rick. He’s all I got left.”

“You have all of us.”

Maggie frowned. “You know what I mean. My entire family is gone now; my blood kin. Glenn is my husband, and if I lose him I think I’ll lose myself.” There was awkward silence between them for a moment, before she continued. “We never said any vows, you know; Glenn and I, that is. He put this ring on my finger and I said yes, and that was it. We became husband and wife right then and there, but we never came right out and said vows. I did always dream about my wedding someday and what it would be like, but never about whom I would marry. But then Glenn came into my life and the wedding was no longer important. He’s the only important thing to me. Being with him the rest of our lives is what matters. Everything else is just bullshit. That’s why I can't lose him.”

“I wouldn’t say having a wedding nowadays isn’t important,” Rick contended. “I think we gotta hold on to as much of the world before as possible.”

“I dunno.”

“Maybe, when Glenn gets better, because he _will_ ,” Rick stressed, “you and him can join Jo and me for a double wedding. If anything it’ll give everyone else something to look forward to.”

Maggie knitted her brow together and wiped the tears from her face with the back of her right, and still only, hand. “Wait— _double_ wedding?”

Rick nodded; a faint smirk toying at his lips. “Yeah.”

Her frown disappearing, Maggie’s spirits seemed to lift slightly. “You and Jo?”

“Yeah.”

“I guess congratulations are in order,” she remarked. “You both deserve to be happy, and I’m happy for you both.”

“Thank you,” Rick replied, gesturing to her. “You and Glenn will be happy, too. We just gotta get over this hurdle.”

Maggie moved to fold her arms across her chest, momentarily forgetting she only had the one. When she remembered, she shifted her weight from one foot to the other and placed her hand on her hip instead. “Do you really think we’ll get through this?”

“I won’t lie to you and say I’m certain we will, but I sure as hell hope we do.”

Maggie nodded and looked to the ground for a moment.

“You gonna be okay?” Rick continued.

Looking up, she nodded again. “Yeah.”

“Good.”

As he began to step away, Maggie called out to him. “Rick?”

Stopping in his tracks, Rick turned and looked back at her. “Yeah?”

“You seem pretty okay, like, you don’t look like you’re gonna get sick at all,” she remarked. “Could I hug you? I need to hug someone right now.”

Frowning, Rick shook his head. “I’ll have to take a raincheck on that,” he answered. “I don’t want to take the risk of possibly sending you to A Block, but you can do something for me.”

Maggie nodded. “Sure.”

“Go back to C Block, find Hope and hug her instead, for me and Jo, and tell her how much we miss her and love her, and that we’ll come back to her as soon as we can,” Rick said. “Do that for us, if you will.”

“I’d be delighted to.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank _you_.”

 

* * *

 

That evening, as the sun was almost completely set below the horizon, Jo was standing at a clothes line, touching her fingers to a shirt hanging there, testing to see how dry it was, as Rick came sauntering up behind her. As if she had eyes in the back of her head, she wasn’t surprised at all when a pair of hands found their way to rest upon her hips and pull her back against a taut torso. Instead, Jo simply smiled and dropped her hands down to cover Rick’s, pulling them forward to wrap around her waist.

“Laundry duty,” he murmured into her ear. “How exciting.”

“I’d rather laundry was the most exciting thing in our lives right now.”

“No, I know.” Resting his chin down on her shoulder, he looked straight ahead at the yard and how eerily quiet it was. Even the walkers on the fence were barely making any noise; but that was probably because there was no one in the yard to hold their attention. “I told Maggie about us.”

“Did you?”

“Yeah,” he confirmed. “Glenn’s in A Block now and she’s having a rough time of it. She’s worried Glenn won’t make it, so I basically told her to hold onto hope, figuratively and literally. I asked her to give Hope a hug for us. But then I suggested that she and Glenn join us in a double wedding.”

“If he survives this.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t say that to her. I told her _when_ he survives this. She was already down and out. I wasn’t about to add salt to that wound.”

Jo nodded, turning around in his arms and lifting hers to rest on top of his; holding onto his biceps. “I told Carol about us, too,” she admitted. “She wants you to know she says congratulations.”

“Maggie said the same.”

“Carol also said that if you’re the President of this prison, then I’m the First Lady; the queen to your king.” Jo smiled as she looked up to him. “King Richard and Queen Joanna have a nice ring to it, right?”

Rick smirked and responded by kissing her warmly upon the lips. Instead of saying anything at all, he wrapped his arms tighter around her body, enveloping her as much as he could without cutting off her air supply.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Jo mumbled when they finally came back up for air a moment later. Staring up at his eyes, which were darkening with a volatile mix of love and lust for her, Jo bit her bottom lip and looked over toward A Block. “Before we get too distracted, I need you to know something.”

“Hmm?” Rick brushed his nose against the side of her cheek, placing a kiss along her jaw and then down to her neck.

Trying to focus on her train of thought, Jo said, “I promised Carol I wouldn’t say anything just yet, but I can’t keep you in the dark. There can’t be secrets between us.”

Lifting his face, Rick stared back at her with a considerably more focus of his own than moments before. “What’s wrong?”

“Caleb — Dr. S — he’s sick, too, and I’m not sure things are lookin’ up for him,” Jo informed. “Carol says he’s been showing her how to help take care of the others, as much as she can, and she’s trying her best to keep safe for her own health’s sake. I told her to tell me right away if anything drastic changes in there and she said she would.” Letting a sigh escape, Jo frowned. “I’m just worried; for Carol, for Glenn, for Lizzie, and Sasha and Karen, and everyone else in there. And I miss Hope and I want to hold her in my arms, and I’m getting tired of life seeming like it’s getting better for us, only for the proverbial rug to be pulled out from underneath us.”

Rick lifted his hands up and cupped either side of her face; brushing his thumbs along her cheeks. “We’ll get there someday. But, in the meantime, we just gotta make the best of the little moments we get here and there.” When she didn’t seem too convinced, he leaned his face down and held her gaze. “You and I — we’ll take a run tomorrow; a quick one. There’s a cul de sac not far from here I’ve been meaning to check out. We’ll go there and find some meds and maybe some water and food. I think it’ll do you and I a little good, and whatever we might find could tide all of us over if the others still aren’t back yet by then.”

Jo nodded. “Sounds like a plan to me.”

Smiling, Rick dropped his hands from her face but then snaked one arm around her neck and pulled her in for a hug and she responded by bringing her hands up to grip onto his back, inhaling the scent of his skin as she pressed her face into his neck.

“Do you need help with the laundry?” he asked when they finally took a step back from each other.

“No, it’s still damp.” She gestured to the clothes on the line. “It’s so humid out that it’s taking longer to dry. I’m hoping by morning they will be.”

Nodding, Rick placed his hands on his hips and looked around the courtyard.

It was empty, and it was silent.

No one needed him or her at the moment.

C Block was secure, the children quarantined in the administration were safe and knew where to find help if they needed it, and the sick in A Block were being looked after by Dr. S and Carol, as best as those two could manage. There was nothing else that could be done in the meantime until the others came back with meds.

It was just a waiting game now.

“C’mon.” Rick gestured toward the RV with his head. “Let’s call it a night so we can get an early start in the morning.”

Jo nodded. “Okay.”

Taking his hand, she let him lead her away toward the RV. When he opened the door, he let her step up inside first. He shut the door behind him, but didn’t lock it in case anyone needed to reach them, and quickly. Jo walked to the back bedroom with Rick following after and once they were inside, she reached forward and drew the blinds shut and he pulled the accordion door closed.

Before Rick had turned around to face her, he felt her hands on his gun belt; undoing it for him and dropping it to the spare twin bed to his right. Looking down at her hands, he stood there as Jo continued with removing his regular belt, slipping out of its belt loops and tossing it, too, to the spare bed. Just when he thought she was done assisting him, she undid the button on his jeans and then unzipped the zipper. Finally, he swatted her hands away so he could push his pants off his hips, letting them drop to the floor and pool around his ankles.

Sitting down on the same twin mattress they’d shared the night before, Jo began to pull her shirt off over her head and then unhooked the front clasp of her bra, letting her breasts fall free as Rick quickly pulled his own shirt off and tossed it aside. Shifting around, Jo was soon free of her own jeans and underwear, kicking them both off her ankles and watched as Rick reached back down for his pants and pulled a lonely condom package out of his back pocket.

“That’s not our usual brand,” she commented, staring at the black label and taking it from him. “Where’d you get this from?”

“Found it in a desk in the administration building,” he chuckled. “Someone was having a good time at some point in this prison before the world fell.”

Jo turned it over, checking for an expiration date. When saw it was safe to use, she raised an eyebrow at him. “It’s strawberry flavored, you know.”

“Is it really?” Rick grabbed it back and looked it over himself. “Makes things a little more interesting, I guess.”

Ripping open the small package, Rick pulled a very red condom out and Jo’s laughter quickly filled the back bedroom.

“Oh my God, I almost wish I had a camera.”

“And I’m glad you don’t,” Rick retorted.

Standing up, Jo took the condom from him and pushed him down onto the bed. “Let me,” she insisted. Kneeling down in front of him, she expertly rolled the red latex down upon his stiffening manhood and then spread his legs a little further apart so she could get closer to him. “Now just relax,” Jo whispered before sticking her tongue out and swirling it around the head of his cock. Pausing, she lifted her head and licked her lips and made a face.

“Does it really taste like strawberries?”

“Extremely artificial strawberries, but yeah.”

Winking back at him, Jo pulled her hair back over her shoulders and leaned her head back down to take the head completely into her mouth, working it with her tongue and a considerable amount of suction before sinking slower down.

Leaning back, Rick propped himself up with his forearms and parted his lips to expel a sharp breath as the vibration her mouth made around his cock as she hummed while taking more of him, inch by inch, made him feel as if he’d start seeing stars.

“Fuck,” he muttered when her head began to bob slowly, matched with the pressure of her tongue. Reaching his left hand up, he gripped her right shoulder and pushed her up off him. Rick shook her head as she looked up at him with confusion. “You do that really well, but that’s not how I want you right now.”

Smirking, Jo stood up when he patted his bare legs. She watched him move up the bed and lay back a bit and, without waiting for a verbal invitation, Jo crawled up onto the bed over him, straddling his waist and sank down around his cock. She took him all, and all at once, without hesitation and his hands were instantly gripping her upper thighs. When she raised her hips, sliding up his length and then sliding back down, they both groaned at the friction their bodies were creating.

Rick began the steady thrusting upward as she rolled her hips and ground downward onto him. They maintained a slow, languid pace at first but it didn’t take long for that pace to get very feverish. Jo hunched forward, draping her body over his, pressing her breasts firmly against his chest as she gripped the blanket on either side of his head. All the while, Rick began to pound mercilessly into her dripping core that felt like it was made for him.

With one hand, he gripped the back of her head and claimed her lips with his own while he rubbed her clit with the thumb of his other hand like it was his job. That gesture alone caused her to cry out into the cavern of his mouth.

As the pressure began to build at the base of his cock, Rick drilled up into her like a jackhammer and increased the speed and roughness in which he rubber her clit with.

“Unh…unh… _ungh_ …” she groaned over and over.

Jo pushed herself back up, reaching a hand around to cradle his balls, which was all it took for him to finally peak. His release came hard and fast, spilling inside the strawberry-flavored condom as he rode out the rest of his orgasm until he felt her inner muscles flutter around him and her entire body quaked.

Looking up at her with darkened blue eyes, Rick pushed himself up into a sitting position. He hunched forward and sucked at each of her flushed and hardened buds, as they continued to rock together a little bit more until they came down from their respective highs.

“Oh, God, I love you,” she whimpered, completely sated, as she gripped her fingers through his curls.

“I love you, too,” he replied as he brought his mouth back up to her lips. “But I ain’t done with you just yet.”

The night was still young, neither of them was needed by anyone else at the moment and he didn’t have just the one condom in his back pocket.


	24. Strong

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The need for tissues may or may not be needed for this chapter, depending on how well you accept character deaths.

_"When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure."_ — Peter Marshall

* * *

 

Bright and early the following morning, Jo was dressed, wearing the same clothes from the day before, although Rick managed a different shirt. While he was loading up the Tucson with extra fuel to get them where they needed to go, Jo made her way into A Block, standing on the other side of the glass window to the room that had once been used for the execution of death row inmates. Balling a fist, she banged on the secured glass and waited. After a second succession of bangs, there was movement in the hallway outside the room. A small figure approached, revealing it to be Lizzie.

“Miss Jo?”

Jo smiled. “Hey, Lizzie. How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay. Is Mika okay?”

“She is,” Jo assured. “I just came back from checking on her and the other two; Luke and Molly. But I came here because I needed to tell Carol something, but I’ll have you tell her instead for me, okay?” Off Lizzie’s nod, Jo said, “Tell her that Daryl’s group isn’t back with the meds yet, and Tyreese and Zach aren’t either, so Rick and I are going on a run for some supplies; hopefully some antibiotics that can help. Plus we lost all the food in D Block, so we’re gonna go look for more and whatever else we can find.”

“Okay.”

“How is everyone else in there? Carol, Glenn, Sasha…”

“Ms. McLeod died during the night. But Carol said she probably couldn’t fight off this infection as long as everyone else has because she was old and more vulnerable.”

“But everyone else is okay?”

Lizzie nodded. “Yeah. No one else has died yet.”

“Yet?”

“I think a lot of people are going to die. It’s what always happens. Makes me sad, but at least they get to come back.”

Jo frowned and leaned a little closer to the glass. “Lizzie, when they come back, they’re not the same anymore. They’re dead, and they’re dangerous.”

“Yeah, but they’re something. They’re someone. I’m little now. If I don’t die, I’ll get big. I’ll be me, but I’ll be different. It’s how it is. We all change. We all don’t get to stay the same way we started.”

“Honey, there’s more to it than that.”

“I don’t think there is.”

Noticing Lizzie’s face looking sad, Jo tilted her head slightly to the side and folded her arms across her chest. “What is it?”

Lizzie looked down at the ground. “I’m not afraid to kill. I’m just afraid.”

“It’s scary out there in the world now, I know. But you gotta be strong.”

“How do I get strong?” Tears stung Lizzie’s eyes.

“With time and bravery,” Jo replied. “And when it feels like everything’s falling apart, and that fear creeps in, you just remember the good things you still have your life, like your sister. You do what you have to do to be strong. You fight back against the bad things to preserve the good things. And then one day, it just happens. You _are_ right. We _do_ all change. Just...some for the worse, some for the better; and it’s always easy to do the wrong thing. If it feels easy, it’s probably not right, and you want to be the better person. And it takes a strong person to be the better person.”

“I want to be strong.”

“Then you will be, if you really want it bad enough.” After a moment, Jo asked, “Do you remember what I asked you to tell Carol?”

Lizzie nodded. “Daryl and Tyreese aren’t back yet. You and Rick went on a supply run for food and whatever else you can find.”

Jo smiled. “My star pupil,” she quipped, placing the palm of her hand on the glass.

Mimicking the gesture, Lizzie beamed proudly. “If I get better—”

“When you get better,” Jo corrected.

“When,” Lizzie repeated. “Will you continue teaching us again? I really liked your science lessons.”

“You betcha.”

“Thanks, mom—I mean, Miss Jo. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Jo smiled. Gesturing with a nod of her head, she said, “Alright, I have to get going. Don’t forget to tell Carol what I said.”

“I won’t.”

Jo stood there, watching as Lizzie turned away from the other side of the window and hurried out of the room. Turning away as well, Jo made her way back out of A Block and into the morning sunlight; squinting along the way as she soon approached the Tucson.

Rick saw her approaching; leaning against the driver’s side door with his arms folded across his chest. “D’you talk to Carol and let her know what’s up?”

Jo shook her head. “I talked to Lizzie for a bit; told her to give Carol the message.”

“Everyone okay in there?”

“Ms. McLeod died during the night apparently. Sophia might be upset about that when she finds out,” Jo replied. “After all, the woman _did_ care for her while I _was…confined.”_

Rick nodded, unfolding his arms and placed a hand to Jo’s shoulder. He didn’t make any comment in regard to either Ms. McLeod’s demise or Jo’s past in Woodbury. He just looked at her and leaned in to place a kiss on her temple before pushing up off the door and opening it up. “Okay. Let’s beat pavement.”

With a nod, Jo looked down through the main gate and into the yard where she noticed Maggie sauntering down the gravel road ahead of them. As she walked around to the passenger side of the Tucson, Rick had slid into his seat and shut the door by the time Jo did the same. Once they were both situated in the vehicle and strapped in, Rick started the engine and drove off out of the courtyard; winding along the gravel road at a slow pace before coming to a temporary stop to wait for Maggie to slide open the inner gate. Once they were cleared of that first barrier, Rick let off the break and crawled several feet before stopping again; waiting for Maggie to pulley the outer gate open. As the two red, metal doors lurched open, Rick rolled his window down and leaned his head out to look over at the brunette.

“Make sure to keep checking on the kids in administration, and let Shane know where we went.”

“I will,” Maggie assured.

“We should only be gone a few hours at most,” Rick continued, keeping an eye out for the possibility of walkers approaching. “And if the others come back before we do—”

“Tell ‘em where you went. I know.” Maggie grinned knowingly and then leaned down a little to get a better look inside the Tucson at Jo. “I’ll make sure to kiss Hope good morning for the two of you.”

“Thanks, Maggie,” Jo called out, leaning against Rick’s right side, and then giving a brief wave.

Rolling the window back up, Rick looked forward and took his foot off the break once more and instead on the accelerator. As soon as they peeled out outer gate, he looked momentarily in the rearview mirror to see Maggie closing the gate as quickly as she could. Fortunately the nearest walkers were a ways down the out fence, giving the young woman enough time. Jo turned around in her seat and stared out the back hatch window at the receding sight of the prison; a sense of restlessness pulling at her insides, which always seemed to happen whenever she left the prison and her daughter behind.

Rick and Jo both caught each other’s eye.

It seemed they were both feeling the same thing.

There was always going to be that fear and worry of something happening while they were away, and not being there to do anything about it. But they had to do something.

 

* * *

 

Driving only eight miles south of the prison, the Tucson turned off a main, country road and onto the seemingly abandoned residential street of the cul de sac Rick had mentioned. He pulled the vehicle up behind a tan, early 90s model Ford Taurus wagon with a black, rooftop cargo box on top; the pair of them just sitting still for a moment before climbing out of the Tucson. Walking toward the back, Rick opened and lifted the back hatch, as he and Jo both pulled out backpacks to throw over their shoulders, while checking to make sure their weapons were secure.

Because it was left in their cell in C Block, Jo didn’t have her short sword and its scabbard with her, which she tended to feel naked without. She made do, however, with a large hunting knife strapped to her thigh holster, while her Beretta was tucked into the gun holster on her right hip; same as it was for Rick.

Closing the back hatch, they walked up alongside the wagon in front of their Tucson and noted one of the back driver side windows had words written on them in the dust that literally stated, _Pardon our dust_. As he opened the driver’s door, Jo followed suit in opening the back passenger door.

“Do you think they’ll be back?” Jo asked, leaning upward out of the wagon.

Rick gestured to the front of the car. “Windshield’s clean, wiped down. Can’t have been here more than a day, maybe two.” When he leaned back up as well, he caught Jo’s eye and could tell she wasn’t talking the owners of the wagon. “You mean Daryl and the others, don’t you?”

Jo nodded. “That’s why we’re doing this, right? Woodbury is so much closer than where Daryl and the others went. Tyreese and Zach should’ve been back to the prison by now. We need to start thinking that maybe something happened and they aren’t coming back.”

“For someone who believes hope still exists in this world, you sure can be pessimistic.”

“I’m not being pessimistic. I’m being a realist.”

“Same difference,” Rick shrugged.

Jo rolled her eyes. “In case they don’t come back, or until they _do,_ that’s what this is, right? We’re the backup plan. It’s not just something for us to do, to keep busy.”

"Medicine cabinets, first aid kits—anything that could help Caleb and Carol. We get in, we get out. And if we can eat it, we take it,” he remarked, leading her up the driveway of the first house.

“Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they had pancake mix? And syrup,” Jo muttered. “I haven’t had pancakes since…well, I don’t actually remember.”

“We’ll keep a special lookout for pancake mix, then.”

Rick opened the front door and stepped inside first, walking quietly along the entrance hall as Jo closed the door slowly and silently behind her. Off the hall there was a half bath and Rick ducked into it; opening the medicine cabinet and finding a bottle of aspirin inside, along with a box of Band-Aids and an unopened tube of toothpaste. Shoving the items into his backpack, he ducked back out into the hall.

“What about toilet paper?” Jo inquired.

Leaning his head into the bathroom, he craned it to get a glimpse near the toilet, but the toilet paper holder was empty. Looking back at Jo, he shook his head. Rick next moved into the kitchen, pulling open the nearest cupboard to him as a floorboard from the top of the stairs creaked.

Jo looked up to see a female walker in pink pajamas snarling down at her and then falling down the stairs toward her. Rick, however, was quick to pull her back by grabbing onto her backpack.

“Jo!” he shouted in concern as she fell back against his chest at the same moment the walker hit the ground with a sickening crunch of broken limbs.

Pulling herself back into a more upright position, Jo looked over her shoulder at Rick, casting an appreciative look at him, and then she unsheathed her hunting knife. Crouching down beside the walker, she buried the blade into its skull. Blood that was almost black immediately seeped out of the fresh wound and sprayed onto the wooden floor, causing Jo to frown as she stood back up. Giving the knife a few quick shakes to get some of the blood off, Jo quickly found herself looking back up toward the top of the stairs, along with Rick, as a door creaked open.

Without hesitation, Rick pulled out his Colt and aimed it toward the top of the stairs; both him and Jo waiting with bated breath for whoever or _what_ ever to grace them with their presence.

After a moment, a young woman poked her head out, looking down the stairs at Rick and Jo. As she stepped out onto the top landing, a young man with very blonde hair followed her out of whatever room they had been in.

“Whoa, whoa, it’s cool. We’re—we’re cool,” the young man insisted, holding up one hand.

“We have fruit,” the young woman added, holding out what looked to be peaches she held in her hands.

“Yeah, we got apricots, peaches,” the young man rattled, taking on of the peaches from the young woman. “Here, catch.” As he tossed it down the stairs, it bounced off a couple steps while Rick and Jo just watched it roll onto the ground without moving an inch. “Or, you know, don’t.”

As Rick kept his gun trained on them, the young man laughed nervously and the young woman kept her hands held out; looking as if she might piss herself.

Sensing no clear and present threat, Jo lifted her left hand and pulled Rick’s arm down so that he was no longer aiming his gun at the pair. Turning her head, she whispered in his ear, “They seem like two, naïve college kids who are more scared of us than we are of them.”

As the tension left his shoulders, Rick met Jo’s gaze; looking her in the eye long enough to believe in her instinct about the duo at the top of the stairs. Holstering his Colt, he took a step back and gestured for the young man and the young woman to come down.

“It’s alright,” he assured. “We ain’t gonna hurt you.”

“We’re just here looking for medicine and food,” Jo informed.

Smiles of hope appeared slightly on the young couple’s lips as they slowly made their way down the stairs, and the short journey looked like a pained one for both. There was a limp in the young woman’s step and the young man had yet to move his right arm at all. As they reached the bottom, they stepped around the dead walker and Jo moved out of the way and pointed toward the dining room table where she then gestured for them to sit down.

“I—I’m Sam,” the young man quickly introduced. He nodded at his female companion. “She’s Ana with one N,” he added nervously, taking a seat at the kitchen table while Ana limped as she moved to stand behind him.

“Are you both hurt?” Jo asked.

Sam nodded. “Yeah, but we’ve managed.”

Pulling her backpack off, she pulled a first aid kit out, while Rick apprehensively watched her approach the young man to clean up the wound on his right shoulder.

“How’d this happen?”

“Greenhouse around the corner,” Sam answered.

“We were looking for a place to crash. The roof’s broken now and it’s been getting rain, so it’s full of fruit,” Ana piped in with a smile, considerably more comfortable around Rick and Jo now. “We were there about a day and the skin-eaters showed up.”

Sam giggled. “Killjoys, man. Jackin’ it up for the whole world. I thought everybody was an asshole before this all went down. Now I _love_ people. You know—people who are alive.”

Jo placed her hand gently upon the back of Sam’s shoulder while she saw Rick fidgeting a few feet away; always suspicious of new people. “How did it happen?” she asked.

“When they were coming in through the door, I tripped crawling out the other side. Pulled the glass out, but my shoulder—it still hurts like a _bitch_.”

Jo frowned. “It’s dislocated.”

“Can you fix it?” Ana wondered.

Looking at Sam, to Ana, back to Sam and then the table, Jo knitted her brow together. She could sense Rick moving a little closer while she tried to recall how exactly fixing a dislocated shoulder went. “Here, lay on your back,” Jo announced, pushing everything that was on the table down onto the floor. As Sam looked up at her with hope in his eyes, he stood up and sat down on the table first before lying back onto it. “Now, move over a bit to the edge. Just hold your arm. Grab ahold of this bag.” As she handed him her backpack, Rick moved into the kitchen, but Jo couldn’t tell what he was doing. She was too focused on Sam, who was whimpering and gasping out in the pain he felt. “Hold on. And keep holding on.”

“N-no, that hurts,” Sam cried out as she stretched his arm out.

“Keep holding.”

“I can’t, I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. Keep holding,” she advised, more authoritatively, while pushing his arm upward slowly but steadily.

As his cries got more pained, she could hear the bone and cartilage in his shoulder making a slight crunching sound, which made her grimace slightly; hoping like hell she was doing this correctly and not fucking the poor guy up even more. When a noticeable popping sound could be heard, however, Sam’s breathing quickly seemed to ease up, and moving his arm became less of a chore.

“Sit up,” Jo directed.

“Is it—?” Ana began to ask.

Sam rotated his arm around once and looked up at Ana with a bright smile. “Yeah.”

“It’s gonna be sore for a few days,” Jo warned, pulling a seeing to the first aid kit again, and then placing an absorbent compress dressing over his shoulder wound, and keeping it in place with adhesive tape.

“Thank you so much,” he remarked with so much appreciation dripping from his voice.

“After the greenhouse, you came here?” Rick asked, finally joining the conversation.

“Yeah. We thought it was clear,” Sam nodded. “We missed the deadie in the PJs, so we dove into the bathroom.”

“How long were you up there till we showed up?”

“Like, two days.”

“There was just one. You had guns,” Jo remarked, a little dumbfounded.

“We have about twelve bullets,” Ana laughed, almost as if she thought it was all fun and games. “It usually takes us about five or six to bring one of them down.”

“But you have knives.”

“To what, stab it in the head?” Sam asked.

Jo suddenly looked at him as if he were an idiot child. “Uh, yeah.”

“We got separated from our crew about a week ago. Been trying to play it safe since it’s just the two of us.”

“I have to with my leg,” Ana offered.

“Yeah.”

“We were at a refugee center together and there was a fire,” the young woman began to explain. “People were just trampling over me.”

“Assholes,” Sam bit out, shaking his head; still visibly pissed off by their share memory.

“Sam saved my life. We didn’t know each other before. It didn’t heal right, but it healed,” Ana continued, rubbing her hand lovingly along Sam’s back. “And we found each other. It was worth it.”

Jo looked over at Rick and shared a look with him.

They knew all too well what it was like to find someone in this world you were willing to risk your neck for and to not regret it for one moment.

“Where are you two headed next?” Rick inquired, looking back at the young couple.

“We just keep moving. We haven’t been waiting for places to go bad,” Sam replied. He then smirked and gestured to his shoulder. “I mean, it’s getting a little old.”

“You guys look alright,” Ana commented. “What’s your setup like?”

Instead of outright answering their question, Rick stepped forward and smirked. “The ‘skin-eaters’? We call them walkers.” He shot Jo another look, and she just nodded at him; the two of them once more on the same wavelength. Bringing his focus back to Sam and Ana, he asked, “How many have you killed?”

The young couple looked at each other and both shrugged.

“I don’t know. A bunch?” Sam replied. “It’s not like we’ve kept count.”

“How many _people_ have you killed?” Jo joined in the questioning.

They looked at Rick and Jo as if they were crazy.

“None,” Ana replied. “Well, there was that _one_ guy—Danny. But we didn’t _directly_ kill him.”

“Why?”

Ana shrugged. “We were all stuck in this house a few miles away and Sam and I got out first and if we would’ve had helped Danny, then Sam would’ve gotten bit. We just…we couldn’t bring ourselves to risk our lives for his.”

“He was kind of a dick anyway,” Sam added. “Called her names because of her limp.” As Rick nodded, Sam stood up off the table and looked between the older pair. “So, did we pass your test?”

After brief hesitation, Rick shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “We're in a prison eight miles north,” he informed. “If you come back with us, we can't guarantee your safety. There's an illness, a flu. It's bad.”

“We've lost a lot,” Jo added, zipping her backpack up and throwing it over her shoulder. “Kids, too.”

“Yours?” Ana wondered.

“No, thank God,” Jo replied, albeit ruefully. “Our daughter’s safe in an area that wasn’t exposed to the illness, but one of the girls I teach has it.”

“I'm sorry.”

Jo shrugged. “She's strong. She'll make it.”

“You got fences and walls? We're in,” Sam insisted.

Nodding in agreement, Ana stepped a little closer to him. “Yeah, whatever you need us to do.”

“For now, sit tight,” Rick said, throwing his own backpack onto his shoulder. “The two of us will circle back for you in a couple of hours.”

“You promise?” Ana asked, hopefully.

Jo nodded. “We promise,” she assured. “Just stay here and take it easy. Eat a peach. And if we’re not back before dark, find a map and follow it north. The prison is on it. Someone will be there to let you in. Just tell them Rick and Jo sent you.”

Sam frowned a little. “What if we go there and they don’t believe us.”

“Tell them I said it’s what Hershel would’ve wanted,” Rick remarked, casting an eye at Jo.

“Who’s Hersh—nevermind. Okay. Yeah, we’ll wait here for you until you come back.”

With a nod of their heads, Rick and Jo wandered out toward the front hall and made their way back outside, shutting the door behind them, but stopped on the front steps. They looked at each other, then over their shoulders back at the door before continuing on their way.

 

* * *

 

A little while later, they were busy searching through the upstairs master bedroom of a different house; Rick was in the small en suite bathroom, looking through the medicine cabinet, while Jo was crouched down beside the bed, digging through the drawer of a nightstand.

“It’s all expired by at least a year,” Jo commented about the pill bottles she found so far.

“Better to take it,” Rick insisted. “Let Caleb decide what he can use.”

“If he’s even alive by the time we get back.”

“There you go again,” he quipped. “Pessimist.”

“Realist,” she corrected, moving on toward the dresser.

“Did you think it was right, letting those kids back with us?”

“Yeah, I do,” Jo replied. “We’ve lost too many people over the last few days and it’s better to have safety in numbers. If the infection doesn’t get them, and if they survive, then we got ourselves two more able bodies to help us rebuild what’s been broken down.”

Rick turned around and looked out into the bedroom at her. “That’s what I think, too,” he spoke. “It wouldn’t have been right leaving them behind. They’re not fighters, at least not yet, but we can help them get there. And they can help us.”

“It’s a win-win.” Jo cast her eyes over to him, watching him smirk at her comment. She then gestured toward the bathroom. “Don’t forget to check for toilet paper.”

“Aye-aye, Cap’n.”

Letting out a small chuckle, Jo returned her attention to the other dresser drawers.

 

* * *

 

Cutting through the downslope together behind a group of houses, Jo pointed up ahead of her and Rick.

“Let's hit the houses across the street,” she suggested.

“Hold on.”

Initially confused by why he suddenly stopped, Jo looked down and saw a tomato plant that had caught his attention. He dropped his backpack down onto the ground and knelt to pick the ripe tomatoes off.

“How'd you put his shoulder back before?” Rick wondered, referring to Sam. “Did you see that in a movie like you did about cauterizing a severed limb?”

Kneeling down beside him, Jo saw that he was looking at her with a mix of amusement and curiosity on his face. “No,” Jo snickered, helping him remove the tomatoes. “Oscar fell on our honeymoon. He was drunk off his ass and trying to do the Macarena or some other horrible dance at the resort bar. He lost his footing, fell over a bar stool and landed on his shoulder really hard. Paramedics came and determined he’d dislocated his shoulder. They were prepared to take him to the hospital, but Oscar had a phobia of hospitals, let alone some hospital in Cabo San Lucas, so they set his shoulder right there on the floor, and I watched them do it.”

“And you remembered after all that time?”

Jo nodded. “I’ve always had great long term memory. Now, my short term, not so much.”

Rick chuckled. “I think your short term seems just fine.”

Teasingly, she looked him dead in the eye and went completely serious. “Who are you? Where am I?”

Giving Jo a slight push to her right shoulder, Rick snickered. “Shut up.” As they stood back up, he looked over at the other houses across the way and then down at the backpack in his hands. “Do you still think of him?”

“Of Oscar?”

Rick nodded, slowly bringing his gaze back up to her. “Yeah.”

“Yeah, I do, once in a while,” she admitted. “Sometimes when I wake up, I forget where I am for a few moments and think I’m back home in Decatur and that if I roll over, I’ll be in my bed, and Oscar will be there next to me. I mean, we were married almost six years, and together fifteen. I loved him for almost half my life and after he died I couldn’t even comprehend that I would meet anyone else and find love again in this world.” Jo took a step closer to him and placed the palms of her hands on the flat of his chest. “Then you came into my life like goddamned Prince Charming and proved I could.”

Rick smiled gently. Tossing his backpack over his right shoulder, he brought his left hand up to the side of her face and kissed her for a brief moment. “Glad to be of service,” he joked.

“What about you?”

“What _about_ me? Do _I_ still think of your husband?”

Jo smacked his arm as he grinned back at her. “You know what I mean,” she insisted. “I know she’s still alive and very nearby, but do you ever think of Lori — like when the two of you were still together?”

As they began to continue walking, Rick nodded reluctantly. “If we’re being completely honest?”

“Please do.”

“Some mornings I still wake up half-expecting Lori to be there; reminding me to pick up Carl after school or telling me breakfast is ready,” he confessed. “Every Sunday she'd make us these pancakes that were just… _godawful_.” They both chuckled at his memory. “Clumps of flour that weren't mixed in right. Thing was…she knew it was bad.”

“Why'd she keep at it?”

“Well she wanted us to be the kind of family that ate pancakes on Sunday.”

“Maybe we can start that again, if we find some pancake mix like we discussed,” Jo remarked. “But we’ll make sure Lori does none of the cooking.”

Rick nodded and put his hand through hers. “Sounds like a plan.”

“Maybe we can find some chocolate chips,” Jo continued. “It’s just too bad we don’t have butter.”

“Maybe we’ll find ourselves a cow after this flu business goes away and we’ll have fresh milk. There’s gotta be a farmhouse somewhere with a butter churner. This is Georgia, after all.”

As the two of them continued onward behind a few houses, the sound of faint snarling wafted through the air and they stopped dead in their tracks when they rounded the corner of a house and came upon one male and one female walker. Rick pulled out his knife and walked up to female, jamming the blade through her temple as Jo did the same to the male; except, since the male walker was much taller than her, she put the blade up through the bottom of his chin.

“We should get back,” Jo spoke, once both walkers had fallen down upon the grass in dead heaps. “Sam and Ana are waiting for us.”

 

* * *

 

“We can’t believe you really came back,” Ana beamed as soon as Rick and Jo came through the front door. The young brunette was practically jumping out of her skin in relief and delight.

“We said we would,” Jo remarked.

Rick looked around the downstairs and then gestured to the couple. “You got everything you want to bring with you?”

“We left it all in our car,” Sam mentioned.

“The wagon with the writing on the windows?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, you’re lucky, because it looks like it’s gone untouched.”

“You still coming back with us? Even after knowing the risks you might be facing?” Jo inquired.

“Definitely,” Sam nodded. “Anything’s gotta be better than what we’ve been used to.”

“Are there any skin-eaters, I mean, _walkers_ out there?” Ana asked, a little nervous.

“There were two, but we took care of them.”

“Cool,” Sam smiled.

Rick looked between the young couple and then just nodded at them. “Alright. Let’s get out of here,” he announced. “We don’t want to waste daylight and we got people waiting on us.”

Without another word, Rick turned around and opened the front door, leading the way back out of the house. Jo followed after him first, with Sam and Ana closely in tow.

“You okay to drive?” Jo wondered.

“Yeah,” Sam insisted. “We’ll follow behind you.”

Rick and Jo accepted this. They were expecting the younger couple to do just that anyway.

Walking up to the Tucson, they opened up the back hatch and set their backpacks inside. They then moved around to their respective sides of the vehicle, opened their doors and slid inside, watching through the windshield as Sam and Ana did the same in the wagon in front of them.

“I think they’ll fit in rather well with our group,” Jo deduced, as Rick bought the Tucson to life.

“Yeah,” he agreed, “Me, too.”

 

* * *

 

Eight miles and one unexpected, but minor, roadblock later, the Tucson came ambling up the road leading to the prison as the sun began arching a little lower in the sky. As it came to stop a few feet in front of the outer metal gates, so did the Ford Taurus wagon behind them.

Rick peered into the rearview mirror, watching as Sam and Ana seemed to be talking excitedly between each other, and it brought a smile to his lips. The young couple’s hope made him feel a little more hope as well. And, considering the trials and tribulations from the last few days, he was welcoming of any little ounce of hope that could be tossed his way.

Dropping his right hand from the steering wheel, Rick reached over and intertwined his fingers through the fingers of Jo’s left hand.

She looked up at him and smiled at the gesture, just as Maggie appeared; walking out of the main guard tower up toward the courtyard.

They watched as she made her way down the gravel road and began the tedious process of opening both layers of gates. And, once they were through, the one-armed brunette raised her lone hand up over her eyes and squinted at the second vehicle following behind Rick and Jo. Unfortunately, she couldn’t take pause to watch the cars head up to the courtyard together, because she had to get at least the outermost gate closed first so no walkers got in. As soon as she pulled the inner gate closed, though, Maggie made a beeline up the gravel road and approached the two vehicles with one raised eyebrow.

As Rick hopped out of the Tucson, he looked ahead of where he and Jo had parked and noted the jeep, which Tyreese and Zach had taken, was back.

Rick breathed an audible sigh of relief. “Tyreese and Zach are back?” he called over to Maggie.

“They got back an hour after you left, if that,” Maggie replied. “Whoever’s the new leader of Woodbury gave them a rough time; made ‘em sweat it out after they pleaded our case. Literally made them wait all night long for a goddamned answer.”

“Which was?”

“They wouldn’t spare any of their meds, but they agreed to lend their doctor to us for the day. They want her back no later than tomorrow at sunrise or they are apparently gonna come here asking for our heads on a platter or some bullshit.”

“Lilly,” Jo spoke, having hopped out of the car and heard everything Maggie said. “The new leader’s name is Lilly.”

“I’d think ‘Major Bitch’ is more fitting.”

“Yeah, she didn’t seem to have the greatest bedside manner last time we saw her,” Rick remarked.

“Then again, we _had_ just attacked her town.”

“Tomato, to _mah_ to.”

Jo walked around to the back hatch of the Tucson and pulled out both their backpacks. “And now we _have_ more tomatoes and to _mah_ toes.” Handing his bag off to him, she looked over at the wagon, where Sam and Ana remained seated, and shy. “You coming out?”

Jumping out of their car like two puppy dogs with their tails wagging happily, the young couple sidled up beside each other and nodded over at Maggie.

“Hello,” Sam greeted with a smile as he looked curiously at Maggie’s prosthetic. “I’m Sam.”

“And I’m Ana.”

Maggie narrowed her gaze at them, a little suspicious. “I’m Maggie.”

“We found them during our run,” Rick explained. “Jo reset his dislocated arm and we figured the more, the merrier.” Giving the Maggie a reassuring gaze, she seemed to visibly stop tensing. “Where’s Tyreese and Zach now?”

“Oh, yeah…about that.” Maggie turned to face Rick and Jo more fully; lowering her voice a bit. “While you were gone, Sasha took a turn for the worse.” Off the older couple’s fallen expressions, Maggie nodded; confirming their worst fear. “She died a little while after Tyreese got back. He couldn’t be there when it happened, but at least he was back from Woodbury.”

“Shit,” Rick muttered. “How’s he taking it?”

“Not too well. He practically barreled out into the yard and began digging her grave,” Maggie informed. “He wouldn’t even stop to take a break for a sip of water until she was buried and he insisted on doing it all himself.”

“Where’s he now?” Jo wondered.

“Pacing in D Block, last I checked.”

Rick nodded. “I’ll go talk to him.”

As Jo locked eyes with him, she nodded as well. “I’ll take the meds we found to A Block and check on Carol. She should take a break anyway, seeing as that Woodbury doctor is here now.”

“I’ll do it,” Maggie offered. “I want to see how Glenn’s doing.”

Rick shook his head. “No.” Looking over at her, he gestured to their newcomers. “I need you to show Sam and Ana to C Block. I want to keep the risk of them getting exposed as low as possible, so can you set them up in your dad’s old cell for now?”

“Shane’s using it.”

“Tell him he can bunk in with Daryl, Morgan or Merle, then, if he still won’t work his issues out with Lori.”

“Yeah,” Maggie caved. “Alright.” She motioned for Sam and Ana to follow her. “C’mon.”

As they watched the young couple quickly gather up their belongings from the backseat of their wagon, and then head off toward C Block behind Maggie, Rick and Jo looked back at each other.

“Wear a scarf around your face when you go in A Block, but don’t go all the way inside,” he advised.

“I’ll leave the meds outside the door to the cell block and someone can get them after I leave.”

“Okay,” Rick nodded. Leaning in, he placed a kiss upon her lips and then handed her back his bag before stalking off in the direction of D Block to find Tyreese.

Just when she thought she was alone in the courtyard, Zach came sauntering out from the direction of the administration building to greet her. “Hey.”

Jo looked over at him and smirked. “Hey,” she repeated. “I heard you had an aggravating night in Woodbury.”

“Yeah, and I’m fucking exhausted. We couldn’t even sleep. They had us in this office in the Town Hall and all we could do was either sit in these uncomfortable chairs or pace around, waiting for hell to freeze over.” Zach groaned and sighed heavily. “What a bitch, too. I don’t remember Lilly being such a big one. I think she’s let power go to her head.”

“As long as she’s not doing to anyone there what The Governor did to me, or as long as she doesn’t try to hurt us unprovoked, she can be as big of bitch as her heart desires,” Jo quipped. “She may have been shitty, how she went about treating you and Ty, but at least she consented to helping us as much as she was willing. She could’ve just said no after all was said and done.”

“True.”

Digging through the backpacks she transferred the meds into one smaller plastic bag. “Can you take everything else in these two backpacks to D Block for me?”

“Sure,” Zach nodded, taking the bags from her.

“Thanks.” Without saying anything else to him, Jo walked off toward A Block.

As soon as she made her way inside, she pulled a scarf out of her back pants pocket and tied it around her face before approaching the completely solid metal door that led into the quarantined cell block. Looking through the small, glass window in the door, she knocked on the hard surface and waited. When Glenn came stumbling out of one of the caged cells, looking like death warmed over, Jo frowned and waved at him, but then pointed to her left — his right — for him to head into the same room where Lizzie had spoken to her from that morning.

Moving to the large glass window, Jo waited and shortly after Glenn appeared, shuffling slowly into the room; his skin pallid and clammy, his eyes bloodshot with dark circles around them and his shoulders slouched.

“Hey, Glenn. Are you feeling any better?”

“No,” he replied honestly. He shook his head and looked weary-eyed back at her.

“Rick and I brought back some meds from our run. We’re hoping they might help.”

“I’m sure any little bit will.”

“How’s that Woodbury doctor?”

Glenn coughed, and it easily winded him. Placing his palms against his side of the window, he braced himself to keep from falling over. “She’s okay, but there hasn’t been much she can do without meds. She brought a bag with medical tools with her, and she intubated Henry. Carol’s helping her with that right now.”

“So, Carol’s alright?”

Glenn nodded. “More or less.”

“What does that mean?”

Coughing again, Glenn held up an index finger; silently asking her to give him a second to catch his breath before he answered. “She’s got a fever now,” he eventually replied. “And Lizzie died about an hour ago, so she’s mentally drained, too.”

Jo’s shoulders fell. “Lizzie died?” she questioned as tears filled her eyes.

“And Dr. S is worse,” Glenn added. “I don’t think he has much longer.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Jo dipped her chin to her chest and wiped her tears away.

“Jo?”

Lifting, her eyes back up to the young man across the window from her, Jo knitted her brow together. “Yeah?”

“Will you tell Maggie I love her?”

“I can send her in here as soon as I see her. You can tell her yourself.”

“No. I don’t want her to see me like this,” he insisted. “I want her to remember me when I looked healthy. And—and tell her I’m sorry we argued about having a family of our own and that if things were different than they are right now, that if I hadn’t gotten sick, I would’ve been honored to have children with her.”

Jo shook her head. “Don’t you dare start talking like that, Glenn. Just don’t.”

“She needs to know, and I need you to—”

Glenn couldn’t even finish his sentence. He began coughing so hard he had to drop to his knees and brace himself on the floor. Jo craned her neck to try and get a better look at him; wishing there was more she could do for him. When he sat back on the heels of his feet, she watched as he moved the back of his hand away from his lips and noticed a small spattering of blood had transferred from his mouth to his hand.

Glenn looked up at Jo and frowned. “Please don’t tell Maggie about this,” he pleaded. “Just…just tell her what I told you. Don’t tell her anything else. If she asks how I am, tell her I seemed fine; as good as to be expected. Or, better yet, tell her there hadn’t been any changes in my condition.” When Jo seemed hesitant to acquiesce to his request, he got back up to his feet — albeit, slowly — and pleaded at her with his dark, tired eyes. “Please, Jo.”

Parting her lips, Jo yielded. “Alright. Okay, fine. I’ll lie to her for you.”

“It’s not lying,” he attempted to smile. “It’s just omitting a few truths.”

Shaking her head, she placed the palm of her right hand against the glass of the window. “Please don’t die,” she begged. “I don’t want to lose anymore people today.”

Glenn placed his left hand on the window, over hers. “I’ll do my best.”

With a small smile, she gestured over in the direction of the door that led inside to the cell block. “I left the meds outside the door. Once I’ve left, have someone come out to get them.”

Glenn nodded. “Okay. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

 

* * *

 

Minutes later, Jo was back outside in the courtyard and headed off toward the administration building. Winding the hallways, she soon made her way to the room where Mika, Luke and Molly had been quarantined to.

Approaching the door, she knocked softly on it. “Mika? It’s Jo, honey.”

“Yeah?” came the small voice inside.

“How are you three feeling in there? Anyone getting sick?”

“No, we’re fine,” Mika replied. “We found some pencils and we're drawing.”

Jo smiled, but the tears stinging her eyes blurred her vision. “That’s great.”

“How’s Lizzie? Have you seen her?” the ten-year-old asked. “Is she okay?”

“Why don’t you come out into the hall so we can talk.”

“Is it safe to?”

“Yeah, honey. I’m not sick,” Jo assured.

After a few moments, the doorknob to the office turned and the door opened a little as a set of eyes peered out at her. When Jo offered a smile at the girl, the door opened wider and Mika stepped out. Jo then reached her hand out and pulled the door closed so that she could talk to Mika alone in the hallway.

“Is something wrong?” Mika asked. Studying Jo’s sad face, she added, “Someone died, didn’t they?”

Jo nodded. “Yeah, honey. A few more people have today.”

“Who?”

Pulling Mika a little further away from the office, Jo sank down to her knees and held onto the girl’s hands, staring up into her face. “Mika…” A pout began to form on the girl’s face, and Jo felt horrible. She’d never had to break news like this to a child before. “It was…it was Lizzie. You know she was sick. I saw her early this morning, and she was doing pretty well, but things changed rather drastically. Medicine just didn’t get to her in time, and there was only so much Dr. S and Carol were able to do.”

Mika’s lips and chin quivered as tears stung her eyes. “Lizzie’s dead?”

“Yeah, honey. I’m—I’m so sorry,” Jo nodded. When the tears finally began to fall down Mika’s face, Jo pulled the girl into her arms and held her close. “I know, I know. You go ahead and cry as much as you need to, okay?”

As if that was the invitation she needed, Mika wrapped her arms tightly around Jo’s neck and buried her face into Jo’s shoulder as she sniffled and cried her little heart out. Jo kept her own arms firmly around Mika’s back, rubbing it in soothing circles with her hands.

“I’m alone now,” Mika whimpered. “My family’s all gone.”

“You’re not alone, sweetie. I’m here for you, Carol’s here for you and Rick’s here for you. Everyone is here for you, and we’re gonna fight to protect you. Okay?”

Mika lifted her face up, staring sadly, as Jo held her face in both her hands. She leaned the girl’s head down and kissed her forehead and then brushed the hair behind Mika’s ears while offering a reassuring smile.

“We don’t wanna stay in here again tonight; me, Luke and Molly. It’s scary and lonely,” Mika pleaded. “We’re not sick. I don’t think we’re gonna get sick.”

Lowering her hands from Mika’s face and down to her arms, Jo stared off over the girl’s shoulder and over to the office door. She bit her lips together, thinking, before bringing her eyes back up to Mika. “Have you ever slept in a camper before?”

Mika nodded.

“Rick and I have been staying in the RV the last two nights. Mr. Daryl was sleeping on the table that folded down into a bed, but he wasn’t here last night to use it and there’s two twin beds in the back bedroom,” Jo commented. “I think, maybe, we can all share. How’s that sound?”

Mika nodded again, a small smile trying to appear on her lips. “It sounds good.”

“Alright.” Jo stood up and put a hand on Mika’s shoulder. “Let’s get the other two out of here.”

 

* * *

 

Luke and Molly skipped through the courtyard, hand in hand, a couple of feet ahead of Jo, who was holding Mika’s hand. As the four made their way around the outdoor kitchen and toward the RV, Rick was trailing not far behind them; having come out from D Block’s entrance.

“Jo,” he called out, gesturing to the children. “What’s going on? Did something happen in administration? Is it overrun?”

Jo shook her head. “I made a call,” she replied. “These kids are fine. If they were gonna get sick, it would’ve happened by now, but they’re a picture of health. They’re scared of staying in that part of the prison, away from everyone else, and I think it’ll be better if they stay closer to us, so I’m moving them into the RV instead.” Licking her bottom lip, she could see Mika staring up between the two adults. “If you don’t agree with my decision, that’s tough shit.”

Rick raised his brow at her and took half a step back as he placed his hands on his hips. She watched as he licked his tongue across the tops of his teeth with a closed mouth before looking down at Mika and offering the girl a kind smile.

“The RV door is unlocked,” he said to the girl. “Why don’t you take the other two inside and make yourselves comfortable.”

Mika nodded, but was reluctant to let go of Jo’s hand. Once all three children were out of earshot, and as Maggie came out of C Block with Shane in tow, Rick leaned in toward Jo.

“I’m not upset by your decision, but it would’ve been nice to be informed of it first.”

“Lizzie died, Rick. I literally just got done telling a ten-year-old child her last family member is dead and I couldn’t just walk away and leave her alone in that office another night with the other kids, who also happen to be orphans, as well. They need some semblance of normalcy, and we can provide that simply by sharing a space together.”

Rick bowed his head. “I didn’t know about Lizzie.”

“It happened a short while ago.”

As Maggie and Shane walked past, Shane pointed to the yard. “There’s a cluster of walkers that’s getting bigger than the one that took the fence down,” he informed. “We need to do something about it now.”

Rick nodded. “Alright, I’ll be down there to help in a minute.” Looking at Jo as the other two walked off, he touched his hands gently to her arms. “We’ll talk more on this later. There’s something I need to talk to you about anyway. But first, why don’t you find Zach and grab him. We’ll need the extra set of hands.”

“Okay.”

Giving Jo’s hand a squeeze, Rick walked off out of the courtyard and down the gravel road, disappearing from her sight as she turned toward D Block. However, just as she was about to head inside, Zach came out and smiled at her.

“Good, I was just coming to find you,” she announced.

“Well, here I am. Now what are your other two wishes,” he teased.

“Funny,” Jo spoke, clearly not amused at all. “There’s buildup of walkers on the fence. It’s all hands on deck.”

Zach nodded. “Yeah, okay.”

Following Jo down into the yard, they made their way to the space in between the inner and outer fences; grabbed sharpened sticks or crowbars off the chain-link like the others; except for Maggie, whose arm prosthetic was incredibly handy — no pun intended.

Even though it didn’t look as if they were going to get sick, Rick and Jo still maintained more of a distance from Maggie and Shane, just in case. Zach had been more exposed, so he stood even further down the line away from the latter pair while all five of them sank their melee weapons into the skulls of the walkers lining the fence. Rick simultaneously tried kicking wooden beams into place to keep that particular section of fence from caving like the other one did the day before.

“Jo, did you see Glenn when you went into A Block?” Maggie asked, carrying a wood beam over with Shane.

“I, uh…yeah.” Jo shot Rick a wary look that he didn’t quite grasp at first.

“How is he?”

“He’s holding up.”

“Good, that’s good.” Maggie sighed. “I hope that Woodbury doctor really helps out.”

“And fast,” Shane muttered. “Apparently she’s only on loan to us till the end of the day.”

“Till sunrise tomorrow, actually,” Zach corrected. “But that’s, technically, when they want her back by, so…” Off Shane’s withering look, the younger man added, “But, yeah, till the end of the day.”

Without warning, a hand from a walker slipped underneath the fence and grabbed onto Rick’s ankle, pulling him down.

“Damn,” he grumbled as he fell back on his ass.

Jo reacted quickly, without even thinking, as she grabbed her hunting knife out of its sheath and hack the arm off just below the wrist. As decaying blood spilled out onto the ground, Jo then offered Rick his hand and helped him back up. He nodded and smiled at her before glancing at the others who had looked to see if he was okay.

“Got yourself a good woman, there, Rick,” Shane quipped.

“Yes, he does,” Jo chuckled.

The five of them continued to take out as many walkers as they could on the fence, while Rick and Shane stepped away to cut up the sections from the pigpen for more beams. As they resigned themselves to their respective tasks, shots rang out from the direction of A Block.

“Shit,” Rick muttered.

Maggie was immediately distracted from the walkers on the fence and looking, worry-eyed toward the building. As she stepped further up onto the gravel road from the in between the inner and outer fences, she threw a gaze over at Rick.

“Go ahead, go,” he said to her, knowing she wouldn’t be able to focus on anything except Glenn.

“I’ll come with you,” Zach announced, pulling his scarf up over his face as he began to run after her.

Jo walked away from the fence and looked over at Rick and Shane, with her arms folded across her chest. “I lied to her,” she commented. “Glenn’s not holding up. That’s just what he wanted me to tell her. He didn’t want her to see him.” She looked both men in the eye. “He’s gotten much worse.”

Sighing, Rick looked down at the ground. “There’s nothing we can do about that now. We need to get this fence secure.”

Both Jo and Shane nodded, with Shane beginning to drag another beam over to the outer fence.

Reaching over, Rick touched his fingertips to Jo’s before exchanging a knowing look with her, and then returning to cutting up another beam.

 

* * *

 

It didn’t take long before the gunshots had ceased and darkness had fallen.

Using lanterns to give them some light, Rick and Jo continued providing the support beams to the fence long after Shane had gone up to check on C Block and make and the kids in the RV on Jo’s request.

The beams seemed to be doing their job and Rick smiled at how well things were going, all things considered, just as one of the beams began to crack from the continued weight and buildup of walkers that just wouldn’t ease up.

In a flurry of motion, Rick ran up to the section that was now giving. “Wait!”

Whether he was yelling to her or the fence, Jo wasn’t sure. She _was_ sure when the fence finally gave completely away and walkers began to spill inside.

Rick jumped back and whipped his knife out, stabbing one walker in the head as he shouted to her, “Run!”

As she turned and began to tear up the incline, Rick followed as quickly behind her as he could; pushing walkers out of his way. He placed a hand to her back to move her along as a walker got closer to her. He shoved the walker away, and the exertion caused him to drop to his knees, so Jo turned back toward him and grabbed him up.

“Rick! C’mon!”

They slipped into one of the guard towers, slamming the metal door shut behind them; their breathing coming out in labored pants as they tried staring at each other through the darkness. Groping for her, Rick turned her away from him and pushed her forward through the other door on the other side of the tower that led into another area of the courtyard. A moment later, they practically stumbled out as they turned round and looked upon the small herd of walkers filling up that space between the outer and inner fences, and were beginning to press up against the section of the inner fence that led into the courtyard.

“What do we do?” Jo wondered.

Rick panted, looking to their right. “Maybe I can back the bus up against the fence.”

“Will it hold?”

Looking at each other with mild panic in their eyes, Rick took her by the hand and led her away as the walkers continued to push on the fence, trying to get through. “C’mon.” Instead of the bus, he brought her over to the prison’s old laundry bins that were stocked with guns and ammo galore. “Here,” he said as he began to strap an automatic rifle around Jo, and then handed her a handgun to shove into her back pants. Rick did the same, and then handed her the magazine for the rifle he’d given her.

“Rick, I don’t know to use one like this.”

“Alright, listen to me.”

“Alright,” she nodded, waiting anxiously.

“Magazine goes in here. Release is here,” he began to explain, gesturing what to do as she watch with rapt attention; all the while he was leading them back toward the walkers trying to get in. “Make sure it latches. Pull back the operating rod and rounds feed up. Keep squeezing the trigger for rapid fire, okay?”

Nervously, she nodded her head again. “Alright.”

Leaning down slightly, Rick placed a hand on her shoulder and looked her in the eye. “You shoot or you run. Don't let 'em get close, okay?”

They stopped as soon as the section of fence came down and the walkers began crawling over it; stumbling into the courtyard, snarling and eternally hungry. Without hesitation, Rick and Jo stood side by side as they opened fire. Headshot after headshot, they took the seemingly nonstop barrage of walkers down. Several shots were off a bit; hitting shoulders or chests. Rick knelt down at one point to get a better angle. When his magazine ran empty, he gestured to Jo who pulled an extra out of her back pocket and tossed it to him. Rick caught it and put it in with ease before returning to firing.

Looking to his right, Rick watched as Jo stepped forward a bit more; a woman suddenly on a mission. The more she focused on her targets and let everything else fall away, the better her aim got and it took her only one shot to the head per walker to get the job done. Rick gave her a quick once over; briefly amused when he thought back to the woman she was when they first met. He knew she had always been a strong woman — she had to be to have survived what she went through when her family died, and after what The Governor had done to her. But she was even stronger from the woman she had to become then to the woman she was now. She became strong to survive and that was admirable in itself. However, now she was this woman of strength and authority within the prison who commanded respect and provided a sense of hope for the living, and not just because she had given birth to a child named Hope.

Also, there was the whole beautiful woman firing the shit out of an automatic rifle thing that stirred something more than respect for her in Rick.

As the two of them continued their firefight against the undead, which were dropping like flies, Shane came running out from C Block with a gun in hand.

“What the fuck is going on?”

“You’re late to the party, cowboy,” Jo quipped.

Rick shot Shane a smirk and shrugged. “It happened fast,” he answered. “Beam broke, outer fence fell and they got through here.” As he fired off a few more shots, he watched when Jo looked down at her rifle when she’d run out of ammo. “Just toss it. You got the handgun.”

Jo _did_ just toss it, but she ignored the comment about the handgun and pulled the hunting knife from the sheath still strapped to her thigh from earlier in the day. “Fuck that,” she remarked as she stalked up to the few walkers left.

Jabbing one in the skull, she pushed it back out of her way as it fell down to the ground like a sack of potatoes. As two walkers tried descending upon her at the same time, she kicked one back in the stomach to buy herself some time as she stuck the knife in the second’s temple. While pulling the blade out, the former came charging at her once more, but Rick fired a shot into its skull, dropping it like a bad habit.

After a few more minutes, all the walkers were nothing more than an undead heap on the ground. Some weren’t completely dead, and were still writhing around, so Rick, Shane and Jo moved around, checking to see and destroying the heads of those still figuratively kicking.

“The gunfire’s stopped in A Block,” Shane noted.

Jo looked sadly at Shane, and then to Rick. “Looks like we got more people to bury.”

Rick shook his head. “Nah,” he disagreed. “I hate to even say it, but we gotta burn them. With the sickness, we can’t risk burying them with the others. They could taint the soil as they decompose, and we can’t risk losing our crops.”

Shane nodded. “We’ll get on that first thing tomorrow.”

“You don’t need to,” Rick insisted. “We still don’t know where this infection stands and how dangerous it can be to anyone who hasn’t been exposed yet.”

“It’s gotta be airborne, and if Shane hasn’t gotten it by now, he’s not gonna get it,” Jo remarked. “Not _everyone_ who’s been exposed has gotten it. It’s just been the _un_ -luck of the draw.”

Before Rick could say anything, headlights from a minivan approached the outer gate to the prison.

The trio turned and looked, narrowing their gazes.

“I think the cavalry just finally arrived,” Shane jested.

As Rick looked down at the ground, at the mass of walkers lying dead at their feet, his shoulders slumped and he let out a tired breath, while Shane stepped away to make a beeline to the yard to open the gates.

“I don’t recognize the van,” Jo spoke. “Do you think it’s Daryl or someone from Woodbury, come to collect their doctor?”

“Daryl and the others, I hope,” Rick replied, seeming a little down and out.

Sheathing her hunting knife, Jo closed the gap between them and ran her hands up his arms to his shoulders. “We’re gonna be okay,” she assured. “We’ll fix everything we can, and what we can’t—oh well.”

Rick nodded slowly, leaning his forehead against hers. “I just…I don’t want to lose any more people,” he commented dejectedly. “We’re good people. We don’t deserve this.”

“No, we don’t. We just take what we’re given and we make the best of it.” Jo shrugged. “It’s all we can do. We fight and we live, and that makes us mighty — it makes us strong; not just for ourselves, but each other.”

Sniffing, Rick licked at his bottom lip which felt a bit chapped. “You make me strong, and without you I’m weak.”

Jo rolled her eyes, dragging her hands down to his chest and giving him a playful slap. “Alright, there, Mr. Hallmark Card.”

As she began to saunter away from him, Rick took a moment before following after. He watched as she pulled back the main gate as the minivan came up the gravel road and pulled inside of the courtyard. Inside was Daryl at the wheel, Andrea in the passenger seat and Morgan in the back, sliding the door open to hop out.

Andrea jumped out quickly as well and pulled her gun out on instinct when she saw the slew of dead walkers up a ways. “What the hell happened?”

“A lot,” was Rick’s tired and vague answer.

“How’s Carol?” Daryl asked.

Rick shrugged. “She’s been in A Block all day. There was gunfire not too long ago in there.” He lifted a hand as if to run his fingers through his hair but then just seemed confused by what to do next. He dropped his hand back down and shook his head. “Sasha died this morning, and Ben, and Lizzie, just a couple hours ago. I haven’t been in there yet. I—I don’t know.”

“I spoke to Glenn,” Jo informed. “He wasn’t doing well at all. He told me about Lizzie. He also told me that Dr. S wasn’t long for the world and that Carol was showing signs of the infection, too.”

“Tyreese and Zach got back this morning with the doctor from Woodbury, but we can only use her services until daybreak tomorrow.” Rick threw both hands up in the air, suddenly frustrated. “Shit, if she’s dead in there, I don’t want to even think of the shitstorm that fucking town will try bringing down on us.”

Shane came back up the gravel road and into the courtyard. “We need to check out the situation in A Block.” He gestured to the three that just returned. “They got a bunch of meds and we need to get it to those still alive, and fast.”

Rick nodded, taking a bag of meds that Morgan tossed to him. “Daryl and I will take them in,” he offered. “The rest of you can go back to C Block. Jo,” he looked at her, “Why don’t you check on the kids in the RV? The gunfire’s probably scared the shit outta them.”

Everyone nodded and, after a moment, went off in their separate directions.

Shane, Morgan and Andrea returned to C Block, Jo slipped into the RV, while Daryl and Rick carried the bags of meds into A Block where they were almost immediately greeted by carnage and broken glass.

The door that lead inside to the cell block was locked from the inside out, but the window into the room which had once been used for inmate executions had been shot out. A chair had been pulled up to it for someone to use to climb inside.

As broken glass crunched under their boots, the two men quickly made their way inside the cell block, where they noted several trails of blood and plenty of blood splatter. There were bodies of former D Blockers that had turned into walkers upon death that were lying completely dead on the floor.

“Maggie!” Rick called out. “Carol!”

A woman neither recognized stepped out of an upper cell and looked down at the two men. “They’re up here.”

“Are they okay?”

“They’re alive.”

“We got the meds.”

The woman approached the top of the stairs and nodded. “I’m Dr. Stevens,” she introduced herself.

“I’m Rick.”

“Daryl,” offered up.

Dr. Stevens looked at Rick. “I remember you from that night at Woodbury,” she remarked. It was hard to tell if she harbored any ill will against him because of what happened months before. “I’m sorry this sickness has spread so badly.”

“So am I,” Rick replied, as he and Daryl ascended the stairs.

“We just had one hell of a time in here. Without proper meds I haven’t been able to do much of anything. All I could really do was attempt to making the dying more comfortable; wet rags on foreheads, water to drink. And then they just started dying and turning, and some attacked the others, hence the gunfire you probably heard from outside.”

“We did,” Rick confirmed. “We had some issues with the dead outside, too.”

“Yeah,” Dr. Stevens nodded. “We heard.”

As she led them to a cell at the end up the upstairs level, Rick and Daryl were greeted by Carol sitting in on a bed, covering her mouth with a rag as she coughed briefly. What primarily caught their eye was the heartbreaking scene of Maggie sitting on the floor, cradling Glenn’s dead body in her arms as she sobbed hard. Tears were also streaking Carol’s face when she suddenly looked up and noticed Daryl and Rick standing there.

Jumping up, she ran over to Daryl and threw her arms around him. “You made it back,” she muttered. Just as soon as he reciprocated the hug, she quickly pulled back. “Sorry, I don’t want to get you sick, too.”

Daryl shrugged. “Was worth the risk.”

Crouching down, Rick set the bags at his feet and covered his mouth with his hand as he stared at Maggie and Glenn; tears burning at his blue eyes. “Oh, Maggie…I’m so sorry.”

“I didn’t…I didn’t…” she struggled to find the words to say. Lifting her head, she locked eyes with Rick as her lips and chin quivered in her grief. “I was too late. He was already gone when I got in here,” she blubbered. “I didn’t get to say goodbye.”

“We need to hurry up and put these meds to use,” Dr. Stevens spoke up again. “We'll dissolve the pills in the IVs, put 'em right into the bloodstream. Dosage will be tricky, though, considering the time we lost.”

“Do whatever you need to do to save the rest,” Rick commented, wiping his tears away with the back of his hand.”

Dr. Stevens nodded. “I know my people told you they would only let me stay until morning, but I will stay as long as it takes,” she informed. “I made an oath to first do no harm, and if I leave before I’ve done all I can do, harm is exactly what I’d be doing.”

“We appreciate it,” Daryl acknowledged.

 

* * *

 

While Rick stood back up and eventually took his leave, Daryl chose to stay and help Dr. Stevens; though Rick had a feeling the archer mostly wanted to be nearby to help take care of Carol so she didn’t get as worse off as the others had.

Once he was back outside and greeted with air that wasn’t stale from death, blood and other bodily fluids, Rick inhaled a deep breath and then dropped to his knees. Hunching forward, tears rolled down his face while sweat caused his curls to cling to his forehead and droop over his ears. Rick braced himself by resting his hands on his upper thighs as sobs of his own grief wracked his body.

He grieved for the loss of his friends, for the deep losses everyone else was feeling for those they lost that day and the previous days that they were closer to than he was, and he grieved for those who still might die because the meds didn’t get to them soon enough. He felt nothing but guilt coursing through his veins as he ugly cried, making a lame attempt at wiping the incessant tears from his face.

Rick sensed one or two people nearby, but couldn’t be bothered to look around and see whoever it was. All he was seeing was sadness, and if felt like all the good that he’d managed to accomplish earlier in the day no longer meant anything.

Over in the inner courtyard, just under the covered bridge, Tyreese and Zach stood, watching their fearless leader as he broke down, while Jo stood outside the RV and slowly began to approach him.

Her gait never faltered as she walked right up to Rick, and when she reached him, she crouched down and placed her hands upon his shoulders.

“C’mon,” she urged, trying to get him up to his feet.

Trying to rein his tears in, Rick nodded and stood with her. Once they were both upright, Jo slid a hand behind his back and led him past Tyreese and Zach, who stepped aside to give them room, and continued to lead Rick toward the door that led into D Block.

From there, they maneuvered the halls and climbed a set of stairs. Rick wasn’t even paying any attention to where they were going until he noticed they were in the administration building.

The scattered papers all over the floor, and the brown, wooden office doors were the dead giveaways.

“Where are we go—?” Rick began to ask, before Jo shushed him and opened up one of the doors.

Inside the room in question was a simple office, but there was a leather couch along one wall, and that’s where Jo made Rick sit down. Shutting the door behind them, he looked up at her as his tears subsided and his breathing returned to a normal pace. Then, she moved to take a seat next to him, but leaned back against one of the armrests and lifted her left leg to stretch out behind him.

Patting her stomach, she gestured for him to scoot back up against her. “C’mere.”

Looking her over for a moment, Rick then turned his back to her and slid up against her chest while she placed her hands on his shoulders, forcing him to lean down. Without hesitation, Jo wrapped her arms around his upper chest, and smiled as he rested his head back upon her left clavicle.

“Glenn’s gone, isn’t he?” she whispered.

Rick nodded briefly. “Yeah.” His voice sounded drained of all emotion.

“I was supposed to tell Maggie that he said he loved her and that he was sorry they argued about having a family of their own; that if he hadn’t gotten sick, he would’ve been honored to have children with her,” she admitted. “He didn’t want her to see how sick he’d gotten. I think he just wanted her to remember how he was.”

“She was holding his body. He was already dead,” Rick spoke. “I didn’t notice any wound on his head, so I don’t think he turned yet, and if he hasn’t, I don’t know if she’ll be the one to take care of him, or if someone else will.”

“She shouldn’t have to,” Jo remarked.

“I feel like a failed her somehow. Since she met me, she’s lost her sister, her arm, her father and now her husband.” Shifting slightly in Jo’s arms, Rick reached down into his front pocket and grabbed onto something. “I guess there won’t be any double wedding now.”

“I guess not.”

Whatever he was holding onto in his pocket, he slowly pulled out. “I found these in a jewelry box in one of the houses we checked today.” Opening the palm of his hand, he revealed two wedding bands. They were simple, silver rings; although one was slightly thinner and was imbedded with three tiny diamonds. “I told you I’d find you a better ring, and I found one for myself, too.”

Jo took the smaller, more feminine ring meant for her between her thumb and index finger; holding it up to peer through the considerably dark office at it. “It looks like it’ll fit, too.”

“That’s what I thought,” he agreed. “I already tried mine on and it fits.”

Placing her ring back in his palm, she curled his fingers around both of the wedding bands. “Hold onto them,” she insisted. “I don’t think we should put them on just yet. It’s not the right time. I think we’re gonna need more time for anyone to be in the mood for a wedding, and at this point I don’t think we should even bother with the pomp and circumstance of one.”

“Yeah, I’m not in much of a celebratory mood right now, either,” he concurred, pocketing the rings back up.

He sounded so deflated that it made her heart ache.

“How about a week from now, whether or not anyone else cares to be present, we’ll exchange those rings, we’ll say some vows and become man and wife?” Jo suggested. “I think Maggie and Glenn had the right idea. All that matters is we’re together and that we stay together.”

“That’s fine with me.” Shifting around again, Rick pulled his legs up onto the leather couch and bent them at the knees to fit. He turned his body, sliding his head down to rest it sideways upon Jo’s chest while he wrapped his arms around her torso.

Lifting her own arms up, Jo brought her hands down to rest upon Rick’s head; intertwining her fingers through his curls which were damp from sweat. Leaning forward slightly, she kissed the top of his head and closed her eyes; letting the steady rise and fall of her chest lull them both.

After such a long, emotional rollercoaster of a day, they were too tired to stay awake for much longer.

There would be plenty for them to do by the time the sun began to rise and they would need as much rest as they could get.

“I love you, Rick,” she murmured against the top of his head. “Come hell and high water.”

Rick sighed; a faint but loving smile attempting to take up residence on his lips. “I love you, too, babe.”

Closing their eyes tight, and focusing on the sound of their breaths, Rick and Jo let temporary unconscious descend upon them.


	25. Gone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: Major character deaths ahead!
> 
> That being said, I hope you've all realized by now that I'm not following the show verbatim. As stated in the story summary, not everyone who originally lives does, and not everyone who originally dies does either! While you may lose your fan favorites, characters who were killed off early on and/or never got a chance, now do!

_"When enemies are at your door_  
_I'll carry you away from war_  
_If you need help, if you need help._  
_Your hope dangling by a string_  
_I'll share in your suffering_  
_To make you well, to make you well."_  
— Phillip Phillips

* * *

  
As the morning sun began to rise a little higher in the sky, it was time for everyone in the prison to take stock of what they still had to figure out what to do next.

Rick hadn't been able to sleep very well. He tossed and turned most of the night; riddled with nightmares and a mind that just wouldn't shut up. Jo had to wake him up a few times when he began thrashing, to let him know he was dreaming and to calm him down. Eventually he had just moved down to the floor to sleep, and leave Jo to sleep more comfortably on the leather couch by herself. However, the floor was uncomfortable, which made sleeping even more of a chore. So, before the sun had even risen for the day, Rick had gotten up. He walked quietly around the small office and sat down at the desk, biting his thumbnail while he looked over at Jo's unconscious form. His eyes were tired but there was nothing he could do about it. His body wanted sleep, but his mind had other plans.

Leaning back in the chair, he folded his hands across his chest and just stared into the diminishing darkness of the room; it became easier to see as the sun came up and the light peaked through the disheveled blinds on the window behind him.

When he could no longer sit still, Rick reached forward on the desk for a piece of paper and flipped it over to the blank side once he grabbed pen from one of the drawers he quietly looked through. Writing a brief note about going to check on A Block, he placed the note gently upon Jo before slipping out of the office.

He made his way out of the administration building; sauntering through hallways and down flights of stairs until he found himself with two directions he could go in. One was to D Block, and the other was to C Block. Both would lead him out to the courtyard, but only C Block had Hope in it and he hadn't seen his little girl in days.

Rick believed he was fine, and that he was no longer at risk of getting the horrible infection that had already claimed so many of their own, and neither did he believe he could expose anyone else to it, most of all Hope. So, his decision was made. Rick chose to turn right, and made his way through the hallway to C Block; eventually reaching it and entering in through the back way.

Stepping past the first set of stairs, he walked only a couple of feet before he came upon Sophia's cell. He pushed back the sheet giving privacy to the cell and peered over at the pack-n-play crib to find Hope was very much asleep, as was Sophia. Tilting his head to the side, Rick just stared at his daughter and smiled; thinking about how good it would be to hold her again, and hopefully as early as later that day once she the courtyard was cleaned up and the fences got fixed again.

As soon as he had a moment to breathe.

Smiling, Rick let the privacy curtain fall back into place and Rick continued on. He peered into Maggie and Glenn's cell which was empty and would only house Maggie from now on, and his grief pulled at his heart again. Carol's cell was empty, too, but she would return. The meds had gotten back to the prison at the early sign of her symptoms. She should be fine. In Hershel's old cell where Shane had been sleeping, Sam and Ana slept, curled tightly against each other in the twin-sized mattress. Rick smirked and hoped they would be a good fit in their group. Lastly, Rick came to his and Jo's cell, giving it a good once over.

It felt like ages since they'd slept on that bed.

Stepping inside, he picked up his stick of deodorant and put some of it on and then began to change out of the shirt he was wearing, opting instead for his a different one that was just as old and frayed as the other, although much cleaner. On the small shelf in the corner where there were a few books and other odds and ends of his and Jo's, Rick picked up the pocket watch that belonged to Jo's dad and then turned around to grabbed her short sword and its scabbard off the top bunk.

It could've come in handy these last few days for her, but they hadn't been in the position to go into C Block for her to get it. She had made the best of what weapons she had on her and held her own, although he knew she was more in her element with the sword, and it suited her better, too.

Giving the room one more look, Rick slipped out of the cell just as a voice from above called to him.

"Morning, stranger."

Rick took a few steps back away from his cell and looked up at the upper level to find Lori standing there, leaning on the railing. As she smiled down at him, he smiled back. "Morning," he greeted. "How you been?"

"Going stir crazy," she replied back in quiet voice as not to wake anyone up. Instead, she stepped away from the railing and then made her way over toward the stairs.

Rick watched her as she made her descent and slowly approach him with her hands shoved into her back pockets. "Yeah, sorry about all this," he remarked. "It was for the safety of the rest of you."

"I know. _We_ know. And we appreciate all that's been done. It's just been hard, and I don't mean having to stay in here. I mean not being able to help while our friends have gotten sick and died," Lori remarked. "Shane told me about the fence and all those walkers. We heard the gunfire. Me and the girls — Sophia and Hope — we bunkered down. I locked us in. I didn't know what might happen."

"You did the right thing."

"I know Sasha died, and Lizzie. What about Luke?"

Rick half smiled. He hadn't forgotten how the little boy had filled the void in Lori's heart that had been created the day Carl died. "He's good. He didn't get sick," he informed. "Jo moved him to the RV with Molly and Mika. It was more comfortable there and not as scary to them as the administration building was."

"Has anyone else died in A Block?"

Rick nodded, solemnly. "Glenn died last night. I think Dr. S might've, too," he admitted. "There were a lot of bodies lying around; both in and out of the cells. Blood everywhere. It looked like a massacre. Actually, that's pretty much what it was; a contained massacre. A lot of them turned; those that weren't put down right away as soon as they died, maybe because no one had realized they'd died."

"Oh, not Glenn." Lori had removed her hands from her pockets and was covering her mouth to muffle the tiny sobs that came from her throat. As tears rolled down from her eyes, Rick frowned and nodded, knowing what she was feeling and pulled her in for a hug.

"I know," he concurred. "I had a rough time last night after it all."

Wiping her tears away, Lori stepped out of Rick's arms and looked him in the eye. "How's Carol? She's been in A Block this entire time helping with the sick."

"She's sick, too, now, but meds got back in time for her. I think she'll be right as rain in the next day or so. There were others, too, I think will make it," he replied. "Karen, for starters. I think I saw her a little more mobile than the rest. She was one of the first to get sick, so I think whatever meds we had in the beginning of all this were given to her first, and I think her body's had time for those meds to run their course and combat most of the illness."

"Tyreese will be glad of that; a silver lining after just losing his sister."

Rick nodded. "You fancy a bit of fresh air?" He gestured in the direction of the Common Room with a cock of his head.

"Oh, God, yes," Lori chuckled, running a hand through her long, dark hair.

Following behind Rick, she let him lead the way out of the cell block, through the Common Room and then out the door. As they stepped out of the caged entrance together and into the baking morning sunlight, Rick looked over at his former spouse with a smile as she reveled in the warmth on her face and arms.

"I'm glad you're okay," he spoke.

"Ditto."

As they looked at each other for a moment, Rick felt the urge to tell her about how he planned to "officially" marry Jo, and he wondered how Lori would take the news. However, that wasn't a pressing subject at the moment. He really just needed to head to A Block and check on how things were going in there; if anyone was better, if anyone was worse and if any more had died.

Without saying anything else to Lori, he began to walk away, but out of the corner of his eye he could see her making her way over to the RV; most likely to check on Luke and the other kids.

Once inside A Block, Rick made his way through and saw that there had been some cleaning up that had taken place during the night. Most of the dead bodies were missing but the smell of death still hung heavy in the air.

"Dr. Stevens?" he called out.

After a moment, the doctor stepped out from a different cell from the one he'd left her in the night before. She stared down at him with a smile and nodded her hello to him.

"How's everyone? Have the meds been working for the others?"

She nodded again. "No one else has died since last night," she confirmed. "I think everyone else will be okay. They just need to rest and drink a lot of fluids."

Climbing the stairs, Rick approached the doctor. "Carol okay, too?"

"She is. She's been a trooper, helping the way she did; even outliving my predecessor."

Rick bowed his head. "Yeah, it's a shame about Caleb. He was a good doctor. He helped take care of a lot of us, countless times."

"There weren't many opportunities to practice medicine in Woodbury for him, with the two of us there. And, in Woodbury, there have never really been any major medical issues that have come about; even when The Governor led us. Despite the man he was, he _did_ keep us safe. I think Caleb came here partly for the challenge and to feel more useful, and he did everything he could right until the end." Dr. Stevens folded her arms across her chest and stared at Rick who was looking toward the cell where Glenn had died in, but was now empty. "What Lilly didn't tell Tyreese and that other young man, when they came to Woodbury for help, is that we have another doctor there now. It hasn't been just me there for a while. They don't need me back anytime soon. Lilly was just throwing her weight around. She knew you needed something and she was gonna make you beg for it because she could."

"She's still better than The Governor was, and at least she still let you come here at all."

"I would've come regardless," Dr. Stevens quipped. "She's a twit who took over as leader of the town because no one else felt like rising to the challenge. I won't lie and say she's terrible at her job; she's not. She's done very well, and kept us safe, too. But she and I don't always get along." Off Rick's slight smirk, Dr. Stevens took a half step closer to him. "Rick, what I'm getting at is that if you'll have me, I'd like to stay here. Like Caleb before me, I feel like I have more to offer here. Woodbury doesn't need me. The rest of you _do."_

Relief and appreciation washed over Rick's face. "You are more than welcome to stay here. I mean, we're not a town. We don't have apartment buildings with proper homes for people to live in, and it'll most definitely be a step down in quality from what you're used to, but we have an Infirmary here you can work out of. Or, if you want, you can take the RV out in the courtyard as both your living space and your workspace. Or just take it as your living space, so you have someplace more private to call home if you're not too keen on sleeping in a jail cell."

Dr. Stevens held up a hand to shut him up. "I'll make do," she assured. "I wasn't always living in Woodbury after the outbreak. I've lived with much less than what you have here."

Rick nodded and smirked. "Haven't we all."

The two of them spoke for a few more minutes about the current state of the survivors, and how they were doing — namely Carol and Karen; both of whom were expected to make full recoveries in the next couple of days.

Daryl had then come out of a cell a few spots down where Carol was sleeping; finally catching up on some much needed rest. Daryl, himself, seemed fine. Nothing, _especially_ no pandemic, seemed to be able to bring him down. He confirmed with Rick that Carol was gonna be okay, but he also commented about how Maggie had sat with Glenn's body all night.

Glenn had reanimated a short while after Rick left A Block the night before and Maggie had stabbed him through the side of his head with the blade sticking out of her prosthetic. Tyreese had come into A Block a short while later and helped Maggie take Glenn's body out into the yard, burying him in the darkness with only the faint light from a dying flashlight to help them see what they were doing.

When Rick asked where Maggie was now, Daryl shrugged; saying she never returned to A Block. Tyreese did; to stay with Karen at her bedside, which is where the other man still was. Rick peered down to the lower level and was able to catch a sliver of the couple somehow managing to share a twin sized bed as easily as Rick and Jo had managed — and Tyreese was a much larger man, too.

Feeling certain that everything was finally under control in A Block, Rick left it all in Dr. Stevens' capable hands as he returned back outside, where he was once again greeted by the warm morning sunlight.

Walking up to a barrel, Rick leaned down and splashed some water, which was nearly filled to the barrel's rim, up at his face, into his hair and running it down the back of his neck to cool himself down. As he walked away from the barrel, he rubbed the spot where his shoulder and neck met as he turned around and noticed Jo was there. He hadn't noticed her when he first walked up to the barrel, but now he could see she must've gotten up not too long after he did, and made her way outside just after he went into A Block, because now she was in the midst of loading corpses onto the trailer hitched to the jeep.

Squinting up at her as she stood atop the trailer, he sauntered over with a smile. "Morning, sunshine."

Jo cast her green eyes over at him and smiled back. "Morning, officer."

With a small chuckle, he gestured toward the bodies with a nod of his wet head. "Need help with that?"

"No, we're good," came a different voice from behind him.

Rick turned around to see Lori walking over with a red gas can in one hand that she set into the backseat of the jeep. "Getting your hands dirty?" he asked his ex-wife.

"Better late than never," she quipped. With a shrug, she held her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun and smirked. "I spent the last few days cooped up in that prison and I'm gonna start pulling my weight again now that it's safer to do so."

"You were pulling your weight plenty enough inside, taking care of Hope and Sophia," Jo insisted.

"She's right," Rick agreed.

"I just wish I could've done more."

"Well," Rick gestured at her with his hand, "now you are."

As he looked back up at her, Jo nodded at him. "Why don't you go see to those crops, Farmer Rick?"

"You trying to get rid of me?" he asked with a laugh.

"Yes," Jo nodded, deadpan. However, she soon revealed a smile again before making a shooing motion at him with her hands. "Now go. Didn't you know collecting corpses for burning is woman's work?"

"Yeah, alright," he snickered. Before walking away, he stepped up toward Jo and held out her sword and its scabbard he was still holding in his hands from earlier when he'd gone into C Block. "Take this with you."

"Thanks," Jo replied, accepting her weapon. "This could've come in handy last night."

"Tell me about it." With a brief look back at the pair, Rick smiled and sauntered out into the yard, down the gravel road until veering to the right slightly to head toward the vegetables.

His bowlegged gait was not lost on Jo as he went. She watched after him with a wistful gaze, biting her lip, and Lori seemed to catch on to what had amused her.

"I used to tease him that he looked like all he did was ride a horse, day and night, by the way he walks," the brunette quipped.

"He really does."

As Jo hopped down from the trailer, Lori noticed Zach walking toward them. "I'm glad he has someone like you to make him happy," Lori admitted, while it was still just the two of them standing there. "He deserves to be happy. He was such a great father to Carl and you giving him that second chance to be a father again with Hope — it means the world to him. I know you know that, and I assume he's probably said as much to you, but it also means the world to me, too."

"There's no one else I'd rather be Hope's father," Jo insisted. "He _is_ Hope's father."

"How you ladies doing?" Zach asked as he finally approached both women. "Need any help with those bodies?"

Jo and Lori looked at each other. "You can open the gates for us when we head out with them," Jo offered as she looked back at the young man.

"You sure you don't want any of my muscle?" He began to jokingly flex his arms. "I'll even spot you two free tickets to the gun show."

Lori snickered and shook her head. "I suppose a third set of hands won't hurt."

"And I'm sure Rick would feel better knowing we had such a manly man out there to protect us weak womenfolk," Jo jested.

"I've seen you wield that sword," Zach commented. "If anyone will be doing the protecting, it won't be me."

Jo looked pointedly at him and grinned mischievously. "And don't you forget that."

As soon as the last walker from the first batch to be burned was loaded up into the trailer, Jo climbed into the driver's seat and Lori hopped into the passenger. They both waited as Zach made sure the trailer and its contents were secured and then as he pulled himself up and into the middle of the backseat, placing his hands on the backs of Jo and Lori's. Once the jeep sputtered to life, Jo pulled out of the courtyard and down the gravel road through the yard, catching Rick's attention as he hurried over to the inner gate to slide it open. Before he pulled the outer gate open for them, though, he walked up to the jeep and placed one hand on the side of Jo's seat and the other on her thigh.

"You make sure you stay safe out there," he said to her, and then eyed both Lori and Zach as well. "All of you."

"We will," Jo assured.

As a loving looked passed between them, they both leaned in toward each other at the same time and kissed.

It was brief, but ardent; and, out of respect, Lori and Zach looked away.

Stepping back, Rick tapped the hood of the jeep before moving over to the pulley as he then opened the outer gate. He then stood there, watching as the jeep slipped through the copper-colored metal doors and out onto the country road that lead away from the prison. However, down the road was not where they were headed. Jo hooked the jeep left, along the side of the prison to take them toward the back where they had burnt plenty of walkers' bodies in the past several months. Jo had been present a couple of those times so she knew exactly where to go.

Once they were out of Rick's immediate sight, he pulled the outer gate closed and then slid shut the inner gate before turning back toward the crops. He removed his gardening gloves from his back pocket and slid them onto his hands as Shane came sauntering down the gravel road toward him.

"Shit," Shane grumbled. "Did Lori just leave in that jeep?"

Rick looked up at his friend and nodded. "She did."

"Shit," he repeated. "I was gonna ask her if I could talk to her for a bit."

"Oh?" Rick raised a curious eyebrow.

Shane bowed his head a bit sheepishly as the two of them slipped between some of the bean stalks together. "Yeah, this shit that's been going on between us these last couple of months, I know it's been my fault. I was just being my typical stubborn jackass self and didn't want to see things from her point of view, or couldn't, which were her exact words," he admitted. "I just had this vision in my head of me and her having a litter of babies together; them growing up alongside Hope, becoming best friends like you and I when we were young and foolish."

"Well, I think it's safe to say we're still foolish sometimes."

Shane snickered. "Hell yeah, we are."

"She really adores Luke," Rick commented. "I dare say she loves him. Can raising him with her be enough for you?"

There was a slight moment of hesitation, but Shane was then quick to nod his head. "Yeah, I think it is. I mean, I'd like to be a dad; kid needs a father. Two birds, one stone, right?"

"Yeah," he agreed; removing a pod from a stalk and cracking it open. He removed a single bean and handed it to Shane before removing a second and popping it into his mouth.

As both men chewed in silence, they looked around in comfortable silence for a moment.  
Then, "I asked Jo to marry me."

Shane looked at Rick with amused brown eyes. As a smile spread across his face, he asked, "Did she say yes?"

Rick nodded. "She did."

"So," Shane began to chuckle, "The former Sheriff's Deputy is gonna have himself a prison wedding, huh? Kinda ironic, don'tcha think?"

With a shake of his head, Rick smirked and gave Shane a playful punch to his shoulder.  
Jo had pulled the jeep to a stop just inside an opening to the woods behind the back of the prison where it was clear of walkers, thankfully. Alongside Lori and Zach, she removed the bodies from the trailer and they piled them on top of each other, a few feet away from the ashes and pieces of bone and fabric leftover from previous burnt walkers' corpses. Lori stood to the side as Zach went around pouring gasoline over the bodies and, as soon as he set the canister down, Jo stepped forward with a matchbook. She struck one match and tossed it onto one section of the pile, and then repeated the process three more times.

The three of them stood back together, watching the corpses go up in flames; covering their mouths and noses to avoid the stench of burning, rotting flesh. After a moment, Zach grabbed the canister back up and walked ahead of Jo and Lori toward the jeep when he dropped backward suddenly and Lori was sprayed in the face with blood.

Stopping dead in her tracks, Lori looked down at Zach, who was lying face down in the grass with a bloody exit wound caused by a bullet in the back of his skull. Just as she made sense of what had just happened to the young man, Lori turned around to look back at Jo with trembling hands.

Before Lori could say anything, Jo's eyes went wide, staring ahead of both of them. The second Lori looked forward as well, she was punched so hard in the face she fell back onto the ground, completely unconscious; never having had the time to notice who had hit her.

Jo did.

"Somehow I'm not surprised it's you," she muttered bitterly.

With a grin, The Governor held up a gun, complete with a silencer, and aimed it at her head just as she attempted to reach for the gun she had stashed in her back pocket, since her sword and its scabbard were still in the backseat of the jeep.

"Unh-uh," he muttered, wagging a finger at her as if chastising a small child.

He gestured for her to drop her gun, which she did begrudgingly and then twirled the finger; signaling for her to turn around and not face him while he still aimed his gun at her. Jo could hear him step up behind her and her entire body tensed as he began to pat her down for any other concealed weapons; of which she had none.

When he was satisfied she was defenseless, he leaned over her left shoulder and whispered into her ear, "Did you miss me?"

Before Jo could answer, The Governor hauled back and struck her across the back of her head. As her body crumbled beneath her, she was able to glimpse him standing over her with a victorious smirk before her vision went completely dark.

 

* * *

 

She wasn't sure how long she'd been out, but when Jo came to, she was seated upright and slouched against someone. Slowly, she lifted her aching head, forgetting why it was so sore.

"Rick?" she mumbled.

When her sight came back to her, she blinked rapidly and her heart rate increased at the unfamiliarity of her surroundings. From what it looked like, she was in some sort of camping trailer.

"Try again, sweetheart."

Jo turned to her left as The Governor came walking from the rear of the camper. He came to a stop, standing in front of her with his thumbs hooked into the front pockets of his black jeans. Visibly withdrawing from the sight of him, Jo turned to her right and saw she was leaning against Lori, who was also just waking up and trying to figure out what happened and where she was. Lori's nose was slightly swollen from where she'd been punched and it was obvious her nose had bled and it didn't look broken, but it had been cleaned up by someone. Jo just wasn't sure who, and she'd be very surprised if she knew it was The Governor who had done it.

Stepping over to the counter beside him, he grabbed a package of what could only be stale crackers and dropped it between both women. "Here; eat something," he suggested. "It's gonna be a long day. Nobody's gonna hurt you."

"Why would we believe that? You just killed our friend and struck us both unconscious," Jo snipped as she watched him sit down on a sofa, turning his back to them. "Oh; and then there's our history where we've physically _and_ mentally hurt each other."

"Things have changed for me and the two of you are simply a means to an end," The Governor informed. "What happened in the past is the past. Jo; what happened to Penny, my daughter, I don't blame you for any longer. She was dead. I know that now and I accept it. The fact that the two of you were in the woods when I was…that was just happenstance. If it had been any other pairing, I would've taken them just the same."

"For what?" Lori questioned, finally finding her voice. "What do you want if not to kill us or take some sort of revenge on us?"

"I want the prison," he replied, busying himself with something on the cushion beside him. "I have people to protect now, to keep safe, and I need the prison for them. Simple as that."

Jo didn't believe him. "I'm going to kill you."

The Governor stopped puttering. The slouch of his shoulders suggested he was unamused by her malice toward him. "No you won't."

"I'm going to take out your other eye with—"

"Jo, shut up," Lori cut her off and leaned forward slightly, looking at the back of The Governor. "You want the prison?"

He nodded. "Yeah, and I'll take it as peacefully as I can."

"Bullshit," Jo mumbled.

Lori turned and shot Jo a look. "Governor—"

"Don't call me that," he interrupted.

Lori nodded. "Your people, our people; we can find a way to live together. These people that you need to protect and keep safe; do you love them?"

The Governor turned around and looked at both women. "I must apologize, I was never introduced to you," he said, eyeing Lori.

Licking her bottom lip, Lori sighed. "Lori."

"Lori what?"

"Grimes," she replied. She supposed she was still a Grimes, even if she wasn't considered Rick's wife anymore. "Lori Grimes."

"Any relation to Rick?" The Governor's curiosity seemed piqued.

"We used to be married."

"And you still live with him?"

"Not as man and wife, but in the same location, yes."

The Governor grinned, looking between both women and pointing at each of them. "How do the two of you get along; with Lori, you being the former lover, and Jo being the current?"

"I'm with someone else now and have been for a while," Lori admitted. "I suppose that makes it easy."

The Governor tilted his head slightly, still amused. "I dunno. I would think that would make things awkward."

"Well, it doesn't," Jo bit out. "We're all friends. We're family." Sitting back, she narrowed her gaze at him. "Everything you've just said, about changing. Rick's changed. I've changed. We've all changed, apparently. But that doesn't mean we're gonna just let you take the prison. It's our home."

"Maybe we could share the prison," Lori offered. "It's big enough. It's possible."

The Governor shook his head. "Rick and I, Jo and I — we would never be able to live together."

"We could find a way—"

"I _found_ a way!" The Governor snapped, temporarily losing cool. He quickly reeled himself back in and looked at Lori and Jo, looking almost serene. "I'm trying hard. There's all kinds of ways I could do this. This way, you get to live and I get to be…"

He trailed, not really knowing how to finish that sentence. So, instead he got up to his feet and walked to the door, opening it up and preparing to step outside.

"You say you want to take this prison as peacefully as possible," Lori remarked, bringing his attention back to them. "That means you'd be willing to hurt people to get it. Her daughter is there. That's who you'd be hurting. If you understand what it's like to have a daughter, then how can you threaten to kill someone else's?"

The Governor stared directly at Lori and then quickly snapped his complete focus to Jo. "So it was a girl?" he questioned; a small, ghost of a smile appearing on his lips. "I have another daughter."

"No," Jo shook her head adamantly, ignoring the fact that Lori had let slip the sex of her child. It wasn't the brunette's fault. She had never told her that she had kept that information from The Governor. "She isn't yours."

His face growing stern, he held Jo's gaze for a long moment and then exited the camper.

 

* * *

 

A while later, back at the prison, Rick was standing in C Block, holding Hope in his arms with his lips pressed firmly to the top of her head; completely reveling in her scent and her softness. His heart practically swelled ten times its size from being able to hold her again. She seemed to be just as content in the reunion by the way she rested her head upon his chest and clung tightly to his shirt with her tiny fingers.

As he stood there, rocking on the heels of his boots with her, Shane walked up from the Common Room, scratching his head and newly, clean shaven face.

"Whoa," Rick commented, taking in the sight with a laugh. "There's a face under there."

Like Rick, Shane had let the hair on his head and the hair on his face grow out, and not by choice. There just hadn't been the necessary grooming tools at their leisure or the opportune moments. Shane, however, had clearly found both within the last hour since they'd returned back inside the prison.

"Your face ain't exactly winning the war," Shane retorted. He walked up, rubbing his smooth chin, which was still an odd sight for Rick to take in, and placed his hand on the back of Hope's head. He might never be a father to children of his own flesh and blood, but if Rick could love someone else's child as his own, then so could he. "Hey there, peanut," he greeted the little girl, who looked at him and began to pout when she saw how different he looked than what she was used to seeing. "Aww, sorry, honey. I didn't mean to scare ya."

Rick just chuckled, placing a kiss atop Hope's head again. "It's alright, sweetheart. It's just Uncle Shane. He's just a little less ugly now."

"Eat me," Shane remarked with a laugh as he flicked his thumb and index finger at Rick's ear.

"Maybe I will if I die first."

"Rick!" called a voice with a raspy, Southern twang.

Rick and Shane both looked to see Daryl coming into the cell block from the direction of D Block.

"What's up?" Rick wondered.

Daryl had his crossbow strapped to his back and was holding two arrows in his hand as he approached. "Merle's been gone a couple days, and with everything settling down, I wanna head out and look for him," he insisted. "He went out on his own 'cause he's a stubborn sumbitch and I wanna make sure he ain't dead." Off Rick's nod, he added, "Carol's already feeling much better, the others, too. I don't think you'll need me anytime soon if you can spare me a day or two."

Placing his hands on his hips, Shane looked over his shoulder, back toward the Common Room, as if expecting someone to walk into the cell block and join them. "Rick, how long have Lori, Jo and Zach been gone?"

With the temporary change of subject catching him off guard, Rick blinked and then looked down at his wristwatch.

"They should've been back by now," Shane continued.

"Did they take the jeep and trailer?" Daryl asked.

Rick nodded. "Yeah."

"It ain't back yet."

The pit of Rick's stomach damn near plummeted with all the worst case scenarios beginning to flood his mind. "The back of the prison—shit, Shane; what if it's overrun again and they—"

Shane held up a hand. "We ain't thinking like that. We can't."

Rick looked from Shane and then to Daryl; the latter nodding in understanding. The women had to come before Merle, and Daryl seemed okay with that.

"I'll head back through the Tombs; see if I can make my way out there and see them," the archer offered.

Rick nodded in appreciation—

—Just as a booming blast suddenly rocked the entire prison grounds to its core; with plaster and bits of stone from the walls cracking and falling down around them in a faint shower of dust.

Sophia came out of her cell, wide-eyed, as Rick turned to her and passed Hope off without hesitation.

"Stay put with her," he advised.

The teenager just nodded obediently and hugged the toddler to her chest before slipping back into their shared cell.

The three men took their leave from C Block as quickly as they could. As they made their way out into the courtyard, others were following outside to see what the commotion was, like Andrea, Morgan and Tyreese; all with their weapons suddenly at the ready for whatever the new threat was.

"Get back!" Rick shouted to the others.

As they approached the main gate, they each stood off to the side; carefully peering out toward the yard, but their focus soon became what was beyond the yard, outside the fences. What was outside the fence was a cavalcade of six trucks with an army tank in the middle, facing the prison, and on top of the tank stood a man with his arms akimbo.

"Rick! Come down here," the man on top of the tank called out. His voice was eerily familiar. "We need to talk."

Two men from inside the tank came topside, brandishing guns, and several others stepped out of their trucks, standing behind the safety of the doors, while some stood boldly in front of the trucks. All, however, were armed and waiting. Rick and the others, standing at the main gate inside the courtyard, looked back with dread.

Just when the threat of the sickness was ebbing away, something new had to rear its ugly head, and the unspoken consensus was that of them all wondering if they would ever just have one good day with no drama.

"Give me one good reason why!" Rick shouted; his mouth turning into a sneer.

"I believe you remember your ex-wife, Lori?"

Rick felt the color leave his face when he narrowed his gaze and watched as a young woman with shoulder length brown hair pulled Lori out from one of the opened doors of one of the trucks. It was obvious Lori's arms were tied behind her back as she was led to stand in front of the tank.

"Lori," Shane muttered, growing antsy.

"What about Jo?" The Governor pressed.

A butch looking guy removed Jo from the other side of the same truck and brought her over to stand beside Lori. She, too, had her hands bound behind her back.

"Are they good enough reasons?"

Feeling suddenly very sick to his stomach, Rick curled the fingers of his left hand through the chain-link of the main gate. His nostrils began flaring and his jaw clenched so hard he thought he'd chip a few teeth in the process.

"What do you want?" Rick shouted, watching as Lori and Jo were made to kneel down as the young woman and the butch guy stood on either side of them, just as armed as the others.

"I want you to talk to me, Rick," The Governor replied. "Come down here, and let's have that talk. I know the last one didn't go so well between us."

Breathing heavily to keep his temper in check, Rick looked behind him at Shane, who seemed just as ready to turn into the Incredible Hulk and start smashing things out of anger. Placing his hand on his longtime friend's arm, he gave a nod of his head, and then a brief look to the others; Daryl, Andrea, Morgan, Tyreese and Julio, one of the former Woodbury residents who had survived the infection and come out of A Block to see what the commotion was about. Even Sam and Ana were there, but they seemed as useful in that particular moment as a wet rag.

Opening the gate up, Rick stepped through into the yard and Daryl shut the gate behind him. Apprehensively, he sauntered along the gravel road, the sound of small stones and pebbles crunching under his boots before stepping into the tall grass in the direction of where The Governor and his posse waited on the other side of the fences.

"Let 'em go, right now," Rick pleaded, as he approached; oblivious to the top of the nearest guard tower that had been blown to bits and was up in flames. "I'll stay down here and talk as long as you want; but you let 'em go. You got a tank. You don't need hostages."

"I do," The Governor insisted. He looked down at the tank with what looked to be pride. "This is just to show I'm serious; not to blast a hole in our new home." He looked back at Rick. "You and your people have until sundown to get out of here, or they die."

Rick shook his head; panic, fear and anger ripping him apart from the inside out. He was visibly, albeit faintly, beginning to shake. "Doesn't have to go down this way," he contended.

"I got more people, more firepower," The Governor gestured to his group. "We need this prison. There it is. It's not about the past. It's about right now."

"There are children here, and some of my people are sick. They won't—they won't survive."

"Oh, I know there are children," The Governor replied knowingly. "But I have a tank. And I'm letting you walk away from here. What else is there to talk about?" He shrugged, and smirked. "I could shoot you all. You'd all shoot back. I know that. But we'll win and you'll be dead. All of you." Then, as an afterthought, he added, "Well, all of you except for my daughter you have in there."

"She ain't yours."

"Genetics would say otherwise."

"Genetics don't make a father," Rick growled.

"I wasn't given the chance, was I?" The Governor narrowed his gaze down toward the back of Jo's head. "She was stolen from me before she was even born. And I'm gonna take her back, along with this prison."

Rick continued to shake; both in fear and in rage. "She is _not_ your daughter. She is _mine."_ He jabbed himself in his chest to make a point.

"Like I said, it's your choice."

As two snarling walkers came stumbling out of the woods, it ensnared the attention of both Rick and The Governor, as the latter removed a handgun from the holster on his left hip and took the walkers down with three shots.

"Noise will only draw more of them over," he continued, holstering the gun back up. "The longer you wait, the harder it will be for you to get out of here. You got, maybe, an hour of sunlight left? I suggest you start packing."

Rick hesitated, staring through the fence and catching Jo's eye. She was nodding faintly at him and he could tell she was telling him it was okay, to leave and take Hope with him. Her life didn't matter to her as long as her daughter was safe and away from The Governor. However, Rick couldn't walk away like that. He couldn't leave Jo _or_ Lori behind. They were both important to him. They were his family. He couldn't make a decision he knew Jo would want him to make. He needed to convince The Governor otherwise. How, he didn't know.

"The longer you wait, the harder it's gonna be for you to get out of here," The Governor repeated.

Rick fought for the right words to say. "We can all—we can all live together," he spoke, addressing everyone on the other side of the fence, not just The Governor. "There's enough room for all of us."

"More than enough," the man with the eyepatch agreed. "But I don't think my family would sleep well knowing that you were under the same roof."

"We'd live in different cell blocks. We'd never have to see each other till we're all ready," Rick insisted.

Lori tried looking over her shoulder, back at The Governor. "It could work. You know it could."

"It could've. But it can't. Not after Woodbury," he replied. "Not after Jo, here, killed my daughter Penny, and then stole my other daughter—who I still don't even know the name of."

"And you never will," Jo snarled, eyeing Rick through the chain-link and shook her head.

He looked back at her and tilted his head slightly. As he shifted his weight around on his legs and looked up at The Governor again. "Look, I'm not saying it's gonna be easy. Fact is, it's gonna be a hell of a lot harder than standing here shooting at each other. But I don't think we have a choice."

The Governor smirked. "We don't. You do."

"We're not leaving," Rick maintained, shaking his head slightly, which did nothing to sate the growing impatience within the villainous man on the other side of the fence. "You try and force us, we'll fight back. Like you said, the gunshots will just bring more of them out. They'll take down the fences. Without the fences, this place is _worthless._ Now, we can all live in the prison or _none_ of us can."

Biting back on his own rage, as well as his impatience, but not fairing so well with that suddenly, The Governor jumped down from the tank and beckoned for something from one of his goons, when suddenly Jo's short sword was produced and handed over.

"We'll fix the damn fences," The Governor mumbled to himself as he took the sword in his hands and walked up beside Jo. He grabbed her hair with one hand and held the blade out beside her neck with the other; immediately bringing the fear of God into everyone, including his own group, to show he meant business. As he released Jo's hair, he gripped the hilt with both hands and glared back at Rick.

"No," Rick muttered, mostly to himself. Try as he might, he faltered in doing the best as he could to be resolute. Scanning The Governor's group, he spotted one person who looked like the weakest link; someone who looked obviously uneasy about the entire situation and as if they rather be anywhere else. "You: you in the ponytails. Is this what you want? Is this what any of you want?" he demanded, holding his arms out at his sides at a desperate attempt to reason with them all.

"What we want is what you got. Period," announced the lackey sticking out of the top of the tank. "Time to leave, asshole."

Rick, stressed, and probably developing an ulcer, pointed at The Governor. "Look, I fought him before. And after, we took in a bunch of his old friends. They've become leaders in what we have here. Those that didn't come back here with us, he abandoned and they wanted nothing to do with him anymore," he informed. "Now you put down your weapons, walk through those gates; you're one of us. We let go of all of it, and nobody dies. Everyone who's alive right now. Everyone who's made it this far. We've all done the worst kinds of things just to stay alive. But we can still come back. We're not too far gone. We get to come back. I know we all can change."

Jo began to smile as she looked out at Rick; the man who had her heart.

At the same moment, The Governor pulled her sword away from her neck and he seemed keen to accept Rick's offer. Straightening his posture, he stared back at Rick as well; a grin causing a corner of his mouth to curl upward.

"I tell you what, Rick," he spoke. "I'll give you an extra choice."

When there was pause between them, Rick nodded. "I'm listening."

"You get to choose who lives and who dies. Whatever choice you make, saves the lives of everyone else. _Then_ maybe I'll consider letting my people and I share this prison with you."

There was something in the man's voice that Rick didn't trust, but he was willing to hear him out, even if just for the sake of buying his own people sometime and himself some time to find a way out of this situation. What was worse, though, was that he could sense what The Governor was suggesting and there was no way he could make such a choice.

He was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

"Who will you let live, Rick? The woman you used to love, who was your _wife,_ or the woman you love now, who's the mother of my child that you're raising as your own?"

Rick nervously looked between both Lori and Jo. They looked back at him with fear in their eyes but both did their best to maintain their composure.

"I—I can't…you can't ask me to—"

"Can't make a decision, Rick?" The Governor toyed. "C'mon, now. The choice is to sacrifice one in favor of the rest. Or, I could just kill them both, here and now, and then we'll kill the rest of you, and you can die knowing I will be raising my daughter, as I should be."

The sun glinted off the blade in The Governor's hands, catching Rick's eye, as his heartbeat sped up even more and his stomach twisted in knots. He could even practically feel bile rising into his throat; he was just so sick to death over the decision he was being presented with.

When his hesitation took too long for The Governor's liking, The Governor lifted the blade. "Alright then, both it is."

Just as he was about to swing the blade down at Jo's neck, Lori looked over with fear in her eyes and shouted, "No! Stop! Please, just…wait."

The Governor did, casting his lone eye over to the brunette on the other side of Jo.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did you want to say goodbye?"

"No, I…this isn't a decision Rick should make," she insisted. "It's not one he _can_ make. Him and I, we had a son together. We have a history. But Jo…him and Jo, they have a future. You can't have one without the other. But—but the past is in the past, and that's where it should stay."

Rick stared at his ex-wife; pain in his blue eyes as he shook his head at her.

"I miss our son every day, and this world is so cruel." She nodded back at Rick, and began to smile through the tears that were beginning to spill down her cheeks; the same as they were down Jo's, down Rick's and even down Shane's. The latter had begun creeping down into the yard with a gun tucked into the back of his pants, unknown to The Governor, whose attention was currently on only Lori. "Don't give Rick the choice. It's not his to make. It's ours." Lori looked over at Jo and smiled ruefully. "I choose me. I choose seeing my son again." Then, up at The Governor, she added, "If you need a sacrifice, I'll be it."

 _"No,"_ Rick pleaded to her. "It doesn't have to be this way. Goddammit, _please…"_

The Governor smirked, considering Lori's words. Slowly he stepped back from Jo and lowered the sword, but then he walked around to stand beside Lori. "This is your decision?" he asked of her.

"It is."

 _"No,"_ Jo mirrored Rick's sentiment.

"It's a shame, really," The Governor commented. "I was liking you more than Jo."

Lifting her eyes back up to Rick, she forced a braver smile. "It's okay," she assured; directed at him. Then, as she saw the sunlight hit the blade at her side, she called out to Shane, who was blocked from her line of sight by Rick's form. "Shane! I'm sorry!"

The Governor rolled his eyes. "Enough talking," he muttered.

Without warning, he pulled the blade back and brought it down, hard and fast against the right side of Lori's neck, cutting halfway into it as her blood immediately spurted out.

Rick stood there stunned for a moment, as did everyone else. It was like the world fell silent. He didn't hear the screams from his people in the courtyard behind him. He didn't hear Jo cry out before him, and he sure as hell didn't hear the frantic and devastated cry of agony coming from Shane from mere feet behind him.

As Lori fell over onto the ground, with blood continuing to seep profusely from the gaping wound in her neck, reality came crashing back.

 _"No!"_ Rick shouted in pain as he whipped out his Colt Python from its holster and aimed it at The Governor.

No longer hesitating, he fired a shot directly at the man and getting him right in the shoulder.

The Governor's people began to fire back, and so did the prison group, as war officially erupted between both sides. As the barrage of bullets flew in every direction, Rick backed up toward the overturned, grey prison bus and was pulled back by Shane to take cover, but not before a bullet struck Rick in his upper, left thigh.

"Lori," Shane muttered, tears burning at his eyes. "I didn't get to—"

"I'm sorry, Shane," Rick shook his head, swallowing back his own sobs as he whipped his arm back and continued to fire his gun.

Amidst the chaos that ensued, Jo quite literally rolled away; trying to dodge bullets buzzing by her head, but no one on The Governor's side seemed to be paying her much attention anyway. Their focus was on the firefight coming from the prison. However, just as she slipped between two of the trucks, one of The Governor's goons approached her, but he actually looked quite surprised to see her there. Possibly, he was attempting to flee the chaos, but Jo wasn't taking that chance.

Without waiting for him to make the first move, Jo lifted a leg and kicked him in the groin as hard as she could manage, dropping him immediately to his knees. When he was down, she kicked him in the face with her boot; knocking him backward into the grass and then kicked him again in the face, repeatedly, as he tried to cry out in pain. He could barely hear his pleas over the sound of gunfire, and she didn't care. When he was barely moving anymore, she lifted her right boot up and brought it crushing down onto his head; the sound of crunching bone vibrating through the sole of her boot as chunks of blood and brain matter, as well as his eyeballs, popped out of his demolished skull.

Wobbling slightly as she took a step back to inspect what she'd just done, Jo whipped around to find something to unbind her hands as she came face to face with the young woman with short brown hair in the ponytails that Rick had addressed earlier.

On instinct, Jo snarled at her and was prepared to do the same to the girl as she did to the guy. However, the girl, who wore an automatic rifle draped at her side, but wasn't bothering to man it, held her hands up, as if surrendering.

"I'm sorry," she blubbered, visibly shaken and terrified, and obviously just wanting to hide or flee. "I'll help you." She grabbed Jo by the arm and pulled her down to the ground behind a truck as she pulled a hunting knife out. When Jo tensed up, she attempted a reassuring smile. "It's okay," she insisted, as she turned Jo around and cut the binds that tied Jo's hands together.

Once she was freed, Jo whipped back around and eyed the younger female. "Thank you," she replied. "Now get the _fuck_ outta here."

The girl with ponytails nodded, but Jo didn't waste time to see if the girl ran off or not. Instead, she did the only thing she _could_ do to get away from The Governor's entourage, and that was by running straight into the woods, unarmed. She would have to make her way around and come back into the prison another way in order to get to her daughter and get to Rick.

As she more or less disappeared, the rest of the prison group continued their defensive assault on the cavalcade of trucks and tank and its people. A few had been taken down by the spray of bullets, though they hadn't necessarily been kill shots to the head. Meanwhile, Rick and Shane had maintained their position behind the prison bus. Shane, however, couldn't sit still, letting his more hotheaded demeanor come out as he ran around the back side of the bus and then up toward the gates to get slip outside from where the section of outer fence had come down the night before.

Rick didn't even have the chance to say anything to his best friend before he slipped away. All he could do was pull himself up to his feet, using the underside of the bus to brace himself against as he shimmied upward and reloaded his Colt with bullets from his pockets.

He ducked his head out in time to see the tank rolling forward, ripping down the outer fence and then the inner fence after it. The trucks started up and followed suit, driving into the yard as The Governor led his assault inside the prison grounds. Gunfire shot out from those inside the trucks and those on foot. As the vehicles came deeper inside, Rick hurried around to the back of the bus and waited until the trucks and tank had gotten far enough in that he could come up behind them. He did cast his eyes outside to where Lori and Jo had been and saw neither and the pit of his stomach fell. Though, as he scanned closer he did eventually make out Lori's decapitated body lying in the grass after the dirt kicked up from the vehicles had settled.

Rick made a pained face; a mix of wanting to break down and cry and of wanting to go feral like a lion and rip people to shreds with his bare hands and teeth. And, not knowing where Jo was, and if she was even alive, was eating at him. He was slowly beginning to crumble, trying to accept that she was very well dead, when he spotted Shane slipping around toward where Lori's body was and then drop to his knees beside her.

However, Rick couldn't pay attention to that scene for very long.

The tank blew a hole into the prison and lump of panic rose in Rick's throat, knowing that he had left Hope inside with Sophia. But that's when he noticed The Governor had taken cover behind the topside of the overturned bus. Ducking back around to the back, Rick crept forward and peeked out, waiting for his nemesis to step out. When The Governor did, Rick ran at full speed, adrenaline giving him that boost he needed, and threw his arms around the taller man as he tackled him to the ground.

As Rick straddled the man, he proceeded with a barrage of punches; reveling in the feel of his fist repeatedly striking The Governor's face. It was so satisfying. It didn't even matter that he was hurting his own hand in the process. All Rick wanted to do was pummel this asshole to death; to feel his fist go straight through his skull.

However, as the tank had busted through the main gate into the courtyard and everyone from both sides began to scatter all over, The Governor had gotten one good punch in to the side of Rick's face, which was enough to knock Rick off him. As both men scrambled to their feet, The Governor grabbed Rick by the shirt and threw him up against the topside of the bus and hauled off with his own punches to both Rick's face and his chest. Rick was able to get some more in, too, though; the two of them ensnared in fisticuffs. And Rick looked as if he had the upper hand, but that was until The Governor head-butted him, knocking him down onto his ass.

Leaning back into the grass, Rick momentarily placed a hand to his head as the spinning sensation he was starting to feel got out of control. As The Governor purposely kicked at the gunshot wound on Rick's left thigh, Rick cried out in pain, and all he could do was lay there as he was grabbed by the shoulder and pummeled in the face by the taller man, who was now the one straddling Rick, and not the other way around.

All the while Rick was receiving the beatdown of his life, the tank continued blowing holes into the prison and a slew of walkers began making their way out of the woods and into the prison yard from all the noise.

Rick spit blood from out of his mouth and cough with every strike to his face and he did his best to reach his hands up to The Governor's face to finish was Jo started about a year and a half ago, by attempting to pluck out the man's other eye. However, Rick was losing his strength and that fight within him as well.

Carl was gone, Dale was gone, T-Dog was gone, Hershel was gone, Glenn was gone, and now Lori was gone and most likely so was Jo and Hope; not to mention everyone else he cared about.

What was the use in fighting anymore?

Why not just let the man above him end him so he could be united in death with the people he loved?

As The Governor's hands went around Rick's neck to choke the life out of him, Rick made one, last ditch ever to fight of his body's instinct for air. All he could really do anymore, though, was stare back at The Governor and await death. But then, through his one good eye that wasn't already swollen up, Rick saw a blade suddenly pierce through The Governor's chest, from the back to the front. Blood was dribbling from his mouth and both men looked considerably surprised by this new development.

When the blade slipped back out, The Governor gasped in pain and crumpled to the ground, as Rick found it was Jo standing there. With her short sword in hand and covered in blood, which belonged to probably both walker and human alike, she looked like the Queen of Hell.

Rolling over, away from The Governor, Rick coughed and gasped for air that returned to his chest now that his airway was no longer restricted. Doing his best to climb up to his hands and knees, Jo walked up to him and grabbed him by the arm.

"Hope," Rick wheezed.

"There's no hope for you, Rick," The Governor managed to speak, as he struggled for his own breath, while simultaneously beginning to choke on the blood filling his throat. "No hope…for either of you."

Jo released her grip of Rick's arm and let him get up to his feet by himself as she sauntered over to The Governor. Cocking her to the right slightly, she stepped over him so that her feet were planted firmly on the ground on either side of him. Sinking her weight down, she sat down on his chest and looked down on him with a vengeful grin.

"No," she shook her head. "Hope is my daughter's name." She narrowed her gaze at him and shrugged. "It sounds kind of ridiculous, but you gave me Hope. The only good thing you've done with your life in this world was give me my daughter so, for that, I thank you. For what you did to give her to me, and for everything else?" Her eyes darkened. "Fuck you."

As Rick got up to his feet, he stumbled slightly, but made his way up to Jo and The Governor, just in time to watch as she lifted her sword up, parallel to his throat and sliced downward.

The Governor's warm blood immediately spurted upward, spraying her chest and the underside of her face, but Jo didn't care. She just watched the way his head now hung, barely attached to his neck anymore, before cutting down further to fully sever his head; doing to him what he did to Lori.

"Jo," Rick coughed, touching his hand to her shoulder. "We need to get—we need Hope."

On instinct, she jerked away and turned around to look up at him with a sneer. Seeing his face brought her back down to reality. Her shoulders slumped and her expression changed from rage to grief. Standing up, she shook as much blood from her sword as possible and then threw an arm around Rick's back as he rested one of his around her shoulder, using her as a crutch as they walked together up the yard to the courtyard.

"Let's get Hope and get out of here," she murmured. "There's no saving the prison."

They looked up at the structure, and how destroyed it already looked, and how overrun it was getting with walkers. There was no saving the fences, the crops were destroyed, and even the graves of their previously fallen had been trampled on.

The prison was a lost cause and they just had to gather up Hope and anyone else, and find someplace new where they could be safe.

As they made their way into courtyard, it seemed like a ghost town.

There didn't seem to be one living soul there.

Rick slipped slightly, nearly bringing both him and Jo down in the process. However, Jo was strong enough for the both of them, and she continued to carry him as he spit excess blood from his mouth to the ground.

"Sophia!" he shouted, knowing she had Hope last. "Sophia!"

Walkers were ambling around or feasting on fresh corpses on the ground; which were a mix of members from The Governor's group as well as the prison group. Julio was one such fresh corpse. The tank had a plume of flames and smoke rising from the top hatch, the school bus was missing, the covered bridge between C and A Blocks had been blown apart and smoke filled the area.

Aside from the snarling and shuffling of feet from the walkers or the crackling of fire, it was silent as the grave at the prison.

"Sophia!" Rick continued to shout.

"Rick," called out a faint, but familiar, voice.

Jo and Rick both headed toward the area just under the destroyed covered bridge where they spotted Hope's car seat, but without Hope in it.

Blood was, though, and the world began to end right there for both Rick and Jo. Ugly crying seemed to be the only option for them. As Jo sheathed her sword into its scabbard she had since attached to her back before finding Rick, the two of them turned to one another and they almost immediately embraced each other in their grief as tightly as possibly; as if letting go meant they would lose each other, too.

"Oh _no…no,"_ Rick wailed, pressing his face down into Jo's shoulder as she did the same.  
Her own voice, however, was stuck in her throat.

"Rick," came the familiar voice again.

Lifting their heads and turning their gazes off to the side, they discovered Maggie seated on the ground, hidden under a pile of scrap metal, and pierced through the chest by a broken piece of rebar. The blast, from when the covered bridge was destroyed, must've sent her flying back onto it.

"Jo," the brunette mumbled, as blood spilled from her lips.

"Maggie," Jo left Rick's side in order to kneel down beside the younger woman. Placing a hand to the side of her face, she frowned. "Oh, Maggie, I'm so sorry about this." Knowing there was nothing she or Rick could do to save her, as her wound was quite certainly fatal and since they had no means of fixing her anymore, there was no sense in pussyfooting around their need to know what happened to Hope. "Have you seen Hope?"

As Maggie went to reply, more blood filled her throat and she began to choke and cough. She did, however, nod and lift her hand to point away from the courtyard.

"Was she alive?" Rick struggled to ask, placing a hand on the small of Jo's back.

Maggie nodded again, tears staining her face.

"I'm sorry, Maggie. I know this is hard, but is there any way you can tell us who has her?" Jo pleaded. When Maggie tried, the choking sound returned and Jo just held up her hand. "I'm sorry, it's okay. Don't talk." Placing both of her hands to the younger woman's face, she forced her to maintain a gaze with her. "It's okay."

"Glenn," Maggie managed to say, before screwing her face up in grief, over her loss and the overall loss of everyone and everything, including her own fading life. "All…gone…"

"I know," Jo nodded, tears burning at her eyes.

Walkers began approaching them from two different directions, which Rick quickly noticed as he curled his fingers as tight around Jo's shirt without causing more pain to his already sore hand, which was bloodied and cut from pummeling The Governor's face. "Jo, we have to go," he insisted.

Jo turned to look briefly at him, imploringly. "We can't just leave her here."

Maggie nodded. "Leave."

"No," Jo responded, shaking her head. "We aren't leaving you here to become food for walkers."

"My dad…Glenn…they—they're here," Maggie gasped.

"They were buried, though," Jo remarked, tears staining her face as well.

"It's okay."

"No, it's not." Jo brushed hair out of Maggie's face and then reached forward. Hooking her hands under Maggie's arms, she slowly began to pull her off the rebar. "I'm sorry," she added as the younger woman gasped in pain. "I can't leave you here to die alone."

Jo pulled Maggie up into her arms and lifted her up to her feet. Although, since Maggie had no strength to stand on her own anymore, she slumped against Jo's chest as blood seeped from both the entrance and exits to her fatal wound, faster than it had when she was seated and still impaled. The rebar had been holding most of it all in.

"She has her," Maggie muttered in Jo's ear, spitting some blood onto Jo's shoulder in the process.

"Who?"

"She…she has…" Maggie gasped in a sharp breath. "She…Hope."

Rick reached forward to help Jo in carrying Maggie by placing one of the brunette's arms around his shoulder but, in doing so, he noticed Maggie was no longer breathing. Her eyes were closed and her head was drooped forward and, despite the situation, she looked peaceful.

"Jo," he muttered, and she quickly realized what had happened as well.

Fighting back their tears, Jo gave Maggie's entire weight to Rick as she grabbed up an automatic rifle resting on the ground as well as a full bandolier of ammo for it that she threw diagonal across her chest. She fired a few shots at nearing walkers but then returned to helping take on Maggie's dead weight as they both choked on their sobs of grief.

"She said someone has Hope…a female," Jo remarked, as they walked toward off together to the right, around C Block's building. "We have to find her."

"We hafta go," Rick commented.

"I know."

As they cast glances back at the place that had been home to them for nearly a year, they ignored anymore tears and focused on just getting away in one piece; in surviving.

There was nothing left for them there anymore.

It was the end of an era and all they could do was just walk away.

It took only less than five minutes, but they reached the edge of the woods, away from the prison grounds, and scaled a slight hill; both still bringing Maggie's body with them. It was like a desperate attempt at clinging to what they had; not completely ready to give it up.

Rick didn't realize it, but the spot where they were at was the same spot he and Daryl had stood when they first found the prison.

It would've been bittersweet if his mind wasn't so preoccupied that he could've remembered.

As fires and herds of walkers overran the prison, Rick looked over Maggie's drooped head at Jo, who was attempting to glance over her shoulder at the miserable scene behind them.

"Don't look back, Jo," he insisted, his voice shaky. "Just keep walking."


	26. Broken

_"I'm falling apart, I'm barely breathing_  
_With a broken heart that's still beating_  
_In the pain there is healing_  
_In your name I find meaning"_  
— Lifehouse

* * *

 

Walking away from the prison without her daughter in her arms or knowing any details about her fate was possibly the hardest thing Jo had ever done in her life. It felt almost cruel. She wished it had been realistic to stay behind longer and search through the cell blocks to make sure for herself. She wanted to see with her own two eyes that there was no sign of her daughter or if there were any clues lying around that pinpointed who might have her or if she, for sure, survived.

There had been too many walkers descending into grounds, though, and the prison was a loss.

She knew this. She just didn’t want to accept it.

She didn’t want to accept having witnessed Lori, her friend, get decapitated, but she had.

She didn’t want to accept that Maggie, also her friend, had literally died in her arms.

But she had.

She didn’t want to accept the notion that others might not have made it out alive.

So, she didn’t.

Instead, she bottled up that fear and doubt and grief and became stone-faced.

And now, there she was, carrying the brunt of Maggie’s weight down an abandoned country road as Rick did his best to help while hobbling at her side, with the sleeve from his right arm having been ripped off so that he could tie it around his left leg where he’d been shot.

“Jo, don’t walk so fast,” he muttered. His voice sounded muffled, though it was probably due to the swelling on the left side of the face from where The Governor had punched him really good. “She’s gonna turn soon if we don’t do something.”

“I am doing something.”

“Jo.”

She stopped walking, which caught Rick off guard a little as his own footing stumbled slightly as he came to a quick stop as well. Turning briefly to look over at him, Jo pulled Maggie’s body away from him and dragged her over to the side of the road, laying her gently down onto the ground. She could feel Rick’s eyes on her, looking grief-stricken, but she ignored his gaze, even when she stood back up and walked up to him. She looked down instead, at the Colt Python holstered at his side, and removed it. Stepping away from him, she crouched down at Maggie’s side again and placed the end of the barrel against Maggie’s temple.

Jo finally turned back to look at Rick. “Happy now?” she asked, and pulled the trigger.

Tiny bits of skull, brain matter and blood exploded from the opposite side of the brunette’s head; canceling any possibility of her reanimating.

Rick watched Jo with concern and regret in his expression as she walked back over to him and returned the smoking gun into his holster in a rather brusque way. She gave him a brief, stern look and then went back to Maggie; lifting the younger woman upright to lean against her. Bending at the knees, she struggled slightly to toss Maggie’s dead body over her right shoulder. Jo let out a grunt of exertion and when Rick attempted to help her, she whipped her head toward him and snapped.

“I got her.”

She then proceeded to walk, carrying Maggie on her own; ignoring how heavy she was now and how that dead weight made her ache. It was a necessary ache, though. It almost felt like penance for letting so many get killed recently while she was still alive. It was penance for not protecting her daughter or anyone else for that matter. She was supposed to have been the prison’s First Lady, wasn’t she? What a great job she’d done at that.

“Jo, let me help.”

“No.”

“ _Jo_ ,” Rick implored.

“I said no.”

Choosing not to fight with her on the matter any further, they continued to walk along the road in silence for what felt like possibly an hour. A few times, Jo had to stop and catch her breath and just take an overall break from carrying Maggie’s body. She had to switch shoulders a few times as well, but it usually didn’t last too long when it was over her left shoulder, which was still aching from where she had been stabbed and stitched up less than a week before.

As the road opened up, becoming more of a rural highway, albeit surprisingly vacant of any vehicles or walkers, Rick and Jo sauntered tiredly onward for another twenty or so minutes before any kind of shelter came into view. When it did, it was a simple roadside diner with a grey stone façade and a green, tin roof. There were seven abandoned vehicles in total out front; a grey SUV, a champagne-colored sedan, and five motorcycles. Dried leaves and a few articles of clothing were scattered here and there, while two fuel canisters were situated between two of the bikes.

It looked like any other abandoned place in this new world.

However, there was no way of telling what the inside was like.

As they approached the front door, Jo brought Maggie’s body down to lie upon one of the picnic tables on the covered patio and then reached behind her for her short sword; pulling it out of its scabbard. Rick leaned up against the side of the door and removed his Colt before yanking the screen door open, creaking as it went.

“Wait out here,” Rick commented, looking over at Jo. “Keep watch.”

She narrowed her eyes and lifted an eyebrow at him in response. “Are you shitting me right now? You should keep watch,” Jo scoffed. “You can barely stand right now. I’m not letting you go inside alone.”

Rick stared back at her and he really wasn’t in any position to argue, and didn’t want to either. Instead, he raised his gun and pushed open the inner door and darted inside as quickly as he could manage. As Jo followed after him, with her sword at the ready, they found themselves initially in the establishment’s bar area. Moving around the side of the bar counter, Rick peered in toward the kitchen while Jo walked ahead toward the dining room.

“Kitchen’s clear,” Rick announced in a quiet, raspy voice, as Jo walked straight through into the dining room.

When he joined her, they were both staring at the tables and chairs stacked on top of each other, forming a barricade of sorts. After a moment of accessing the area, a walker came out of a back room, making the typical snarls they were both long used to.

Rick gestured to the shelves of hot sauce and other pickled items along the wall behind the makeshift barricade. “That may be all that’s left.”

Jo nodded at the walker. “I got him.”

Turning toward her, he watched as she set down a piece of paper she had been looking at before pulling at the barricade and letting the tables and chairs fall down. Without hesitation, the walker came rambling toward Rick, who stepped aside in time for Jo to swing her sword.

In one fell swoop, the head came off and dropped to the ground mere seconds before the body followed. However, the head was still snarling and chomping at air so Jo finished him off by jabbing the tip of the blade into its temple, which required very little effort due in part to the amount of decay.

Rick holstered his Colt and brought his gaze back over to Jo, giving her a nod before pointing at the shelving. “Let’s get what we can and move on.”

“No shit,” she muttered under her breath, sheathing her sword.

He’d heard her, but simply clenched his jaw and looked away as he went off toward the kitchen, while she stepped onto the other side of the now demolished barricade. As she began pulling a bag of pork rinds and a few jars of pickles off the shelving, the sounds of Rick’s shuffling feet became louder as he soon rejoined her in the dining room with items in his hands.

“The kitchen wasn’t empty after all,” he informed, shoving some sort of food item Jo hadn’t caught a glimpse of, along with a few water bottles in a cloth bag. “My haul. How about you?”

“Pork rinds and pickles,” Jo replied. “We’ll eat like kings.”

Rick looked down at the bag as he held it open for her to shove her found items in, and then looked up into her eyes to see the sparkle he loved in them was missing. His heart ached even more, because they were both aching over the same things and he could tell she was blaming him as much as she was blaming herself. But blaming themselves wasn’t gonna help them move forward and attempt to find Hope or any of the others.

“Alright,” Rick nodded. “Let’s head out and find some shelter where we can rest. It’ll be getting dark real soon.”

Jo paused. “We need to bury Maggie first.”

Rick held her eye, and then nodded once more. “Yeah.” He gestured toward the outside with his sore, right hand. “I think I saw some sort of shed around the side of this place as we were walking up. There might be a shovel in it we can use.”

Jo didn’t reply. She walked ahead of him out of the dining room and back into the bar area, not waiting to see if he was following. Once she was outside, she stepped over to Maggie’s body and pulled her up against her chest, grunting slightly as she tried lifting the brunette back over her shoulder again. However, she was so tired and so sore from the amount of time she had carried Maggie like that, that her body rejected the move and her knees buckled. Falling back onto the ground, Maggie’s body fell down on top of her just as Rick was coming out the front door and in an instant he was leaning down to help remove Maggie from Jo.

“I’m fine, I got her,” Jo insisted.

“Like _hell_ you do.”

“I _got_ her.”

“ _Goddammit_ , Jo, no you _don’t_. Now, stop acting like a _fucking_ child and let me help you,” he growled at her, but only out of love and not out of malice.

Sighing heavily, Jo obliged him. Tears were stinging her eyes and she bit her lips together as she scooted off to the side a little while Rick let the cloth bag on his arm slide back toward his elbow as he hooked his hands under Maggie’s arms. With a grunt of exertion, he pulled their deceased friend up, turned her over and then hoisted her up into his arms, bridal style. Maggie was completely and utterly limp, like a wilted flower in his arms. What was left of her left arm, with the bladed prosthetic still attached, was dangling downward while her intact right arm lay draped across her chest. Rick looked down at her peaceful, eternally resting face and did his best to ignore his own tears which were starting to sting his eyes as well.

Bringing his gaze back over to Jo, he watched as she finally got back up to her feet and looked at Maggie for a brief moment. Then, she just turned and walked away from the patio and off toward the side of the building to where the shed Rick had mentioned was.

Slowly, and limping, Rick followed behind her with Maggie in his arms and finding it very difficult not to give in to his tears that wanted to fall. He chose to not look directly at Maggie’s face anymore and look straight ahead toward Jo who was yanking the doors to the thankfully unlocked shed open. It wasn’t a very deep shed, but it was large enough that when she stepped inside only a foot or two, the shadows seemed to envelope her. Rick just remained waiting, doing his best not to put too much weight on his left leg while Jo looked around inside the shed.

Fortunately, it didn’t take very long at all for Jo to procure a shovel.

“Is there another one?” He asked. “It’ll go faster if we both were digging.”

“There was only this one,” she answered; holding it up as if to prove she wasn’t lying. Looking over to the grassy area beside the property, Jo pointed at it with the shovel’s handle. “That’s a good enough spot.”

As she walked toward the area in question, Rick followed quietly behind her. When Jo stopped walking, she turned around and helped Rick lay Maggie down on the ground before turning away from them both to begin digging the grave.

“We can take turns,” Rick suggested. “You dig a foot, I’ll dig a foot.”

“I can manage,” Jo insisted. “Just keep an eye out for walkers.”

Clenching his jaw again, Rick shook his head but accepted his role as watchman while Jo pushed the shovel into the grass, and then pressed her boot down to assist in the removal of the initial clump of earth.

While she continued to dig and toss the mix of grass and soil off to the side, Rick removed his Colt from its holster once more, to be prepared for anyone or anything that might approach. He looked down at the ground, at his boots, daydreaming for a while about everything and nothing at the same time. Eventually, he brought his gaze back upward and looked off toward the empty rural highway; listening to the sound of the shovel digging into the ground.

As the sun fell lower in the sky, Rick finally looked over toward Jo and the grave to see that Jo was coming along really well with it.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to take over?”

“I’m almost done anyway,” she assured, huffing slightly. “It’s not like it needs to be six feet deep.”

After a few more minutes, Jo finally jammed the shovel into the ground, off to the side of the grave so that it was sticking upright on its own, without falling. She then gestured down at Maggie and Rick crouched down with her, as best as he could; him lifting Maggie up at the feet and Jo hooking her hands under Maggie’s arms. The two of them, together, gently set Maggie’s body down into the grave and then stepped back to see that their friend fit very well.

“Should we bury her with the prosthetic or without?” Jo wondered.

“I feel like it’s become a part of her, so that it might be a bit weird to remove it, but I know she also loathed having it for the longest time,” Rick replied. “That it was a constant reminder of what she’d lost.”

“Losing her arm wasn’t the worst thing she’d lost.”

Rick caught Jo’s eye and frowned, and then nodded in agreement. “So, off it is?”

Jo took a moment to consider the two options, and then nodded as well. “Yeah,” she answered.

Kneeling down, Jo reached into the grave and unhooked the strapping that went around Maggie’s chest and shoulders and slid the prosthetic off; leaving the deceased brunette with only her stump. When Jo stood back up with the prosthetic in her hand, she reached forward toward Rick and shoved it into the cloth bag.

“Who knows…maybe one of us will end up needing it down the line,” Jo remarked with little emotion in her voice.

“Let’s not think like that.”

She shrugged in response and removed the shovel from its niche in order to begin tossing the dirt onto Maggie’s body. As she did, the tears she had been holding back could no longer be contained, and neither could the sobs that echoed in her chest.

Watching Jo crying felt like the cue Rick needed to allow himself to cry as well, although he still forced himself to reel it in a bit. If Jo was going to show her moment of weakness, then he wanted to be the stronger one for her; the way she had been stronger for him back at the prison when he was falling apart at the seams.

Jo waited to cover Maggie’s face completely until the very end and when she did, it was almost cathartic, like a weight had lifted off her shoulders, and not just the literal weight that had been Maggie from carrying her body for such a long distance. It was like saying goodbye to the last bit of the prison and to all those they couldn’t save or left behind. It was like saying goodbye to those who had gotten away but were still probably dead anyway. But it was also the chance for her and Rick to focus on themselves and the whereabouts of their daughter.

But first—

“We need to get moving,” Rick interrupted her thoughts. “It’s already starting to get dark.”

Jo nodded and let the shovel fall to the ground. “She doesn’t have a grave marker,” she commented.

Looking at Jo, and how dejected she appeared, Rick dragged his eyes over toward shed; setting the cloth bag on the ground before limping over to the shed. As he temporarily disappeared inside, Jo followed after him with her own eyes, waiting to see what he would find. After a few moments, Rick stepped back out, holding a battery-powered nail gun in one hand and two scrap pieces of wood in the other. Kneeling down, and wincing as he did so, Rick hunched forward and unlocked the switch so he could use it. Placing the pieces of wood, one on top of the other, in the form of a cross, Rick checked to see if the battery was charged at all. When he saw that it had enough juice in it, he pressed the end against the top board and pulled the trigger; releasing a nail through both pieces of wood. Just to make sure it took, he shot two more and then tossed the nail gun away. Climbing back up to his feet, with Jo’s help when she grabbed onto his arm, Rick stepped over to the head of Maggie’s grave and shoved the base of the makeshift cross into the ground, letting it stick up on its own.

“I think she’d appreciate it,” Jo remarked, nodding at his impromptu handiwork.

Catching Jo’s eye, Rick closed the gap between them and wrapped his left hand around her right wrist. As he leaned his face toward hers, she inched away slightly from him, so he looked down. However, Jo seemed to sense his disappointment and instead inched forward so that the side of her face brushed gently against his. She reached her left hand up and cupped the back of his head before turning hers to let her lips graze the corner of his mouth.

It was barely a kiss, but it was the most affection they’d shared with each other since earlier in the day when he’d kissed her before she’d left the prison yard with Lori and Zach to burn the bodies of those walkers.

Anything was welcomed at this point.

When Jo pulled away completely, she picked up the cloth bag from the ground and nodded to him. “Alright, let’s go.”

“Should we say goodbyes?” he asked, gesturing lamely down at Maggie’s grave.

Jo shrugged. “She’s long gone,” she replied. “Goodbyes are pointless now.”

Turning around, she began to walk off; knowing he would soon follow, but not waiting for him to do it.

 

* * *

 

As twilight wrapped around them, not long after leaving the diner, Rick and Jo found themselves stepping across a set of railroad tracks perpendicular to a residential street.

Jo was walking a few feet ahead of him, dragging her feet from exhaustion as he called out from behind her.

“Hey…hey…”

Jo slowed her pace down and cast him a look over her shoulder at him. “What?”

He gestured with a nod of his head to a home coming up on their left. “That one’s as good as any.”

Agreeing, Jo waited as he was beside her before making her way up toward the house in question.

Walking up the pathway together, they stepped up onto the large front porch and, as usual, she removed her sword from its scabbard and Rick removed his gun from its holster. Then, with a nod of his head toward her, Rick lightly slammed the right side of his body into the door and, as soon as it slammed open, his arm was raised and his weapon was aimed straight ahead before he even considered stepping inside.

“You could’ve just turned the handle to see if it was unlocked,” Jo remarked with a slight roll of her eyes.

Stepping around him, Jo walked in first with less apprehension and began to check out to room to their immediate right while Rick moved around the living room they had entered into. When Rick lost sight of Jo, he darted around until he spotted her in the hallway where the stairs were.

“Jo,” he called out.

“What?”

“Stay close.”

Jo sighed. “Rick, I’m not a child,” she retorted, continuing forward down the hall away from him. “All the doors are open down here. Nothing has come out. I think it’s safe to say we’re fine at the moment.”

“Would you just _stop_ for a moment?” he compelled.

Doing just that, Jo’s shoulders slumped and she turned around. Catching Rick’s eyes, she pursed her lips together. Letting out a small puff of air through her nostrils, she lifted her fist up to the wall and began banging on it.

_Bang._

“Olly olly oxen free!” she shouted.

_Bang._

“Come and get it, big boys!”

_Bang._

“Is anyone home?”

_Bang._

“Jo, stop it,” Rick bit out.

Jo leaned back. “Seriously? If there were any of them down here, they’d have come out by now,” she retorted. “Get your panties out of a bunch.”

After a moment of just staring each other down, Jo turned and walked up the stairs, leaving Rick behind downstairs, clutching his gun tightly in his hands. As he let the silence from the first floor fall around him, Rick huffed and began to limp forward down the hall, stepping into the kitchen with his Colt once again raised.

Not surprising, he found it to be empty.

Shutting the fridge door, he hobbled into the room which was a complete mess, like the rest of the lower level, from the original owners and most likely plenty more people coming through to ransack the place for food and other supplies. Cupboard doors and drawers were opened, pots and pans rested on the counters and small table, and there were plenty of empty cans of food lying around as well, not to mention the many Tupperware containers of rancid food sitting in the now defunct fridge that offended Rick’s nostrils as soon as he stepped in front of the fridge.

He couldn’t get that fridge door closed fast enough.

Pulling open one of the unopened drawers, he found the utensils and pulled out a carving knife that would do for a decent weapon since he no longer had his machete or his own knife. Those had been left behind at the prison, amongst plenty of material possessions they’d all come to cherish, like—

“Shit,” Rick muttered.

He remembered Jo’s father’s pocket watch. He patted the outside of his pockets, where he'd placed the watch after grabbing it from their cell. He'd planned to give it to her but it was gone now. I figured it must've fallen out during his fight with The Governor. After everything Jo had been through in losing that pocket watch to The Governor and finally getting it back after the fight in Woodbury, and now losing it again…it was now something else Rick had to be angry at himself about.

After a while of them each puttering around on different levels of the house, Jo finally came downstairs and rejoined Rick in the living room where he was struggling to push the overturned couch up against the front door to barricade themselves in.

Frowning gently, Jo walked up beside him and took to the other side and helped push the couch the remainder of the way with him.

“Thanks,” he mumbled.

Jo simply nodded in response, and then helped him pull the couch down so it was right-side up.

Wheezing slightly from the exertion, Rick began to unhook his gun belt and, when it was undone, let it drop to the floor. “This’ll hafta do for the night,” he spoke, sinking down onto the couch, and momentarily reveling in how good it felt to sit.

“There are beds upstairs,” Jo replied.

“We should stay down here,” Rick insisted. “We can keep a better watch out and it’ll be easier to leave if it has to be done in a hurry.”

“We ain’t going anywhere right away, Rick.” She gestured to him and how his breathing was still labored. “You’re ready to keel over.”

“I’ll survive.”

Jo lifted her eyes toward his face and after a moment he sensed her gaze and met it.

“Let me take a look at your wounds.”

Rick began to wave her off, insisting he was fine and didn’t need her to fawn over him, but as she knelt down on the floor in front of him and began to unbutton his completely ruined shirt, he knew it was better not to argue the matter. Instead, he just sat there, somewhat slouched, watching her nimble fingers working each button that was still somehow attached to the tattered material. He let his tired blue eyes watch her intently; the left of which had the small issue of a broken blood vessel caused from being punched in the eye by The Governor.

Once his shirt was pulled completely open, Jo ran her fingers gently over the large bruising on the left of his torso. “How badly does it hurt?” she inquired.

“Bad,” he replied, “but like I said; I’ll survive.”

Jo shot him a withering look. “Stay put,” she commanded. “I’ll go find something in the way of first aid.”

“I’m fine.”

“Well, I say you’re not.”

She didn’t even wait for a reaction from him. Jo just got up to her feet and made her way out of the living room and up the stairs the second floor’s main bathroom. However, stubborn as an ox, Rick refused to stay put, as he achingly pulled himself back up to his feet and hobbled out of the room to follow after where Jo had gone.

He was slow to ascend the stairs, but he did make it all the way up; finding the bathroom over toward the right just as Jo was walking out of it with a white, roller bandage in one hand and a pair of scissors and two metal bandage fasteners in the other.

When Jo saw him standing there in the upstairs hall, she frowned and let out a sigh. “Well, as long as you’re up here…” Nodding, she gestured toward the master bedroom and wouldn’t budge until he walked ahead of her and into the bedroom. When he did as nonverbally told, she then pointed toward the bed. “Sit.”

Rick obeyed, sinking down onto the edge of the mattress, which he could tell was about ten times more comfortable than the couch downstairs was. Although, he kind of felt like he didn’t deserve this amount of comfort. Not after everything that had happened. Not when there were so many of the people they loved who weren’t currently lucky enough to enjoy these comforts.

Another pang of guilt pulled at him.

Setting the first aid supplies onto the bed beside him, Jo gingerly tugged off what was left of his shirt and tossed it to the floor. She had seen him wince out the corner of her eye as she lifted the roller bandage up and began to unfurl it. Once she had enough of the gauze material to work with, Jo used the scissors to cut it off from the rest of the roll. She then reached her arms around him and began to wrap the bandaging around his abdomen until his bruising was hidden. Finally, she held it all, firmly, in place with the two metal fasteners.

Taking a step back, Jo gave him a once over. “You should get some sleep,” she advised. “I’ll bring you up those pork rinds and a water bottle. Have something to eat and drink, and then sleep.”

“You, too.”

Jo didn’t respond.

She walked silently out of the room, into the hallway, down the stairs and then made her way into the living room where they’d left the cloth bag. She took a moment to inspect the downstairs, checking to make sure the exits were intact, and then went back upstairs the way she came. When she returned to the master bedroom, Rick was in the same spot; seemingly unmoved.

Setting the cloth bag down on the floor, she reached into it and removed a water bottle, which she handed up to Rick, and then pulled out the bag of pork rinds, which she opened and set down beside him.

“Here,” she muttered.

Rick lifted the bag back up and offered it to her first. “Have some.”

“I’m not hungry right now,” she lied. In fact, her stomach had been grumbling all day. She hadn’t eaten since the day before, having never touched the stale package of crackers The Governor had tossed at her and Lori. “I’ll have something later.”

After a moment, they locked eyes.

“Thank you,” Rick rasped.

Jo could tell he was referring primarily to the bandaging around his abdomen. “You’re welcome.” She then pointed back at the pillows. “Go right to sleep after you’ve eaten and drunk something.”

Rick followed her with his eyes as she began to retreat from the room. “Where are you going?”

“I’m gonna go to sleep, too,” she replied. “It’s been a long day. I’m sore, I’m tired and I just need this day to be over so tomorrow can get here as soon as possible.”

As she went to step out of the room again, he asked, “Aren’t you gonna stay in here?”

Jo looked back, but not directly at him, as she shook her head. “I—I can’t. Not tonight,” she answered sadly. “I need to sleep alone tonight.”

When an awkward silence fell over them, she finally lifted her eyes and found he was already staring back at her. She almost attempted a reassuring smile, but it fell flat.

There was nothing for her to smile about right now, so why bother pretending?

Turning away, Jo slipped out of the bedroom, into the hall, and down the stairs.

 

* * *

 

In the middle of the night, Rick was lying back on the master bedroom’s queen-sized bed, staring up at the ceiling and listening to the deafening silence. There were no random coughs or bouts of snoring from his friends in their nearby cells. There weren’t the occasional shuffling of footsteps along the concrete floor when someone was up before the others. There was no clanking or creaking of doors opening and closing to the other sections of C Block that Rick had grown used to for almost a year. Even in this house he was in, there was nothing to really listen to. The house had been around for possibly the better part of a century — maybe more, maybe less. Yet, there were no random groans from the house settling here and there, no floorboards creaked from anyone walking on them. Maybe the house had seen a series of structural remodels in the recent years before this apocalypse. Or maybe the house wasn’t as old as Rick thought. Maybe it was built to have the same look and feel of an older house, but with none of the headache that came with owning an older home.

Rick sighed.

None of these were the sounds he was expecting to hear that really mattered.

He was straining his ears, expecting to hear Jo beside him, snoring lightly as she curled tightly against his side. After all, they had become accustomed to sharing a twin bed for so long, and now, here he was, alone in a big bed with plenty of room for the two of them, but she had gone downstairs to sleep.

What was harder to accept, was not hearing the occasional middle of the night crying from Hope when she woke up from a bad dream and couldn’t find her mommy and daddy right away.

If she was still alive, and Rick hoped like all hell she was, Hope might be crying right now, stuck with whoever had her, and they probably didn’t have anything she needed, like diapers, a bottle and formula. She was probably scared and hungry and her cries would possibly be drawing the attention of walkers who would then come toward the sound.

Rick closed his eyes tight. He didn’t want to think of what could happen next.

But closing his eyes didn’t stop those terrible images from entering his mind.

There was no stopping them once he thought them.

He couldn’t sleep.

Not now.

Pushing himself up to sit upright, Rick groaned in pain and dropped both his legs over the side of the bed. He looked at the bedside clock, which had been digital once upon a time and was now blank from lack of electricity. Placing his feet onto the floor, Rick stood up with another groan before turning and hobbling slowly out of the bedroom and over to the bathroom. He shoved the door open a little further as he stepped inside and pivoted around to get a good look at the interior.

It was simple and, from what he remembered from seeing Jo come out of it earlier, when it was lighter out, the room was painted yellow; normally a bright and cheery color, but was currently lost on him. The toilet was sandwiched between the wall and the tub, there was a window that led out to some sort of roof, which Rick assumed belonged to either the front or back porches, and then there was the sink and its counter across from the tub. Rick migrated toward that.

There was no running water. He’d tried the faucets to be sure. However, there was a mirror above the sink and he was finally able to see what he looked like and he grimaced, not from the pain this time, but from how terrible he looked. He had known how it _felt_ but to see what his face actually looked like was a different story. This had been the face Jo had been looking at since they left the prison, and even though there was anger and resentment and grief sitting uncomfortably between them, he knew love took up more room because not once did Jo look at him with disgust. She was able to see past his broken features and still see the man he was underneath, and for that he was grateful.

He, however, couldn’t stand the sight of himself any longer. It was just another reminder of everything that had gone so horribly wrong.

Maybe he should’ve just let The Governor take the prison. Maybe Lori and Maggie would still be alive. They could’ve gathered their belongings up, gotten onto the bus or the RV, or any of their other vehicles and driven to Woodbury. The people there would’ve taken them in if they knew what was happening; that The Governor was back. And maybe then they could band together and take The Governor down for good as a whole.

But, no — Rick hadn’t been able to even consider that option. His mind had been so struck dumb from the sudden development and seeing Lori and Jo bound, on their knees, with a tank pointed directly at the prison. His rage for The Governor had gotten his blood boiling and all he saw was red. Well, that and his fear for what could go wrong.

And everything _did_ go wrong.

Turning away from the mirror, Rick backed up and sat down on the edge of the tub, placing his left hand over the bandaging around his abdomen and leaned forward slightly.

He leaned forward as hot tears stung his eyes and the thoughts of everything he did wrong picked at his mind like starving vultures.

As the tears rolled down his face, he did his best to muffle the sobs that began to rise from his throat; revealing him to be nothing more than a broken man.

 

* * *

 

After crying herself to sleep the night before, Jo woke up at some point after sunrise when a sliver of sunlight broke through the blanket she had draped over the front window in the living room. It had hit her like a slap to the face and she rolled over on the couch, expecting to find Rick there, out of habit, and instead finding herself with her face pressed against the back of the couch. Sitting up, she draped her feet over the edge and firmly planted them onto the floor. She hunched forward and placed her face in her hands, closing her eyes when the memories from the day before began flooding back into her subconscious.

All that loss — it was too much.

And her heart ached for her daughter.

She hadn’t seen, let alone held, her in days; not since after D Block fell to the infection that began to spread through the D Block survivors.

Her arms felt horrifically empty and her heart felt subsequently heavy.

All she had left in the world, for the foreseeable future, was Rick, and she was too angry and devastated by everything that she felt like she didn’t want to be touched by him. Not because she didn’t love him, but _because_ she was just so angry. She didn’t want to be touched by anything or anyone at the moment. She was blaming herself, because if she hadn’t taken it upon herself to lead the “posse” in removing those bodies of walkers from the prison grounds, maybe The Governor wouldn’t have had any leverage to hold over Rick. It hadn’t been fair to make the decisions The Governor was forcing him to make. There were children and sick people to think about and she knew Rick tried doing the best he could. He was their leader but sometimes too much weight was put on his shoulders and she knew that burden got too heavy for him sometimes; which was why she chose to do what she could to take on some of it.

And that’s what she was doing now — blaming herself and maybe him a little bit, too.

She knew all too well that The Governor was actually to blame, but he was finally dead and gone and no longer present to be the scapegoat either Rick or Jo needed.

Pushing herself up to her feet, Jo sauntered off into the kitchen and perused the cupboards for anything that wasn’t pickle-related. She had left the bag of pork rinds upstairs with Rick and didn’t feel like taking the risk in waking him up by going up there to grab a crinkly bag that could wake the dead. She had a water bottle she had drank half of the night before left out in the living room and sitting on one of the top shelves in a cupboard was a box of stale corn flakes. Pushing a chair over, Jo climbed up onto it to assist her in reaching that top shelf and grabbing the box down. Once back on the floor, she opened the box, yanked out the plastic bag and tossed the box into the sink. The next step was grabbing a bowl, blowing the dust out of it and setting it down on the table before she began emptying the old cereal into the bowl. After finding a spoon, Jo sauntered back into the living room, grabbed up her water bottle and then made the short trek back into the kitchen where she sat down at the table, poured the rest of the water onto the flakes and then just sat there.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day; she could hear her grandmother telling her.

Her grandmother had been dead more than fifteen years, but she still remembered staying over at her house as a child, on the weekends, or throughout the week during the summer when her dad was at work and she needed someone to watch her. Her grandmother would always make a full breakfast, every morning, complete with eggs, bacon, toast, sausage and sliced up peaches on a separate plate, and then all of it was paired with a tall glass of milk and a cup of tea. Jo’s grandmother had gotten her to drink tea since she was six years old. There had been that one time where she asked to try coffee, and her grandmother obliged her, but that had been a mistake. Six-year-old Jo puckered at the bitter taste and decided it wasn’t for her, and settled for the tea instead. It wouldn’t be until Jo reached college that she developed a palate for coffee, and it was mostly to help keep her awake while she was studying.

Once the water in the bowl started to soften the hard flakes, Jo dove in and began to eat. It wasn’t bad, to be honest. The water helped, but it would’ve tasted better with milk. Actually, eggs and bacon and a slice of toast would’ve been ideal, but that was all but a distant dream from a time gone by now.

As she ate in silence, Jo lifted her eyes toward the ceiling, thinking about Rick and if he slept well and was healing. She then brought her eyes down and looked out toward the living room and considered how they needed to find more food, but Rick was in no condition to do much of anything right now. As soon as she was done eating and as soon as she found something else to wear, she would head out and check some of the other houses on the block.

After only five minutes of trying to eat, Jo got tired of the stale corn flakes and pushed the bowl away. She stood up and walked out of the kitchen, quietly ascending the stairs to the second floor. Walking forward, she slipped just as quietly into the master bedroom where she found Rick was out like a light, lying on his back.

Giving him a once over, she could see the swelling on his face and lips had gone down considerably and the left side of his face didn’t look so purple anymore. That was a good sign and she was able to breathe a sigh of relief.

Stepping over to the dresser, she pulled the drawers open one at a time and as slowly and as quietly as she could as not to wake Rick. However, the drawers had other ideas and it felt like she would wake not only the dead, but life forms on other planets. Throwing a look back at Rick over her shoulder, she noticed he hadn’t stirred. Inside one of the drawers she found a pair of clean, women’s underwear, and in another, she found a plain, grey T-shirt that would do. In one of the bottom most drawers was a pair of jeans that looked to be too big for her, so she opted to remain in the jeans she had on. She would just have to live with the dirt and blood stains until she could find something that _did_ fit her. Maybe one of the other houses would prove fruitful.

Taking the clothing items out of the bedroom, Jo slipped into the bathroom and began to peel off her clothes; dropping them into a pile on the ground near the tub. She checked the faucets for water, of which there was none, so she couldn’t wash off the dried blood and dirt on her arms and face.

Again, she hoped the other homes would be more helpful.

Pulling on her new shirt, she pulled her hair out from under the collar and then let her eyes scan the countertop and zero in on a brush, just sitting there, having gone unused for some time. So, Jo picked it up and began to brush through her blonde tresses, wincing as she forced out a few snarls and knots. Her hair was getting long and she was tempted to grab those scissors from the night before and just chop it all off to about her shoulders, but a flash of a memory of Rick running his hands through her hair every time they’d ever made love popped into her head.

Looking at her reflection in the mirror, she smiled slightly.

The hair would stay.

Somewhat redressed, Jo exited the bathroom and returned to the bedroom again. She walked up to the side of the bed Rick was sleeping on and placed a hand on his shoulder to give him a slight shake.

“Rick,” she muttered, but got no response. _“Rick.”_

Still nothing.

Pulling her hand back, she studied his face and frowned. “Rick,” she repeated, raising her voice slightly.

When he didn’t respond to her at all, she grew a little nervous; however, she had the sense to lift a hand to the side of his neck and, with apprehension, checked for a pulse. After a moment, just before her heart leapt fearfully into her throat, she felt the familiar, albeit subtle, rhythm of his heartbeat as felt through the artery vibrating in his neck. As that moment of fear fell away, she brought her hand up to his forehead and brushed some of the hair off his face.

He was just exhausted and his body had shut down to allow him to rest and recuperate.

She could live with that, as long as he actually lived.

She wasn’t sure she could handle all this on her own again.

Leaning down, Jo pressed her lips firmly to his forehead. He didn’t feel warm from any sort of fever, so that was another good sign. Leaving a kiss upon his skin, she stepped back and exited the room.

Downstairs, she found where she left her sword and scabbard and strapped it across her chest. Once both were secured behind her in their place on her back, Jo headed for the side door and stepped outside. She figured Rick would still be asleep for a while and it wasn’t like she could just tell him where she was going. She could’ve left a note in case he woke up, but she didn’t want to waste daylight hours searching the house for something to write with.

Walking up the side of the house, she removed her sword and held it out in front of her as she crept slowly and quietly toward the front of the house, where she found two walkers wandering aimlessly on the front porch.

Jo frowned at the sight of them.

Making her way toward the front of the house, she watched as they caught sight of her. Casting a look over her shoulder, to make sure nothing else was around, Jo began to walk backwards; keeping her eyes focused on the decaying pair as they stumbled down off the front steps toward her.

“That’s right, you ugly sons of bitches…c’mon…” she coaxed, leading them away from the house.

Leading them up the road a little, she spotted an ideal clearing between two homes. Once the three of them were concealed by the overgrowth of bushes and the tree overhead, Jo smirked and swung her sword in one wide stroke.

Both the walkers’ heads had been sliced in half; the top half sliding off and down to the ground before their bodies crumpled second later, like sacks of rotten potatoes.

Giving her sword a shake to remove some of the blood and decayed brain juice from the blade, Jo leaned forward to wipe both sides of it on the back of the male walker’s shirts. Before she could step back out onto the deserted residential road, she heard a snarl from behind her, and she whipped around to find another walker approaching with its arms outstretched and its greying skin drooping off its fingers.

“You wanna dance?” she asked it, side-stepping away from it.

The walker’s vacant, yellowed eyes stared back at her as it chomped at air and followed her every move. However, their dance didn’t go on much longer because Jo had shit to do. So, raising her sword, she swung down into the center of the walker’s skull, ceasing the last bit of brain activity that kept it going. Lifting her right leg, she pressed the flat of her boot against the walker’s stomach as a brace so she could pull the sword out. Once freed, she kicked the walker backward and it fell over upon the ground, completely lifeless.

Jo continued on her way after that.

 

* * *

 

A few hours went by, and Jo made out pretty well at several houses. The last one she had checked was the only one that proved somewhat difficult. The front door had been locked, for starters, so she shattered one of the small windows alongside the doorframe with the handle of her sword. She then stopped moving and held her breath, looking around to see if the noise attracted any hidden walkers. However, after a few moments of silence, she turned back to the small window and knocked the remaining shards of glass away before shoving her arm inside. Reaching over to the knob, she fumbled a bit but was able to find the lock and unlock it.

The second downside of this house was that she cut her forearm on a tiny shard of glass she hadn’t managed to get rid of as she removed her arm from the window. She hissed at the painful sensation and looked down at the blood that began to dribble down her arm and onto the porch. Rolling her eyes at herself, she turned the doorknob and pushed the door open and her first goal was to find something to sop of her blood with.

With her sword arm, which was her cut arm, outstretched, she moved quietly through the downstairs, reaching the kitchen where she found a drawer filled with clean dishcloths. She draped on across her arm and wiped away most of the blood before spitting down on her skin to use her saliva in an attempt to help expedite the healing process. Hopefully the house had a bathroom with similar first aid supplies as the ones she found in the house where she and Rick were staying. She didn’t want to wait too long in taking care of this fresh wound and risk an infection before she got back to her temporary abode.

With the downstairs cleared, Jo made her way upstairs and found all the doors were slightly ajar. The first one on her right was a bedroom with a dead parakeet on the ground below its cage. She closed that door and moved onto the room straight ahead, which was clear, so she closed that door as well. Behind her was a door to what she assumed must be the bathroom, judging by how the upstairs seemed to be laid out. Walking up to it, she turned the knob and pulled it open, just as a pair of decayed hands burst out and tried clawing at her.

“Fuck,” she muttered.

Shoving her weight against the door, Jo gripped her sword tightly in both hands, and, on the count of three, she stepped away from the door and swung as soon as the walker came tumbling out. She ended up slicing right into the walker’s head through its gaping mouth and continued until the top half of its head fell clean off.

Well, okay, it wasn’t exactly clean, but it was dead now. So there was that.

Grimacing, Jo gave her sword a shake and pushed the walker’s toppled body out of her way as she opened the bathroom door a little wider to step inside. Propping her sword up against the wall, she opened the medicine cabinet and found some aspirin and Band-Aids which she tossed into the cloth bag from the day before she was carrying around. She also had a garbage bag of supplies she had left downstairs in the front hall that was for any food she found, and had found at the other houses.

Crouching down, she looked inside the cabinet door under the bathroom sink and found a rolled up Ace bandage and smirked. “Bingo.”

Unraveling the tanned, gauze material, Jo began to wrap her right arm; covering her cut. She had no scissors to cut the excess material, so she used all of it, and when she was done wrapping, she tucked the end into itself since there were no fasteners or safety pins to keep the material in place.

Standing back up, she grabbed up her sword and made her way back downstairs, ignoring the last room after hearing snarling from inside. Instead, she made her way to the kitchen after grabbing the garbage back up out of the hallway and found more canned goods there than in any of the other houses. She tossed them into the bag and smiled when she spotted the large can of chocolate pudding up above a cabinet.

Jo smirked.

 

* * *

 

As Jo lugged her found goods back to the house, the sun was a little lower in the sky. She walked around to the side of the house and reentered the same way she left and made her way to the dining room where she set her bounty down on the table with an audible thud.

“Rick!” she called out, and received no answer.

With a huff of breath, she made her way into the hall and up the stairs, and then stopped when she saw Rick was in the same position she’d left him in hours earlier. Biting her lips together, her chin quivered because, even though she had checked his pulse earlier and he was alive then, she worried that he might not be now. That was too horrific a thought for her to want to accept.

She couldn’t lose both Hope _and_ Rick within twenty-four hours of each other.

Stalking right up to him in the master bedroom, she hovered over him and held her hand up to his nose to feel for a breath. When it was hard to tell if there was any, she placed her hand over his chest and waited for a heartbeat. After a mere second or two, she felt it and she sighed in relief once more. But then she got angry over getting so scared and reacted by slapping the good side of Rick’s face.

“Wake up!” she shouted. When there was no initial response, she began to fear he might’ve slipped into a coma from head injuries he possibly sustained the day before. Maybe slapping him wasn’t the best idea in that case, but she was desperate for him to be conscious. So, she slapped him again, and this time a little harder. “Wake the fuck up, Rick!”

When she received no reply yet again, a sob bubbled forth from Jo’s lips and she back up to lean against the wall, and then slid down it until she was sitting on the floor with her knees pulled up to her chest. Leaning her head down, she buried her face and began to cry heavily at the fear of being alone washing over her like a cold, ocean wave.

As her tears rolled down her face and dripped down into her lap, she heard a slight groan, and it didn’t come from her.

Lifting her head, she saw that Rick’s right hand had slipped off his chest and was dangling over the edge of the bed, and his fingers were twitching. Scrambling back up to her feet, Jo placed her hands on either side of Rick’s face, she watched for his eyes to open with bated breath.

Slowly, he smacked his dry lips together, coughed and then, finally, lifted his eyelids. When his sight focused, he found Jo staring back at him and he smiled a little; forgetting for a moment where he was and everything that had happened.

“Why does my cheek sting?” he rasped.

Emitting an elated whimper that he was okay, Jo then let her frustration win over as she got angry at him for giving her such a scare by slapping his shoulder with the back of her hand. Rick knitted his brow together for a half a second in reaction.

“You’ve been unconscious since last night,” she replied, glowering. “I was calling and shouting your name and you weren’t answering. I even had to check your pulse to make sure you were still alive, and then I slapped you. Twice.” Jo sniffed. “Sorry.”

Rick attempted to shrug. “It’s okay.” He blinked and the memory of where he was came back to him as he fought to sit up. The pain in the left side of his abdomen wasn’t as strong as it had been, but it was more bearable. “Sorry I was asleep so long.”

“It’s okay,” she repeated his response. “I made do.”

“Yeah?” He narrowed his gaze and noticed the Ace bandage wrapped multiple times around her right arm that hadn’t been there the night before. Concerned, he grabbed hold of her wrist and then looked up at her face. “Are you alright?”

“Don’t worry, I didn’t get bit,” she assured, pulling her arm away. “I was scavenging the houses in the neighborhood. I made out pretty well, actually, but the last house I had to break a window to get in and I cut myself.”

“Is it deep?”

Jo shook her head. “Nah, it’s only superficial.” She then held his gaze and reiterated what he’d said to her the night before. “I mean, there’ll probably be a scar, but I’ll survive, right?”

Rick continued to look her in the eye. He tilted his head slightly to the side, lifting his hand up and touching his fingers to the side of her face before she once more pulled away from him. Frowning, he dropped his hand in his lap and shook his head, chewing on the inside of his bottom lip for few moments before he could figure out what he wanted to say to her.

“Listen, Jo, I know what happened yesterday was horrible, and I wish I could take it all back,” he began to say, bringing his eyes back up to her face, “but I can’t. I know you’re angry with me and I know you blame me in part for it all. Hell, I blame me, too. And I wish—I wish I knew where the hell Hope is and who took her. If you’re angry about us staying put for a while to recuperate, I’m sorry about that, too. We couldn’t be out there, running on fumes; without food, or water and the way I—with my injuries, I’d be no help.” He gestured to her, in general, and shrugged. “You did good gathering food and supplies, and you did it without me, and that’s great. I feel like I can breathe easy knowing you would be okay on your own, so if that’s how it’s gotta be, if you wanna go on without me to find Hope, then that’s what you gotta do.”

Jo leaned back from his as if she’d been slapped. “You seriously think I would leave without you?”

“I’d understand if you did. I’m not much help right now.”

“I can’t believe you’re basically suggesting I should leave you here.”

“If it means getting Hope back to her mother sooner rather than later, then yes, that’s what I’m basically suggesting.”

“And what about getting Hope back together with her father or, now that our dystopian family unit has been broken up, is that not your thing anymore?”

Rick furrowed his brow at her, a little offended she would think he’d stop considering himself Hope’s father. “That little girl is my daughter till the day I die, but I’m not gonna deny that you have a different bond with her, and for a mother to lose their child, when she’s the one who carried that child inside her for so long, I just figured…” Rick trailed off, not knowing what else to say there. Instead, he looked off toward the hall outside the bedroom and placed his hands on his upper thighs. “I’m sorry. I’m not sure I know what either of us should do anymore.”

Letting out a frustrated sigh, Jo just shrugged it all off and walked out of the bedroom, but then ducked in the direction of one of the extra bedrooms; shutting the door loudly behind her.

As Rick watched her leaving, he pursed his lips together and tried cracking each side of his neck. Turning away from the door, he then lifted his left arm and rolled it around in its socket to get out the kinks and stretch out the stiffened muscles. He winced from the overall movement and bit back on it as much as he can; recalling the last time he was in this much ongoing, aching pain was when he’d been shot on duty and wound up in a coma. Thinking back to that day, he realized he didn’t remember too much. He had fainted from the pain at some point, but there had been brief moments of lucidity where he remembered hearing voices, and also the pain he was in before he slipped completely into his coma, only to wake up who knows exactly how much time later, alone in the hospital, after the fall of modern civilization.

All that almost felt like eons ago.

Hell, it felt like that all happened to someone else, because he sure didn’t feel like the same person anymore; not that guy who woke up disoriented in a hospital gown who could barely tell his ass from a hole in the ground. He wasn’t the easy-going, good ol’ Southern boy his mama raised him to be anymore. He was angrier now, and bitter, and hardened, and the only good things that made him feel like the man he was happened to have just shut herself in a different room or was missing out there in the world with God knows who.

Pushing himself up to his feet, Rick grimaced from pain in his side but chose to fight through it. He limped out of the bedroom and turned left, not toward the bathroom, but to walk up to one of the extra bedrooms that Jo had gone in. Lifting his fist, he knocked on the door with the knuckles from his index and middle fingers, and then he waited for a response.

When there was no verbal answer, he knocked again. “Jo?”

“I don’t wanna talk right now,” came her reply.

Rick leaned his forehead against the door’s surface. Something sounded off about her voice. “I know this might be a stupid question, but are you okay?”

“No, I’m not okay!” she snapped. Then, silence again.

Rick straightened his posture a little and nodded, although she couldn’t see that. Scowling at, well, everything, he turned away from the door and hobbled off toward the stairs.

Meanwhile, inside the bedroom, which had belonged to some teenage boy once upon a time, Jo sat cross-legged on the floor with her back against the bed. Her hands lay limply in her lap and her head was hung low as tears were rolling down her face.

Hearing Rick’s footsteps fading away down the staircase was her cue to let her sobs escape her.

She didn’t want him to hear her crying.

Jo was just such a mess at that moment, so utterly broken, and she just needed to cry it out in privacy like she did the night before when she went to sleep on the couch downstairs.

 

* * *

 

When night fell once more on the house, bringing to a close their first full day there, Rick and Jo were still in separate places in the house.

Jo had eventually come out of the extra bedroom and come downstairs, but when she spotted Rick cleaning is Colt on the couch in the living room, she went into the dining room to sort through the canned goods she had found. When she heard him get up and wander toward the dining room, she slipped into the kitchen and found something menial to occupy herself with. She didn’t have her back to him, but she wasn’t facing him either. However, she could see him out the corner of her eye, looking over at her before turning to look away. She listened carefully to him shuffling his feet around the dining room table, and then the sound of the bottom doors to the china cabinet opening up.

Jo was confused by what he could be looking for. Did he require a ceramic gravy boat, or maybe a silver serving platter the original owners of the house probably never ended up using after receiving it as part of their wedding gifts forever and a day ago?

When his footsteps suddenly seemed to get closer to the kitchen Jo began to walk toward the hall to head back to the living room, in a constant game of avoidance on her part. Except, Rick appeared in the doorway to the kitchen before she made her way around the table and the sound of something heavy and glass thudded on the countertop.

Curiosity getting the better of her, Jo turned her head and saw Rick was gripping the neck of a bottle of Wild Turkey bourbon whiskey.

The frown she had been wearing quickly faded away as she looked up from the bottle label and up to Rick’s face.

“Wild Turkey,” she muttered. “That was—”

“—your father’s favorite kind of whiskey. Yeah,” he nodded, “I remember you telling me.”

“That stuff is disgusting.”

“Yeah, it is,” he agreed, moving over toward the table and setting the bottle down upon it. “And we’re gonna drink all of it.”

“We are?”

“We are.” Rick turned toward one of the open cabinets and pulled out two dusty glasses; not even bothering to blow the dust out. He set them on the table and twisted off the cap to the bottle. “We’re gonna drink all of this, and we’re gonna get shitfaced, and we’re gonna have the nerve to finally just talk to each other about everything, instead of crying alone in different parts of this house or hiding from each other like we’re terrified deer mice.”

“Is that what you think I’ve been doing? Hiding from you?” Jo turned around completely to face him, placing her hands on the back of the chair in front of her as she watched him pouring both glasses only halfway

“You tell me,” he retorted. “I’m not the one running out of a room every time you enter it.” Lifting his glass to his lips, Rick nodded and looked over the rim at her. “Cheers.”

Watching him down the entire contents in one, deep gulp, Jo couldn’t help but smirk at how he grimaced at the taste the liquor had just left in his mouth. Reaching across the table, she lifted up her own glass and stared down at the amber liquid. She gave it a slight swirl and then looked up at Rick, locking eyes with him as she pressed the glass to her lips and knocked it all back in one gulp as well. She figured that way she wouldn’t have to really taste it as much.

Unfortunately, she still did and she spurted and choked a bit. “Hoo, damn. It’s been too long since I’ve had any kind of alcohol,” she remarked. “Wait five minutes and I’ll probably be shitfaced then.”

Rick cocked his head slightly and smirked back. Then, he lifted the bottle once more and began to fill his glass again. Reaching over, he held the bottle out to Jo and she stuck her arm out, offering her glass and watching as he tipped the bottle to let the liquid fill her glass again.

“Should we toast to something?” she asked, sniffing at the bourbon before thinking of taking even one sip further.

“Like what?”

Jo pursed her lips together and considered a few options before raising her glass. “Here’s to all our fallen friends, the ones we’ve loved and lost, and to those still lost out there in the world,” she spoke, looking over at the sink for no particular reason at all. “And here’s to finding Hope.”

Rick nodded. “To Hope,” he repeated. “And to us.”

Looking him in the eye, she watched the way he chewed his lip for a moment before taking a swig of his bourbon, and then followed that up by another grimace.

“To alcohol,” Jo added sarcastically, “because, as history will show, it solves every problem.”

Rick’s gaze went a bit stern as he looked at her. “At least it’s something.”

“No, it’s cool. It’s okay. I’m just—”

“Just what?”

“I’m angry,” she replied, without missing a beat. “I am so fucking angry at myself, at you, at The Governor, at this fucking world. There are so many things we could’ve done differently and didn’t. We should’ve been looking harder for that asshole. We shouldn’t have let our guard down. We should’ve been more vigilant. It seems like only Merle gave a real shit about going out and finding him while we just bunkered down and turned the prison into a goddamned farming commune.”

Rick pushed off from the counter he had been leaning against and gestured his nearly empty second glass at her. “That’s it,” he muttered, almost sneering as he spoke. “Tell me how you really fucking feel.”

“I just did.”

“Oh, but you ain’t done. I can hear it in your voice. What else are you angry about?”

Jo practically glared at him and it wasn’t lost on her that they’d never actually fought like this before. This was, essentially, new territory for her and it felt a bit strange, and yet oddly freeing. “I’m angry that you didn’t just pick me to die instead of Lori choosing to sacrifice herself—and for what? The Governor still attacked us anyway. I’m angry that you didn’t just give up the prison. Wasn’t one of our escape plans, _months_ ago, to get everyone into the RV and make a run for the house you and the others found Sophia and me in? We could’ve gone there, or maybe Woodbury would’ve taken us in. We had their doctor! We could’ve leveraged her if need be!”

Rick didn’t bother bringing up that he had those same thoughts about Woodbury. Hell, it could still be an option.

Jo tipped her head and swallowed her second glass in one gulp again. After a cough, she stared back at him. “I’m angry…I’m angry that I went out with Lori and Zach and let them get killed. We could’ve burned the bodies in the yard, or buried them. I could’ve waited for you or Shane or Daryl or anyone else to come with us. I didn’t have to be the one to do it. But…no…it wouldn’t have made a difference. The Governor said it didn’t matter who he would’ve crossed paths with. He would’ve taken whoever as a hostage. It was just my great fucking luck that it was me, wasn’t it? It’s my fault. Lori could still be alive, though. I let her die. I could’ve shot down her choice and insisted he kill me instead. But…no…he knew either way it went that you would’ve reacted the same. He knew…”

Her mind was already getting cloudy from the alcohol. How fast she had downed both glasses and how heated she was getting, the liquor was moving more quickly through to her bloodstream. Her face felt warm, and it wasn’t from the heat. She was also starting to feel a bit numb and it was rather nice. However, because she was drinking while angry, it just exemplified things.

Her last, truly rational thought was about where they were. “We shouldn’t argue down here,” she gestured toward the front door. “We might draw attention to the house from…from…you know,” Jo waved her hand at the living room, “the dead.”

Rick finished off his second glass and grabbed the bottle back up. “Alright. Let’s take this upstairs and yell in the bathroom or whatever.”

Stalking off ahead of her, which looked a little ridiculous, because he was still limping, Rick ascended the staircase, but teetered to the right a little from the alcohol already beginning to mess with his equilibrium. Jo held onto her glass with one hand and held the other outstretched as if that would somehow prevent him from falling backwards down the stairs.

As soon as they were upstairs, Jo pushed past him and went straight toward the master bedroom. “So, you want to know what else I’m angry about?”

“Yeah, humor me.”

Before she spoke he moved closer to her and filled both their glasses for a third time. He then set the bottle down on the dresser and took a few steps back, sipping more slowly this time as he rounded the side of the bed to look out the window toward the street.

“I’m angry at myself because I think I made Maggie die sooner than she had to.”

Rick turned around and narrowed his gaze at her. “What are you talking about?”

“I pulled her off that rebar, and then she bled out quickly. The rebar was what was keeping everything in place or whatever. I killed her,” she muttered, her bottom lip and her chin both quivering. “That’s on me. And she wanted to stay and die there at the prison, but I couldn’t let her. She was okay to be left behind, and I denied her the right to be where her father and Glenn died. I’m an asshole.”

“No, that’s not on you,” he insisted. “That is not your fault. She was going to die anyway, and you made it quick, yes, but it was a better death than her suffering longer than she needed to. And you gave her a respectable grave. It might not have been what she wanted but you gave her the grave she deserved.” Rick step closer to Jo, reaching a hand out and palming the side of her face with it. “You carried her for a couple miles without my help and here you are somehow still standing. You went out on your own today, not knowing what you’d find, while I was laying her broken and unconscious. You’re not an asshole, Jo. You’re strong. You’re strong for me, for others, and you’re strong for yourself whether you realize it or not.” He stared her directly in the eye; the only thing being was that both their eyes were glassy from the bourbon infecting their systems so quickly. “Do you know how lucky I am that I found you? Do you know how lucky I am that I still have you with me when others have lost that one person they planned on spending the rest of their lives with? I _still_ have you.”

Jo’s chest heaved as she was overcome by so many emotions. Tears began to sting her eyes, so she looked away. When Rick dropped his hand from her face, they both simultaneously brought their glasses to their lips and swallowed half the contents.

“What are you angry about?” she asked, bringing the subject away from her.

“Not killing The Governor back at his apartment when I had the chance,” he answered without hesitation. “I could’ve shot him point blank, but instead I let him talk our ears off, and T-Dog got shot because of it. And then I shot him in the head so he wouldn’t come back. And I’m angry about not giving up the prison, too, about letting Lori die like that. I’m angry about losing track of Hope, but the last I saw her, she was with Sophia, so maybe wherever Sophia is then that’s where Hope is and…” Rick tipped his head down, looking at his glass. “I’m just angry, about way too many things, and I wish I could just back in time and redo so many things. There are so many what ifs, but it all comes down to if even one thing changed, maybe I wouldn’t have known you, and Hope wouldn’t have come into this world. Without that, without the two of you in my life, I think my world would be much darker than it is. I’d be much more broken than I already am. Less physically broken,” he pointed to his face, “and more mentally.”

Jo swallowed the rest of her third glass of bourbon, and then stepped backward out of the bedroom. “See this?” she pointed to the glass with her free hand. She then chucked the glass into the other extra bedroom while holding his gaze instead of watching where exactly the glass was thrown. Upon the sound of glass shattering, she gestured toward that particular bedroom. “ _That’s_ broken.” Walking back into the bedroom, she placed her hands on his bare shoulders, since his shirt had been removed the night before so she could bandage him. “This—you—are not broken. _We_ are not broken. We’re not damaged goods. We’re not incomplete. We’re human. We’re sad, we’re angry and we’re scared.” Bringing both her hands up to the sides of his face, she maintained eye contact with him and attempted a smile. “We’re not broken,” she repeated.

Stepping back from her, Rick watched as her hands dropped from his face and then he finished his third glass off but, unlike Jo, he set his nicely down on the dresser instead of shattering it to make a point.

Turning his focus back to her, he suddenly raised his own hands to her face and pulled her in so that her lips crashed upon his own. Her hands returned as well, but she snaked them through his curls on the back of his head that were damp from sweat. Their kiss was hungry and engulfing. It was as if they were dying of thirst in the desert and they were each the cool, welcoming waters from a freshwater lake.

Walking her backward up against the horizontal dresser, her lower back hit the hard surface and she let out a small grunt of surprise. Everything on the dresser shook slightly; a random, old bottle of perfume toppled over and the bottle of bourbon shimmied dangerously close to the edge. Having noticed the latter out the corner of her eye, Jo removed one hand from Rick’s hair and curled her fingers instead around the bottle’s neck. Leaning her head back, she looked directly into Rick’s eyes and she couldn’t remember ever seeing them so glazed and so dark from lust. It sent a shiver down her spine at him looking her over like he was a lion and she was the gazelle he was about to devour.

Bringing the bottle to her lips, she smirked and tipped it back, swallowing a considerable amount and shaking it off. The taste wasn’t as bad anymore, but that could be due to her being numb to it. She then tipped it toward Rick’s lips, setting it down upon his bottom lip and waiting as he eventually opened his mouth and let her pour some down his throat. After swallowing that amber liquid, Rick took the bottle from her and stepped back to set it on top of the mantle above the bedroom’s fireplace so that it was now safely out of the way.

As he returned over to her, his hands were fumbling between their bodies; his fingers moving to unbutton her jeans and shove them down off her hips.

Taking his cue, Jo did the same with his jeans, and the entire process felt like this big ordeal because their dexterity was a bit off. Rick swayed to one side and chuckled slightly under his breath before leaning in and claiming her lips again.

Once both their pants had pooled down around their ankles, Rick rolled one of his thumbs over her clit while he began to work his own shaft to get to the stiffness she deserved.

Gripping the edge of the dresser from his ministrations, she bit down on his bottom lip so hard she thought she might draw blood. She didn’t, but if he hadn’t tipped his head away at the same moment he inserted a finger inside her, then she sure as hell would’ve.

Everything was hazy and everything suddenly felt okay and good again between them. The issue regarding their losses was a hurdle they had put aside and gotten through somewhat, and now it was time to reconnect, figuratively _and_ literally. Being united was a necessity. Their relationship didn’t deserve to crumble because of the deaths and disappearances of others. They had experienced plenty in the past and would no doubt still yet experience more. The two of them, together, is what would keep them moving, keep them fighting; give them something to live for when everything else seemed hopeless and broken.

Grabbing Jo up by the waist, Rick grunted from the physicality of lifting her up to sit on the dresser, and then let out a breath of relief once he was no longer supporting her weight. And it wasn’t because she was heavy. She was anything but. It was just that his left thigh was still sore from where he’d been shot. He had taken the bullet out with his fingers and then used one of his sleeves to compress the wound shortly after they got away from the prison, but the wound was still sore and was days away from truly healing.

Parting her legs for him, Jo looked down at him, placing her hands on his shoulders as he moved between her legs and pressed his tip at her entrance. He teased her at first, sliding the tip up and down against her moist folds and then, once he’d claimed her lips once more, he thrust quickly up into her, buried himself to the hilt.

Jo let out a sated gasp against his mouth, and then let their tongues circle each other, deepening their kiss as much as deeply as he was starting to continuously thrust into her warm, moist sheath. Her hands returned to his hair, gripping tight enough to make him hiss, but he liked it and proved it my pounding mercilessly into her; filling her up with his pulsating hardness.

There was no doubt they loved each other, none at all, but this wasn’t lovemaking anymore for them. This was, fucking, pure and simple, and it was just what they needed.

It was rough, it was carnal, and it was amazing.

Jo did her best to rock with him, but then she began to slip off the edge of the dresser and it was digging painfully into her lower back. Sensing her discomfort, when her whimpers began to sound different, Rick momentarily pulled out of her and helped her down. However, instead of moving things to the more logical, comfortable location, such as the bed or even the old, wingback chair in the corner, Rick turned her around so that she faced the dresser. He placed one hand on her shoulder and dragged it slowly down her back, before sliding his hand under the shirt she was still wearing and forcing her to lean forward over the wooden surface. He parted her legs a bit more with his knees and then repositioned himself at her entrance again before sliding back inside her with ease.

As he drove into her from that position, Jo was able to grind back into him more easily. They both grunted and groaned and when their eyes locked with each other in the mirror that was like the nail in the coffin. Maintaining eye contact with her like that was a bit exciting. Lifting his hands from her hips, he wrapped one arm around her waist and the other snaked around and up under the front of her shirt as his hand then delved inside her bra to palm one of her breasts. He began hunching forward, leaning over her with his back arched.

Then slowly, he moved his hand out from under her shirt and slid it up to her neck, turning her head slightly so he could give her an over the shoulder kiss and, in that moment, she was done for.

Jo’s entire body began to quake as she peaked, and the entire time Rick’s lips never broke from hers.

Even when his own orgasm began to shake him to the core, and he spilled his seed inside of her, he refused to break their kiss.

It was only after, when he slid out and turned her back around to face him, that he removed his lips from hers, and even then it was only temporary.

Rick wrapped his arms firmly around her back and pulled her tight against him, burying his face in her neck and leaving a trail of kisses up to her face before their lips met again. This time, though, it was soft, and it was gentle and it was slow.

“I told you we aren’t broken,” Jo muttered into his mouth. Bringing a hand up to his face, she gently touched the cut across the bridge of his nose, and then she kissed his nose. “We’re just a little chipped and cracked.”

Rick closed his eyes and leaned his forehead down upon her shoulder and she just slipped her arms around his let her hands rest upon the back of his head to keep him there with her.

“I love you,” Rick mumbled against the skin on the side of her neck. “If I ever lost you, too—”

“Shut up,” she cut him off with a smirk in her voice. Jo leaned her face against his. “I love, you, too.”

After a few moments of standing like that in silence, Rick lifted his head back up and stared at her, studying her green eyes, which were still just as glassy as his were. “I think we should take another day of recuperating. We can leave here the day after to start looking for Hope. This,” he lifted a hand and gestured to them both, “I will be paying for tomorrow and will set me back.”

“Was it worth it?” Jo asked, brushing her lips delicately over his.

Rick opened his mouth and made like he was about to bite down on hers but she moved away so he just looked up at her through his eyebrows and nodded. “Oh, hell yeah.”

A smile pulling at the corners of her mouth, Jo brushed his hair off his face and then pressed her forehead to his. “Let’s get continue this somewhere more comfortable, then, shall we?”

“I dunno,” Rick shrugged, stepping back from her, leading her over to the bed. “Can you handle me again?”

Jo snickered. “Can _you_?”

“Probably not,” Rick chuckled. “But I’ll sure as hell try.”


	27. Claimed

_"Be still my heart; thou hast known worse than this."_ — Homer

* * *

 

As the sun rose early the following morning, a single ray peered through one of the master bedroom’s windows, reflected in the mirror above the horizontal dresser and then fell upon the forms of Rick and Jo, still asleep in bed. They both seemed to wince from the offending light at the same moment; shaking their heads and turning them slightly, while trying to cling to those last remnants of whatever dreams they were having. And, it was quite amusing, actually. They had that entire queen-sized bed to enjoy and sleep in, spread out in and enjoy its comfort. Yet, there they laid — Rick on his back, his mouth slightly ajar from light snoring, and Jo curled tightly against his side as if she would somehow fall off the bed; as if they were still back at the prison, sharing the same bottom bunk.

Rick stirred awake first.

His eyelids felt like anvils but he managed to open them anyway and then his head began to throb a bit. He wondered if maybe he was developing a delayed concussion from his fight with The Governor but, when he lifted his head slightly and turned to the bedside table to his right, he noted the now empty bottle of Wild Turkey bourbon whiskey. He remembered him and Jo finishing it off the night before, just as he said they were going to, and then he knew it wasn’t a concussion that was affronting him. It was a hangover. He hadn’t had one of those since the morning he awoke in the CDC. It had been with what he could now, sadly, refer to as his former family; when both Lori and Carl were alive.

He wasn’t thinking about them at the moment, though. Rick was thinking about how he wondered if there was any sort of aspirin he could take to quell the whiskey-induced headache he was nursing, while also enjoying the fact that he had Jo nestled against him, and that more than enough made up for the having a headache. It was all worth it as long as she was there.

But then Rick realized it was a new day, and it was the day they had agreed to leave the house they were in and get back on the road to find Hope, and either thank or fight whoever had her. They didn’t know if it was one of their people, or one of The Governor’s. It really didn’t seem likely that it was the latter, but they had to mentally prepare themselves that it could be a possibility.

“Jo,” Rick rasped, finally finding his voice as he more fully awoke. He shook his arm which was wrapped around her to hold her to him. “We need to get up.”

“Mmm,” she groaned in response. “My head.”

“Yeah, mine, too,” he agreed.

As Jo slowly rolled away from him and fell back against the mattress, her head softly hit the pillows on the right side of the bed that she had neglected all night; having shared Rick’s with him, as that was what they were so used to doing. She placed a hand against her head and grimaced as she wiped the sleep from the corners of her eyes and then turned to look over at Rick.

“Morning, sexy,” Jo said to him, a slightly coy smile on her lips.

Rick scoffed and shook his head. “I should be saying that to you, not the other way around.” With a little exertion, he pulled himself up into a sitting position and then looked around the room.

“Yeah, I probably look like a drowned rat right now,” she remarked; her voice a little hoarse. “Probably smell like one, too. Drowned in whiskey and sex and sweat and God knows what else.”

“Sounds volatile,” Rick quipped with a grin, leaning back down to officially greet her with a kiss for the start of the day.

Jo reciprocated the gesture and nodded. “Oh, it definitely is.” Then, after a few moments of just lying there like that, staring back up at him with a soft smile, she stated, “You know, I almost forgot this isn’t actually our house for a few minutes. And I forgot Hope isn’t with us.”

“Yeah,” he nodded, turning to look out the opened bedroom door out toward the upstairs hallway, as if expecting someone to be there, standing with Hope in their arms.

“It felt like we were waking up to go get her from her nursery, so we could start the day together, the three of us,” she began to narrate. “We’d both enjoy breakfast downstairs with her, and then run around like chickens with our heads cut off so we could both get ready for work, and then one of us would drop Hope off at my dad’s so he could watch her instead of us having to stick her in daycare or pay for a babysitter. And then we’d call him a few times over the course of the day, just to check in and see how she’s doing. Maybe you’d come to the school I was working at during our lunch breaks, and all the other teachers would see you walking up, in your uniform, and then they’d look at me, all jealous-like, because of how I snagged myself a good-lookin’ man of the law. And, as you know, everyone loves a man in uniform.”

Rick looked back at her and snickered. “You ain’t ever seen me in mine, though,”

“I have an imagination,” she insisted. “I can imagine what you looked like. And you looked good.”

Shaking his head, Rick twisted at the waist slightly and then reached his right arm across her, curling it up under her body as he half pulled her against him while also leaning down into her as well. He buried his face into the crook of her neck and kissed his way up to her jaw before claiming her lips tenderly with his.

“Well, if you’re gonna use your imagination to think of me as sexy in my sheriff’s deputy uniform, then you know I’m gonna have to use my imagination to think of you as a sexy schoolteacher,” he whispered against her mouth. When he pulled back a bit, he grinned. “Did you have one of those wooden rulers for slapping hands?”

Jo giggled. “Do you have a naughty schoolteacher fetish, Mr. Grimes?”

“Well, I _have_ done some naughty things that might warrant me having to stay after school for detention.”

“Oh my God,” Jo remarked, rolling her eyes as she pushed him playfully off of her.

Scooting over to the opposite side of him, she stood up as naked as the day she came crying from her deadbeat mother’s womb. As she ran a hand through her long, blonde hair, which had gotten a little snarled from the night before due to Rick manhandling it, Rick watched after her and tilted his head; admiring the pleasant view her backside gave him. She crouched down moments later to begin picking up her clothes that had been discarded on the floor along with his. When she stood back up straight, she tossed Rick’s pants over to him, hitting him softly in the shoulder.

Her smile brought one to his lips as well as he pushed the blankets off his lower half; revealing that he was just as naked as she was, and it was as lovely a sight to her as she was to him. Their mutual smiles grew more impish as she turned away and he climbed out of bed to pull his black jeans on, one leg at a time.

“Hey,” Jo called over to him.

Just as he was pulling his pants up over his narrow hips, Rick through a look over his shoulder at her to see she was gesturing toward the dresser. “What?”

“There’s some clean shirts T-shirts in there.”

Rick looked away from her, to the dresser, and then nodded. Doing up the zipper, he sauntered around the bed and opened one of the dresser drawers, but found only a few pairs of socks in the top right drawer.

“Left side,” Jo remarked. “Right side belonged to the woman of the house. Left side was the husband’s. I got my clean underwear and the shirt I was wearing yesterday from the right.”

Rick nodded and stepped over slightly. “Is that a veiled attempt at getting me to not go commando anymore?” he joked. “I thought you liked the easy access.”

Crouched down to pull open the middle drawer, Rick never saw the balled up shirt that hit him in the back of the head. Turning around, he looked down to see it was the shirt Jo had worn the day before and then picked it up and tossed it back to her with a snicker.

After Rick found a crisp, white T-shirt to wear, as well as a clean pair of socks, Jo had also grabbed a different shirt to wear since she had gotten blood splatter on the previous one from the walkers she’d taken down in the neighborhood. As soon as they were both dressed, they made their way downstairs and went to the dining room where Jo had placed all the food and supplies she’d gathered from the houses on the street. The large can in the back is what caught Rick’s eye right away and made him chuckle.

“I think we should eat that now. It’ll be easier not having to lug it around with everything else,” Rick commented, throwing Jo a smirk.

“I had no problem carrying all of this back here by myself yesterday.”

“The short distance of a few houses, maybe. But we’ll have miles ahead of us to go, and I really just want to split one hundred and twelve ounces of chocolate pudding with you right now.”

Jo smiled back at him with her entire face, and Rick was glad to see the sparkle back in her green eyes.

Finding a can opener, and two spoons, the pair sat down at the dining room table together, sitting side by side. As soon as they had the can opened, they dove right in with their spoons and reveled in eating chocolate; something they hadn’t been able to have in a long time. Because it was chocolate and because they were both so hungry anyway, they were able to empty all one hundred and twelve ounces between them with ease.

With full stomachs, they rinsed it down with swigs from their water bottles, and then stood up to gather duffel bags to use for carrying their food and supplies in. They didn’t even have to announce that that was what needed to be done. They just knew what they had to do and went about it silently.

They split the supplies and food evenly, or as evenly as they could, so one bag wasn’t heavier than the other and, in the event that they lost one bag, there would still have something with them.

“How’s your hangover?” Jo wondered, shoving a box of tampons she’d found for herself into the bag Rick had opened in front of him.

Rick made a face at those particular supplies and then looked over at her. “Better,” he replied. “I think the pudding helped.”

“Same here.”

Rick continued to look her over when he suddenly chuckled. Lifting up a hand, he grabbed her face and turned it to look more toward him. “You got some pudding on the side of your mouth,” he informed, clearly amused. As she brought her hand up to wipe it away, Rick shook his head. “That’s alright, I got it.”

Leaning forward, Rick placed his lips to the corner of her mouth and let his tongue flick out over the small spot of chocolate pudding there. He then used the gesture as another excuse just to kiss her; dragging his tongue over her bottom lip and then slipping it into her readily accepting mouth.

“You taste like chocolate and bourbon,” he mumbled against her lips as he placed both his hands on either side of her face.

“So do you,” Jo cooed at the way his kiss made her melt against him. She ran her hands up his chest and then down the sides of his torso before snaking her arms around him until she clasped her hands together and rested them upon the small of his back.

As they momentarily lost themselves in each other’s lips, there came a rough and abrupt couple of knocks on the front door and they couldn’t seem to pull apart fast enough.

Rick hurried away toward the living room where he remembered taking off his gun belt two nights before and found it where he left it on the floor by the couch. Sliding his Colt out of the holster, he crept up toward the door and looked behind him to see that Jo was quietly approaching with her short sword in hand.

Both of their expressions had gone from lovey-dovey to dead serious in mere seconds as they looked upon each other and nodded.

A second, a louder series of knocks reverberated through the front door, and just before Rick could peer through the peephole, a voice called out to them.

“Rick, Jo…we know you’re in there,” spoke the raspy, Southern voice of a man. “We saw you two kissing through the dining room windows.”

Rick began to chuckle as he tipped his head down. He didn’t need to look through the peephole to know who it was.

Still gripping his gun, he looked over at Jo as he began to push the couch back from the door. When he had the clearance, Rick reached for the doorknob and twisted it before pulling the door wide open to reveal none other than Daryl Dixon.

“I could’ve just walked the fuck right in, but I thought knocking would be more polite,” Daryl quipped; holding onto the strap of his crossbow which was resting upon his back.

Rick’s smile brightened his face, and Jo mirrored his expression as Daryl stepped inside the house.

“Who else is with you?” Jo asked; her heartbeat beginning to race as she got her hopes up — no pun intended. “You said ‘we.’”

Daryl looked over at Jo and gave her a nod of greeting and gestured to whoever was standing off to the side of the door that neither she nor Rick could see. After a moment, Sophia stepped forward and into the house, looking quite dirty and disheveled, though not as dirty as Daryl. But, then again, Daryl sometimes looked dirty even after they knew he had washed up.

“Oh my God,” Jo gasped and sprinted by Rick and swooping the teenager into her arms. “You made it out.”

“What am I, chopped liver?” Daryl remarked with a hint of a smile on his lips.

“Did the two of you get out together or with anyone else?” Rick asked. “Did you see if anyone else made it?”

“Are you okay?” Jo asked Sophia, who nodded.

“Yeah, thanks to Daryl,” the girl replied. “He taught me how to shoot his crossbow and I almost killed a rabbit.”

“It weren’t nothin’,” Daryl insisted with a shrug. “You gotta learn to hunt for your own supper eventually.” As Jo pulled the girl in for another hug, Daryl brought his focus back over toward Rick. “Everyone scattered. That tank came into the courtyard, and those people came in shooting and we were all shooting back. It was chaos. I saw Ty heading toward A Block, probably to go get Karen. Carol was still in there with Dr. Stevens and a few of the other flu survivors, but we don’t know if they got out.”

Daryl and Sophia looked sadly at each other.

When the girl pulled back from Jo’s arms, she looked between the couple and had an expression of guilt on her face. “I’m sorry,” she blurted. “You gave me Hope to look after, and I was, but then there was all that gunfire and shouting and I got scared and didn’t have anything to protect us with. So, I put her down in her crib and ran outside to get a gun. I shot a man in the chest and Daryl finished him off and he was trying to get me out of there, but I told him I had to go back for Hope. We ran back inside and she wasn’t where I left her. She was gone and so was her diaper bag.”

“We didn’t see who nabbed her and got out with her,” Daryl added. “We couldn’t wait around and see either.” He looked between both Rick and Jo, who had seemed like they had just had a rug pulled out from underneath them. “I’m sorry.”

Rick nodded. “It’s okay. You tried to go back and get her, and that means a lot.” He gestured between him and Jo. “We wanted to, but Maggie said someone had Hope, a woman or a girl,” he looked briefly to Sophia, “so we knew she got out alive. We just didn’t know who got her out alive.”

Daryl craned his neck to peer behind Rick toward the kitchen. “Maggie got out, too? That’s good.”

Rick and Jo looked at each other, solemnly.

“She got out,” he remarked. “Just not alive.”

“Oh.” Daryl looked a bit crestfallen, but not really surprised.

Truthfully, they’d all be more surprised by who had lived rather than who had died.

“We brought her with us. I couldn’t—” Jo began.

“We couldn’t leave her behind like that,” Rick cut in, gesturing between Jo and himself, and holding her eye for a moment. “We buried her beside a diner not too far from here.”

Daryl nodded. “So that _was_ you.” The archer smirked. “Yeah, me and Sophia, when we got out, the way we went took us through some thick woods on C Block’s side of the prison. We made our way around after a while, doubled-back a bit when we noticed three sets of footprints. Two were normal, but the middle set was dragging. I thought maybe it was a walker. Those footprints stopped once they hit paved road. Then we found the diner, saw the grave.”

“And we saw the walker inside the diner with its head cut off,” Sophia added.

“Precise blade cut like that — I figured it might be you,” Daryl commented, looking right at Jo.

“You figured right,” she smiled.

“Saw that grave, though; thought it might’ve been Rick.”

“Nah,” Rick shook his head. “It’ll take a lot more to kill me.”

“Hell yeah,” Daryl nodded and reached a hand out to slap it down upon Rick’s shoulder; clearly grateful to have his friend alive and virtually well. He wasn’t blind to the cuts and bruising on Rick’s face. “We’re glad you’re both still kickin’.”

Sophia nodded in agreement as she leaned into Jo and hugged her tightly. If she couldn’t have her actual mother at her side, Jo was the next best thing for the young teenager. Especially since, if it hadn’t been for Jo, she might’ve died that day in the woods, a year and a half ago, when that walker had chased after her. And because of Jo, she found her mother. Sophia just hoped she’d find her once again.

“Have you eaten?” Jo wondered, resting her arms around Sophia’s shoulders.

Daryl shook his head. “We ate some snake yesterday afternoon. Almost snagged a deer earlier, but a damn walker spooked it.”

“Well, I found plenty of canned goods yesterday when I scavenged the houses on this street,” she replied. “It’s all on the dining room table. So, help yourselves to something. There’s water bottles, too.”

With a nod, Daryl glanced at Jo and then gestured to Sophia to head into the other room to get something to eat first. When the girl broke away from Jo’s side, only then did Daryl follow. Rick and Jo glanced at each other and then shut the front door before sidling up beside each other, with Rick placing a hand on the small of her back and brushing his nose against the side of her face.

“When I saw Daryl standing there, I really thought he’d have Carol with him, too,” he whispered into her ear. “I really thought they’d have Hope with them.”

Jo frowned and turned her face. Rick leaned back as they looked at each other. “I did, too,” she agreed. “With any luck, Carol’s still out there, and if she is, Hope might very well be with her.”

Rick nodded. “I haven’t exactly been a man of faith in a long time, and I’m going back before this world became what it is, but if ever there was a time for me to pray to God, it’s now. I pray he — or _she_ — is looking out for us and for our little girl, and putting us on a path to get her back.”

Lifting a hand to the left side of his face, Jo pressed her forehead against his and then absentmindedly let her fingers play with his growing beard. “I pray for that, too.” Lifting her eyes, she glanced at him through her eyebrows, smiling when he sensed her eyes on him and looked back. “I’m praying for a lot these days, but I feel like I’m going unheard, which just makes me feel more and more faithless.”

“I know,” Rick nodded slightly. He brought his face up, removing his forehead from hers and instead placing his lips there. “But something’s gotta give, right?”

Jo shrugged and half-smiled. “You’d think.”

“C’mon.” Snaking an arm around her shoulders, Rick pulled her against his side and led her from the living room to join Daryl and Sophia in the dining room.

 

* * *

 

No, more than an hour later, after Daryl and Sophia had had something to eat, and after Jo had gotten them to take turns in utilizing the bathroom to clean up and take advantage of the clean clothes in the bedrooms, all four of them were stepping outside onto the front porch. Daryl had his crossbow slung over his back, the same as when they arrived, while Jo and Sophia were carrying empty duffel bags on their shoulders. Rick, empty-handed, slipped a hand behind Jo’s back and pulled her in for a kiss, which Daryl smirked at before glancing over toward the street.

“You sure you don’t want me to come with you?” Rick inquired with a slight smirk on his lips.

Daryl shook his head. “Nah, we got this.” He said, garnering both Rick and Jo’s attention as he turned toward them and waved at Rick. “You got beat down pretty bad and you ain’t exactly fully healed yet, are you?”

Jo nuzzled her nose along Rick’s bearded jaw. “Just rest a little longer,” she insisted. “The three of us will be fine.” Jo cast an eye over to both Daryl and Sophia. “We’re just checking the houses on the other street, and we’ll be back, and when we do get back, we’ll hit the road again.”

Rick looked down at his watch. “How long you think you’ll be?”

“Couple hours?” Daryl shrugged, not exactly sure.

“It’s almost ten now. Say, about noon?”

Jo and Daryl both nodded. “Yeah, we should be back by then. Shouldn’t take too long,” she assured.

Rick studied the faces of the archer and the teenager standing in front of him before bringing his gaze back to the woman beside him. “Promise me you’ll be careful,” Rick remarked. And then, more quietly for her benefit, he asked of Jo, “Promise me you’ll come back.”

Jo smiled a small smile. “I promise,” she mouthed, before leaning back in to kiss him again.

“Alright, enough with the sucking face,” Daryl faux whined, causing Sophia to chuckle.

After everything they’d all been through, still being able to smile and laugh about things was so incredibly welcomed.

Rick smiled as well and nodded at the three as they began their descent down the front steps.

“Lie down and rest, Rick,” Jo called back to him like a chastising mother.

He nodded and waved after them.

Slowly, he watched them head toward the street and then turn right in the direction of the tracks. When their figures became obscured by trees and other overgrown shrubbery, Rick gave a careful glance around to check for the unfriendly, undead types, he stepped backward into the house and shut the door behind him. Just to make sure, he leaned forward against the door, peering through the peephole before walking around to the opposite end of the couch and push it back in place against the door as a barricade.

Casually, Rick walked around the downstairs. The bags he had separated with Jo so there was an even amount of supplies had been emptied out so that they had an extra bag for more scavenging. Everything that had been in Jo’s duffel bag had been left out on the dining room table, so Rick took it upon himself to shove it back into his duffel bag. He figured they would be gone for no more than two hours, so he could putter around a bit before taking a small cat nap. He knew that if he didn’t do that latter and lied about having done so, Jo would probably sniff out that lie like some kind of bloodhound and he didn’t want to get her riled up about his well-being. It was best to just bite the bullet and rest as she suggested.

And, also, he _was_ still tired.

After everything that happened, including dealing with the sickness at the prison and The Governor’s attack, he hadn’t had one, decent night’s sleep in almost two weeks. Sure, the night before was pretty decent; thanks in part to that whiskey bourbon and quite literally fucking his and Jo’s aggravations away. However, they didn’t finally fall asleep until late and they were up at daybreak.

When Rick began his ascent back up the stairs, he gripped the railing as firmly as possible with his still sore, right hand while his left hand held onto his water bottle, and then came to a sudden stop.

He was remembering the night before, as hazy as it was now, but he was remembering it nonetheless.

And he was suddenly remembering the one thing that never happened among all the things that _did_ happen.

“Oh, shit,” he muttered. Walking forward into the master bedroom, he looked around at the floor and on any of the surfaces, like the dresser or the bedside tables, but couldn’t find what he was hoping to find. Running a hand through his curls, he let out a sigh and then brought the same hand down over his face to scratch at his beard. Narrowing his blue eyes, he let out a small, unaffected chuckle. “Well, I guess we’ll deal with that if it happens,” he said out loud to himself.

Sauntering back over to the side of the bed he’d been occupying the last couple of nights, Rick sat down upon the mattress. Setting his water bottle down on the bedside table, he then slowly leaned back against the pillows and let out a content sigh of comfort.

For a moment, he stared up at the ceiling, trying not to let his mind begin to run wild with the new thought that had appeared and instead focus on his slight exhaustion. He closed his eyes and he considered the darkness he became enveloped in. He listened to the silence of the house and the faint tweet of birds he could hear from outside through the closed windows. He focused on his own breathing; slowing it down.

Before long, Rick succumbed to the Sandman.

 

* * *

 

Jo was walking through the dining room of a house that seemed as if it had remained virtually untouched since the previous owners left it. She didn’t know the circumstances regarding why the family no longer was there, but she could deduce they most likely fled, heading toward Atlanta like so many others. The sad part was that they were probably dead. It was the likeliest outcome these days. The chances to dying were greater than surviving. However, she was a bit confused because it looked like _nothing_ had been touched. The house had been locked from the inside out, the same as the house Jo had broken into the day before when she cut her arm, and the cabinets in the kitchen turned out to still be fully stocked with canned goods.

“Why would they leave without taking their food?” Sophia called from the kitchen, where she was shoving can after can into her duffel bag.

“They probably thought there would be plenty of food wherever they were going to,” Jo replied, slipping out of the dining room and into the kitchen. She leaned against the door frame and gave the room a careful onceover. “Maybe they had even more with them that they _did_ take.”

“Maybe.” Sophia nodded and then let out a small chuckle, turning around and holding up a small, flat can. “Like old times.”

Jo narrowed her eyes and took note that it was a can of anchovies; remembering the anchovies she and Sophia had ate together a few times after she had found the girl in the woods. “We should look for a deck of cards in that case.” Lifting up off the door frame, Jo walked over to Sophia and tapped her fingers on the girl’s shoulder. “Switch bags with me. Don’t put them all the cans in yours. It’ll get too heavy.”

Placing her duffel bag on the counter, Jo removed Sophia’s and took it. Without another word, she walked out of the kitchen and out into the hall.

“Do you think my mom survived?” Sophia called out.

Jo paused. “I think it’s a great possibility.” Even though she hoped Carol was alive, she wasn’t going to admit to the teenager that her hopes weren’t exactly too high for anyone from the prison. She couldn’t even admit to herself that her hopes of her own daughter having survived getting out, with whoever it was, were also low. “Your mother’s a strong woman. She’s been through a lot, same as all of us, and she’s always come out on top.”

“Do you think she has Hope?”

“Honestly, it doesn’t matter who has her, as long as she’s alive and well.”

“Are you worried at all?”

Jo sighed and dipped her head. “I’m her mother. I won’t stop worrying about her until the day I die.”

“I’m worried about my mom,” came Sophia’s comment in a slightly small voice; as if she felt guilty making that comment. “I’m not as hopeful she made it out as you are.” The teen suddenly appeared in the hallway with Jo’s duffel bag slung over her shoulder. Her presence got Jo to turn around and look back at her. “If she didn’t survive, you’ll stay with me like before, right?”

Jo narrowed her gaze and walked up to the young female. She placed her hands on either side of the girl’s face, forcing her to maintain eye contact. “I won’t leave you,” she insisted, adamantly. Jo nodded, as if the gesture was the punctuation at the end of the sentence to affirm it.

In response, Sophia nodded as well and then leaned in; wrapping her arms around Jo’s waist and hugging her. “I’m glad Daryl and I found you and Rick.”

“So am I,” Jo smirked, resting her head on top of Sophia’s.

 

* * *

 

Daryl hadn’t done much in the way of scavenging with Jo and Sophia. He had wandered the first house with them, but decided to go off into the woods and hunt for some rabbits or squirrels. He insisted some fresh meat for them to cook and eat would feel better for their stomachs rather than expired canned goods. Jo had assured him that was fine with her; that she and Sophia had a handle on things, and that the three of them would just meet up later back at the other house where Rick was waiting for them.

While the three of them were off doing their own thing, one street away from where they’d started out, Rick was still in bed, enjoying a rather, pleasant dreamless sleep.

Well, he was until he heard unfamiliar voices and heavy footsteps downstairs in the house.

An abrupt thud sound and someone shouting out in pain caused his eyes to pop open. His entire body seemed to tense as he lay there, listening, almost afraid to make a move. Dropping his left hand to his side, he reached for her Colt but didn’t have time to pull it out of the holster when footsteps came stomping up the staircase.

“Ya’ll stay down here,” a deep, male voice stated.

Rolling left on the mattress and out of the line of sight from the upstairs hallway, Rick climbed off the bed and stepped quietly around the floor, barely peeking his face out as he saw the figure of a man turning the doorknob to one of the extra bedrooms and pushing the door open before slipping inside the room. Rick pulled his face back and looked around the master. He tapped his Colt with his fingers, but didn’t want to use it. He had one, maybe two bullets left and he didn’t know how many people were downstairs. Either way, he knew he’d be outnumbered and he couldn’t take the risk.

His only choice was to hide.

With the unknown man having gone into the other bedroom, the coast was clear for Rick to step around to the side of the bed he’d been lying on and dropped to the floor to slide underneath the bed. He laid there on his stomach for a moment, his head raised and staring forward as sweat began to drip down his face. When he remembered his water bottle on the bedside table, he shimmied slightly to the right to exit the underside of the bed just as the unknown man came walking out of the extra bedroom and Rick had never moved more quickly in his life in order to hide himself back under the bed again.

He shook slightly; worried he might’ve been spotted. Even though his breathing was just as shaky, he was able to rein it in and maintain silence. He could feel his nerves fraying and his heartbeat racing a mile a minute as his mind reeled with all the worst case scenarios of what could happen if he was found out.

As soon as the coast was clear again, Rick let out a steadying breath and scurried out from under the bed to grab his water bottle as fast as he could and then duck back underneath to lie in wait.

Without fail, the unknown man came back out into the upstairs hall from wherever he’d just been; either the bathroom or second extra bedroom. Either way, the man was now stopped just outside the master bedroom, and Rick could see the automatic rifle he had that was pointed downward at the hardwood floor. After a beat, the man walked forward into the room and Rick winced, tensing up at being found out. As the man stepped directly in front of the bed, Rick held his breath and then watched as the man kicked an article of clothing that was on the floor out of his way to open up the closet. When nothing inside was of interest of him, the man began to move back toward the bed, and then over to the dresser which Rick and Jo had utilized for a while the night before.

Rick suddenly realized he didn’t know how long he’d been asleep and turned his wrist slightly to check the time on his watch. It was almost noon. Jo, Daryl and Sophia would be returning shortly, if things had gone smoothly with their scavenging, and they would be returning to God knows how many, possibly, unfriendly types.

When the unknown man stepped back over to the front of the bed, Rick zeroed in on the man’s boots and, more importantly, on the blood stains all over them.

Blood from walkers never stained that way, Rick noted. Blood from the living _did._

Yeah, these men were most likely unfriendly types.

Rick’s left hand began to shake as the unknown man walked slowly around the left side of the bed and suddenly laid down where Rick had been minutes before. The mattress above him sank down, forcing Rick to drop his head lower toward the dust covered floor. He closed his eyes tightly and looked down at the ground, feeling a bead of sweat rolling down his nose and drip off.

 _Please leave_ , he wished quietly in his mind.

For a few minutes, Rick laid there, silent as the grave. When he heard he unknown man snoring, he felt his window of opportunity had opened up.

Sliding to his right, he attempted to exit the underside of the bed again when new footsteps came clamoring up the stairs. Slipping back to his same position, thankfully unnoticed, he watched as the second unknown man approached; coming to a stop just outside the doorway to the master bedroom.

“Yo,” the second man called out. “Comfy?”

After a moment, the first man replied. “You’re waking me up to ask if I’m comfortable?”

“I wanna lie down.”

“There’s two other bedrooms, bitch.”

“Them’s kids beds. I want this one.”

“It’s claimed,” the first man informed.

“I didn’t hear it. You gonna have to lay claim somewhere else.”

Before Rick realized it, the two men were both standing up and fighting each other. The first man suddenly dropped to the floor, gripping his throat; probably having received a punch there from the second man. As the first man struggled to get back up, the second man grabbed his face and forced him to stay down and followed up by a punch to the head; all the while Rick watched, not a foot away.

When the first man’s face turned to his right, he finally noticed Rick, who cocked his head to the left, silently praying the first man said nothing. Not that he could, though. The second man had leaned down and wrapped an arm around the first man’s neck to choke him out.

Rick continued to watch, holding eye contact with the first man as his fight to struggle lessened and consciousness slowly slipped from him. With one good choke, the first man was forced to sleep, and at first Rick wasn’t sure if he had just died or not. Staring him down carefully, he could tell the first man was still breathing. He wasn’t dead, just asleep.

“My bed now, jackoff,” the second man chuckled as he dropped heavily down onto the bed.

The gesture surprised Rick slightly, who tensed back up again, and balled his fists up in the process. As the second man took his time getting comfortable, Rick turned his head when he noticed a foot draped over the left side of the bed, somewhat blocking one of his escape routes. The right was clear, but Rick didn’t want to risk it, what with it being in full view of the upstairs hallway. The front of the bed was a no go, as well, with the first man lying there, unconscious.

When the second man began to snore, Rick began to slowly slide over to his left; deeming it was now or never. There was a steady thud of something hitting the walls downstairs, signaling the possible approach of a third person, but Rick couldn’t stay put any longer if he was going to get to his people and warn them away before they returned first.

He continued to move slow out from under the bed, but stopped suddenly when he accidentally bumped into the second man’s foot. He paused, and waited for a response, but all he heard was the uninterrupted snoring from the second man. Rick mentally chastised himself, though, for being so careless. However, he didn’t beat himself up to much over it; instead choosing to move ahead and climb out from underneath the bed, quietly and more carefully. He did stop, though, as the thudding sound got closer. A wave of mild panic ran through him, causing him to wonder if he would have to slip back under the bed in case this third person came into the room as well.

When no such approach came, Rick began pulling himself up to his knees once he was cleared from underneath the bed. Sweat continued to drop from his face and from his curls as he got up to his feet and turned back to look at the second man sprawled out, fast asleep, on the bed.

Wasting no more time, Rick hurried right out of the bedroom and glanced down over the railing toward the first floor just as he spotted a man with a small rubber ball ascending the stairs, tossing the ball against the steps and catching it in his hand.

“Tony, Len, get your asses down here,” the third man called up.

Ducking backward, Rick slipped into the second extra bedroom as the third man continued up the stairs.

“Yo, you hear me?”

Moving backward, deeper into the bedroom, Rick looked pulled his Colt from his holster and gripped it tightly his right hand; ignoring the soreness. Just as he moved into the small room off the main part of the bedroom, where the bed was, the third man stepped inside and began perusing. Rick listened as something got knocked over and clattered to the floor. It sounded like a few jewel cases to CDs, but that wasn’t important.

Turning slightly, Rick lifted his gun up, prepared to aim it and shoot as the ball suddenly began to bounce off the wood paneling between the windows, mere feet from Rick. The third man never stepped into the small room with the bed off the main bedroom, though. Instead, only his arm appeared as he tossed and caught the ball a couple of times before turning around and making his way back out of the bedroom. The third man then continued to bounce the ball off the floor; leaving Rick to tip his forehead against the wall and let out a sigh of relief.

Once he was alone in the room, Rick stepped over to the windows and trying prying them open, but to no avail. They were either locked or stuck from having gone unopened for so long, probably due to either heat causing the wood to expand or moisture, or both.

As a few voices from downstairs began to shout out, “Claim!” the second man, lying down on the bed in the master bedroom, growled out in aggravation.

“Shut the hell up! I'm trying to sleep.”

“There's a woman shacking up in here,” a fourth voice called out.

“Say what?”

“Come on down.”

“She hot?”

Rick began to move, stepping up to the side of the bedroom’s door. He listened to the men talking among themselves, and knew they had found Jo’s clothing she’d discarded the day before and the way they were inquiring about her got Rick feeling both defensive and possessive.

“Don't grab your pecker just yet. She ain't here.”

Rick sneered at that comment, cocking his head slightly, as if willing them to say anything further; his two bullets be damned. If Jo, or Sophia, returned before he could warn them away, Rick was sure he’d find a way to take these men down in order to protect his own.

Just as he was about to stick his head out, the second and third man came walking toward the stairs, causing Rick to duck backward.

“What the hell you hollering about?” the second man, possibly the one called Len, wondered.

“Found her shirt. Must have washed it this morning,” the fourth voice from downstairs replied. “Smells good.”

“Oh, you found a shirt?” the third man with the bouncy ball remarked, unimpressed, as he and Len trudged down the stairs together. “She could be miles away by now.”

“Why'd she go to all the trouble of washing a shirt when she's just gonna ditch it?”

“She'll be back,” someone said.

Rick wasn’t sure which one of them has. He was too focused now on getting out of the house.

“I call first when she gets here.”

Alright, well, that caught Rick’s attention enough to make his blood start to boil. No one would lay a hand on Jo if he had anything to say about it.

“Who knows who else she got with her. We need to be ready for anything.”

Sneering again, Rick moved out of the second extra bedroom and made his way back toward the master. He peered inside and spotted the automatic rifle that Len had left behind on the bed, which Rick decided he would try and take for himself. Just as he began to step back into the bedroom, the nearing of voices caused him to stop and look back over his shoulder.

“Len, take the side room.”

“Hold on, let me get a gun.”

 _Fuck_ , Rick thought to himself, as he backed into the bathroom just as Len took the stairs two at a time.

Rick closed the bathroom door quietly behind him just as Len appeared in the hallway and walked into the master bedroom.

“Where the hell is Tony?”

That was the last thing Rick really heard before he turned and noticed another man was sitting on the toilet. He wasn’t using it with his pants down around his ankles or anything, but he was still there nonetheless and, for a moment, both he and Rick were stunned by the appearance of the other.

Without missing a beat, both of them launched themselves at each other. Bathroom Man tried reaching for the submachine gun resting on the countertop. Rick grabbed the strap and wrapped it around the man’s neck to choke him with it. He stood behind him, with the man leaning back into him, fighting to get the upper hand as he slammed Rick back into the door. Rick wouldn’t release his grip, as Bathroom Man began to go red in the face while dropping to his knees and attempting to reach for the pair of scissors on the countertop.

However, Rick pulled Bathroom Man back down onto the floor with him so that Rick was lying underneath him, as the scissors fell to the floor and out of reach.

Rick didn’t think. He only reacted. And all he knew was this man was with obviously bad men, which made him one of the bad guys as well. One of them was not coming out of the bathroom alive, and Rick sure as hell wasn’t going to be the asshole lying on top of him.

Tightening his grip even more on the strap, Rick pulled harder against Bathroom Man’s throat with it; not letting up for one moment until he was certain he had choked every last breath out of the guy. When he was certain, he tossed the man off of him and climbed to his feet, removing the strap from around the man’s neck and holding the Uzi in his hands; prepared for anyone to come inside the bathroom and try to attack him.

When no one came, Rick stepped over to the window and slowly lifted it all the way up before reaching forward to open the bathroom door a hair. Looking to his right, he spied the brown, suede jacket with a broad fur collar tossed over the top of the shower door. Grabbing it for himself, Rick threw it out the window and onto the roof below. He then, slowly and carefully, climbed out of the window and onto the roof as well, with the Uzi still in hand.

Rick looked back in toward the bathroom as he strapped the Uzi across his chest and then silently pulled the jacket on. As he guided himself closer to the edge of the roof, he looked down to judge how far of a drop he had. If he had to drop all the way down to the grass, he’d likely break his legs or back, or worse. Fortunately, the roof overhang didn’t reach that far and the drop off was simply to the back porch alone.

Sliding down onto his stomach, Rick stuck his legs out and grabbed the gutter for balanced. However, the gutter gave slightly under his weight and he lost his grip. He had no choice but to drop the rest of the way, falling to the porch with an unceremonious thud.

He didn’t waste any time, though, as he scurried over to the side of the house and gripped the Uzi in his hands, waiting to see if anyone came out the back door to see what the sound was.

When no one came, Rick darted across the back porch and down the steps. Armed and ready for anything, he moved around the tree beside the porch and made his way through extra shrubbery to conceal himself as he continued onward along the side of the house; pausing here and there to listen for anyone following.

As Rick took cover below the side of the front porch, he looked out toward the direction of the tracks where Jo, Daryl and Sophia had gone off earlier. He didn’t see any of them, only a tired, old green bike that had gone unused for a long time.

A door opened up and the sound of heavy footsteps and that same bouncing ball echoed off the floorboards of the porch, letting Rick know it was the third man, with the gray hair and beard, who had just come outside. He looked up to get a careful look but ducked down quickly as the third man walked over to the railing and spat twice over the edge. Rick looked down and held his breath again while the third man took a seat; balancing on the railing and using the post to prop himself up as he began to eat from one of the cans of food that belonged to Rick and Jo.

After spitting once more, the third man began to whistle, as if trying to summon the birds down from the trees, which Rick narrowed his eyes at. As he lied in wait, Rick glanced around the corner of the porch and spotted Jo and Sophia approaching, completely unaware of what was going on at the house or who was occupying it now.

Panic ripping through him, Rick prepared himself to jump to his feet and take the man on the railing out with the Uzi. However, the abrupt sounds of snarling and shouts from inside the house proved to be a better distraction.

“What the—son of a bitch,” the third man grunted as he got to his feet and headed straight into the house, as gunfire also began to ring out.

With the coast clear to finally get away, Rick tore off in a sprint through the trees and ran directly up to Jo and Sophia.

As soon as they realized he was upon them and urging them quickly away, the gunfire and shouts coming from the house also registered in their brains.

“Go! Go!” Rick urged.

Neither of them hesitated as they turned around and ran toward the train tracks with Rick taking a position behind them.

“What about Daryl?” Sophia questioned; her eyes wide with concern and panic.

As they got closer to the tracks, Rick looked back over his shoulder toward the house while letting the teen’s question sink in. “Where is he?”

“We split up after the first house we checked,” Jo replied, letting out a weary breath from exertion. She turned and sprinted backward slightly for a moment, looking back at the house as well before eyeing Rick. She had pulled her sword from its scabbard on instinct, prepared to use it, when she turned back around to look forward once more. “We continued checking the other houses and he went off to hunt for a bit.”

“We were gonna meet back up at the house.”

“We can’t go back there,” Rick stated. “Some men came in while I was asleep, and they’re not the good kind. They’re not like us. They fight among themselves and attempt to kill each other over a damned bed.” Once he was sure they were in no way in any line of sight to the house, Rick slowed his pace a little but he didn’t stop moving, so neither did the two females in front of him. “Daryl’s careful. He’ll hear them before he gets close enough. He’s a good tracker. He’ll figure out we’ve left and find us.”

Sophia looked back at him with a worried pout as she gripped her own gun in her hands while struggling to carry her duffel bag over her shoulder. “What if he doesn’t?”

“Don’t think like that,” Jo insisted. “If Daryl could lead the two of you to Rick and me, he can find his way to all three of us.”

“Jo’s right,” Rick agreed. He reached out his hand and grabbed the strap of Sophia’s bag, slipping it off her shoulder and slinging it over his. “We gotta keep moving, and he’ll understand that. He’ll find us.”

With the extra weight off her shoulder, no longer bogging her down, Sophia nodded begrudgingly as she walked ahead of the two adults with more ease in her step. Rick took that opportunity to move up alongside Jo, brushing his arm gently against hers.

When she looked at him, he gave her a nod of his head. “How did you make out at the other houses?”

“Good,” she replied, reaching her sword behind her and sliding it back into its scabbard. “One house was stocked up pretty well. It had been locked up, so I thought the people who lived there took off with the intent to come back some day.”

Rick narrowed his gaze, sensing more to the story. “And that wasn’t the case?”

Jo shook her head. “They never left,” she whispered, out of earshot of Sophia who was a few feet ahead of them. “I checked a bedroom off this children’s playroom. The entire family was in there, lying on two twin beds; dead with gunshot wounds in their decayed skulls.” Jo shivered upon reliving the memory. “Another body was in a chair, holding a shotgun, with gun splatter on the wall behind them.” Eyeing Rick, she frowned. “It was a child, barely older than Sophia. I couldn’t tell her what I saw in there. I lied and said it was a dead walker.”

Rick nodded. “I would’ve said the same.”

“She’s not completely jaded yet, so if I can keep her from some of the horrors in this world, then I will,” Jo spoke, focusing on the figure of the teenager in front of them. “She’s already had enough of her childhood taken from her.”

Letting the Uzi hang downward, Rick looked over his shoulder to check to make sure none of those “claimers” were following them. When he was sure they were okay, he reached out his left hand and grabbed hold of Jo’s right, giving it a comforting squeeze.

“She’ll be okay,” Rick insisted. “She’s tough.”

“Yeah,” Jo agreed, squeezing his hand back. “I really hope Daryl can catch up and find us.”

“He will. I don’t know how long it’ll take him, but he will.”

Jo smirked and caught Rick’s eye. “You sound very sure, and you have no idea how comforting that is.”

“Just doing my job.”

“Your job? What job is that, exactly?”

Rick frowned. “Don’t you know? Last I checked I’m still your fiancé. I believe being a comfort to you in tough times is one of the job descriptions.”

Jo noted the smirk pulling at the corners of her lips and she shook her head as a chuckle bubbled forth from her lips. “Must’ve slipped my mind for a second,” she teased, leaning in to him and bumping her arm purposely into his. “I’ll try better to remember from here on out.”

“Damn well better,” he snickered. “Or else I’m returning those rings in my pocket.”

Jo studied the side of his face as he stared ahead, beyond Sophia, to the tracks stretching out before them. “You still have them?” she inquired, honestly surprised. “I would’ve expected them to have fallen out by now.”

Rick nodded. “I got deep pockets.” He turned his head and when they locked eyes, he winked at her.

After about thirty minutes of walking on the tracks, the three of them came to a stop when they spotted an abandoned railcar on the track parallel to the one they were on. There was a large banner strung up along the side and a map wrapped in cellophane to protect it from the elements.

The message sounded too good to be true.

 

 **SANCTUARY FOR ALL**  
**COMMUNITY FOR ALL**  
**THOSE WHO ARRIVE SURVIVE**

 

The map had all the train track routes outlined and leading to the center, which was labeled with a Sharpie-drawn star and the name of TERMINUS.

Rick, Jo and Sophia walked right up to the map and looked it over.

“What do you think?” Jo asked him.

Rick narrowed his eyes and shrugged before glancing at the two females. “I think it’s an option we should consider.”

“The others might’ve seen this map, too,” Sophia offered up. “My mom might’ve seen it. Maybe whoever has Hope has seen it.”

The last comment was enough to grab Rick and Jo’s attention. The two adults locked eyes and an agreement passed between them.

“Let’s go,” Rick decided.

Jo nodded. “But if our people aren’t there—”

“—then we’ll move on,” he finished her sentence for her.

Removing the bandage he had wrapped around his knuckles, Rick tossed it to the ground just below the map and gestured up the tracks with a bob of his head. The three of them returned to the tracks and continued to go forward.


	28. Monster

_“He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster._  
_And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee.”_  
_—_ Friedrich Nietzsche

* * *

  
After about two and a half days, the trio was still traveling along the same set of tracks. They only stopped at night when they ducked into the woods to sleep, and even then either Jo or Rick took turns on taking watch. They were both tired, but they were determined, and their determination won out in the end. They were also still without Daryl; the archer having not yet caught up to them, and that wasn’t lost on them. There was some worry among the trio of what if Daryl had gotten killed by either the Claimers or walkers, but neither of the three dared to speak those worries out loud.  
  
As they trudged along on that third day, Rick was taking lead on the tracks. He was looking straight ahead and had stopped for a moment, glancing up toward the waning sunlight and then at the path before them in general.  
  
“I think we got about a day's worth of water left,” he announced. “We're lucky it's cooled off a little bit.”  
  
“We should find someplace to set up camp for the night and build a fire,” Jo remarked, coming up behind him. “That cool air is nice during the day but it’s worse at night with the sun gone.”  
  
Rick nodded. “There’s another abandoned railcar up ahead,” he pointed about a hundred yards up the track. “We can get the doors open and sleep in there; maybe all three of us can even sleep at the same time and not worry about taking watch as long as we got the door pulled shut tight.”  
  
“Sounds like a plan.” Placing a hand on Rick’s shoulder, Jo then raised it up along the back of his neck and entwined her fingers within the curls at resting at the top of his jacket’s fuzzy collar. “The inside might even keep the cold at bay so we won’t have to bother with building a fire.”  
  
Turning to look over at her, while Sophia remained silent behind them, Rick leaned closer to Jo’s face and whispered. “If it’s still cold tonight we can use each other for body heat.”  
  
“You know I can still hear you, right?” Sophia asked; looking at the pair like a child would when their parents got lovey-dovey with each other.  
  
Rick chuckled and tossed his eyes over toward the teenager as he smirked. “Hey, what I said was PG. You’re fourteen years old. Your mind shouldn’t be in the gutter already.”  
  
“I lived in a cell block with three grown-up couples: Shane and Lori, Glenn and Maggie, and you and Jo,” Sophia retorted. “There were no doors and ya’ll weren’t always quiet enough.”  
  
Rick practically blanched at the teenager’s comment.  
  
Jo, however, gave a hearty laugh as she slapped him playfully on the chest. “You’re not smelling too good, anyway,” she joked, waving her hand in front of her nose to make a point.  
  
“Takes one to know one,” was his comeback as Sophia rolled her eyes and stepped between the two adults to take lead on the tracks. “Maybe we can find some baby wipes to use so we can clean ourselves up before we reach Terminus.”  
  
At the mention of baby wipes, Jo frowned. Her mind instantly wandered to that of her daughter, and Rick’s mind followed suit. Both of their smiles faded and, as a show of solidarity, Rick took her hand in his and leaned back in to press his forehead against hers.  
  
“We’ll find her,” he spoke quietly and resolutely.  
  
“I hope so.”

 

* * *

  
That night, they did sleep in the railcar and they did go without bothering to build a fire. By the time they woke up, it was well past morning and already in the afternoon. All three of them were clearly so overtired from walking and not sleeping well, if much at all, that their bodies shut down and sleep claimed them.  
  
When they piled out of the railcar, they soon began to realize they were growing increasingly overcome with hunger. So, sitting down outside the railcar, but off to the side of the tracks, they opened up a few cans of food to eat something. They sat there in silence, just thinking about how good it was to satisfy their appetites and all around fill the void for a little while longer. Not wanting to waste the daylight they had left, since they’d gotten a late start, they tossed their empty cans to the ground, just under the railcar and got back up to make their way along the tracks again.  
  
“So, what happens when we get to Terminus?” Sophia wondered; walking between both adults with her hands shoved in the pockets of the hoodie they had found for her. “What if they want to know about the things we’ve done? Do we tell them the truth?”  
  
“You make it sound like we’re the villains,” Jo remarked, mirroring the teenager’s stance.  
  
“I mean, what if they want to know all the things that happened to us; like, The Governor and Woodbury and the prison? Do we tell them or do we just sugarcoat it?”  
  
“We tell them who we are,” Rick answered, looking down at the ground as they continued along the tracks.  
  
“Who are we exactly?”  
  
“Survivors, good people,” Jo stated. As Sophia turned her face up to look at her, she added, “That’s all they need to know. It’s all that matters.”  
  
Sophia accepted that answer with a nod of her head as she picked up her pace so that she once more lead the way on the tracks. The area they were in was grew more and more dense with woods on either side of them, so they had to keep their wits about them in case of walkers coming out of the trees. When Jo wound up a few paces in front of Rick, but a few paces behind Sophia, Rick smirked and let out a quiet chuckle.  
  
“Not gonna lie,” he muttered. “Really enjoying the view right now.”  
  
Jo threw him a look over her shoulder. “Are you seriously staring at my ass right now?”  
  
“Every chance I get.”  
  
“You two are still aware I can still hear you, right?” Sophia called back to them.  
  
Rick grinned and looked down as Jo shook her head and looked forward.  
  
“Sorry, hon,” Jo apologized with a chuckle of her own. “We’ll try to avoid nauseating you.”  
  
Sophia turned around, walking backwards on the tracks, to reveal she was actually smiling and looked rather amused. “I actually don’t mind it. I’m just teasing you both,” she insisted. “I never got to see this kind of thing with my own parents as a kid. It’s just kinda nice to be around two people who actually love each other and would rather die than hurt each other.”  
  
The subject matter could’ve easily ruined the mood, what with Sophia alluding to the past when her father was alive and used to physically and verbally beat her mother, but the teenager was still smiling. Despite the world she was surviving puberty in, she was pretty much well-adjusted and was able to allow a lot of things to roll off her back. A lot of bad things had happened, but it was obviously she was also aware and appreciative of the good things that had happened as well, and that’s what she was now clinging to.  
  
The good things, the hope of better things to come.  
  
The sudden sound of a man screaming from somewhere in the woods cut into all three of their thoughts, though; pulling their attention away.  
  
_“Help! Somebody, help!”_  
  
Sophia looked wide-eyed up at Rick and Jo, both of whom had tensed up and reached for their respective weapons on instinct.  
  
“We gotta help him,” Sophia pleaded, turning to run in the direction the screaming came from.  
  
“Sophia, _no_ ,” Jo barked. Reaching an arm out, she grabbed a hold of the hood to Sophia’s hoodie and yanked the girl backward a little more roughly than she’d intended. “Sorry. But we don’t know what exactly he’s dealing with, and you can’t just go off running toward it at full speed.”  
  
“But we can’t _not_ see if we can help!” Sophia persisted. Yanking herself free of Jo’s grip, the girl ran off regardless of the warning she was given.  
  
Jo couldn’t let her run off alone, so she followed suit, and then Rick, as well; the latter letting out a grunt of frustration.  
  
By the time they made their way into the woods and toward the direction of the man screaming for help, those screams became screams of sheer, horrifying pain rather than screams of fear and impending doom. As the trio followed the sounds of equal part screams and snarling, they eventually came upon a small clearing in the woods where a large group of walkers had already descended down upon the man in question and were very much so in the process of devouring the flesh from his face.  
  
As soon as one walker clamped down on the man’s neck and ripped his larynx out, the screams of pain stopped as he bled out and died within seconds from the profuse blood loss.  
  
Rick placed his hand on the stunned teen’s shoulder. Both he and Jo were positive she had yet to truly experience a death that gruesome that she couldn’t be shielded from by her mother.  
  
“There’s nothing we could’ve done for him,” Rick assured. When Sophia didn’t budge right away, he gave her shoulder a firm squeeze to urge her along.  
  
At that same moment, two walkers from the group sensed the trio’s presence and turned around. As they sniffed aimlessly at the air, seeking out the scent of living flesh, they began the staggering march toward Rick, Jo and Sophia.  
  
“We have to go,” Jo insisted.  
  
Two walkers picking up on their scent was okay, but they didn’t need that entire group following after them.  
  
Yanking Sophia away, the three of them spun around and ran off together back through the woods in the direction they came to return to the tracks. They weren’t as swift enough as they would’ve liked, as more than those initial two walkers had followed after them. They couldn’t outrun them on the tracks, either, because there were about four walkers huddled over a fresh kill; someone who the man in the woods was probably traveling with.  
  
Pulling out his Colt, Rick hurried forward, right up to the first of the four walkers, and bashed its head in with the butt of the gun. He took a second down in the same stroke as Jo came running up behind him with her sword out. Without hesitation, she swung the stocky blade upward into the skull of the third walker, slicing it in vertically in half. Spinning around, she decapitated the fourth walker in the next as Rick ran up ahead to lead them forward.  
  
“Let’s go,” he announced sternly, as the group of snarling walkers was now making its way behind them on the tracks.  
  
Jo ran alongside Sophia, letting the teen go ahead of her so that she brought up the rear, only once looking back to see how much distance they were putting between them and the dead.

 

* * *

  
Rick, Jo and Sophia had wandered away from the tracks and down a deserted, leaf-covered country road instead, eventually giving the onslaught of walkers the proverbial slip.  
  
After a while of walking at a considerably brisk pace, Jo looked around at the woods around them. “Hopefully we come upon some houses soon, or some businesses, where we can find some more food,” she commented. “We’ve put a decent dent into our supply the last few days.”  
  
“Maybe we can set up camp somewhere in the woods and build some snares. We can catch some rabbits or squirrels.”  
  
“What about right there,” Sophia suggested, pointing at a broken down, blue GMC Suburban just below where the road sloped downward. “We could sleep in there tonight.”  
  
Jo smirked and patted the girl’s back. “Looks good enough to me,” she shrugged.  
  
As Rick and Sophia sauntered up to the vehicle, movement on the side of the road caught Jo’s eye. Narrowing her gaze, she noticed it was a flattened and very decayed walker reaching its arm up toward her as she approached it. Like every other walker she had the misfortune of encountering, it snarled and stared blankly up at her, but after Jo shoved her blade down into its skull, it could finally be at rest.  
  
Turning around, Jo looked over at Rick, who nodded back at her.  
  
It was a mix of acknowledging her the small kindness she’d given to the walker as well as letting her know the vehicle was, in fact, their best bet for the night. Because of their late start, and the detour they’d taken off the tracks to get away from that small herd, they’d cut into the time they thought they’d reach Terminus by, and not the sun overhead was getting much lower in the sky. It would be nightfall sooner rather than later and it didn’t look like the road they were on would provide them with any better coverage.  
  
Giving her sword a shake of the excess blood on the blade, Jo walked over toward her fiancée and her surrogate daughter while giving the woods around them a careful onceover.  
  
As they got situated and settled in for the evening, Rick ducked into the woods long enough to find some kindling to use to build a fire for them to keep warm. He had begun to realize there wouldn’t be enough time to build a snare to catch an animal for them to kill, skin and cook. It would be dark soon enough, so they would have to make do with warming up a can of baked beans over the open flames.  
  
Once they were huddled in a half circle, seated on a log Jo had pulled over from the side of the road, Rick went about stacking the dry sticks and twigs and a few dry leaves before pulling out a matchbook from of his pockets. Tearing out a match and striking it against the coarse, grey strip on the booklet, he set it down upon the kindling as soon as a small flame erupted. He repeated the process two more times; placing the second and third matches around the base of the fire.  
  
Soon enough, they had a fire going and opened their cans of baked beans, which they cooked over the flames by squeezing the sides of the cans. Doing that dented them and, using two sticks, they were able to balance the cans over the fire, since holding the cans outright would burn their hands.  
  
As they had done after waking up, they ate in silence. When they were finished, Sophia’s yawning drew the adults’ attention over to the teen as they watched her set her empty can down on the ground and wrapped her arms tightly against her chest. She was starting to lean forward so she could rest her head down upon the tops of her knees when Jo reached out and brushed some hair out of her face.  
  
“Why don’t you head into the truck and get some sleep?” Jo suggested.  
  
When the teen lifted her tired eyes and realized the two adults were staring back at her, she felt a bit embarrassed, but then nodded at what Jo said. “Okay,” she caved.  
  
Standing up, she gave the pair a small wave goodnight and walked over to the Suburban. Pulling open the back, passenger door, she climbed inside and then shut the door behind her. Rick and Jo remained where they were, watching at the teenager shifted around to get comfortable.  
  
“She’s a good kid,” Rick remarked.  
  
Jo nodded in agreement. “Yeah, she is.”  
  
They both looked back at each other and smiled a bit. Reaching a hand out, Rick took a hold of hers and gave it a squeeze, but then continued to hold it.  
  
“Speaking of kids,” he began, looking down as their fingers as he brushed his thumb over her knuckles.  
  
“I miss Hope,” Jo blurted.  
  
He nodded, but seemed distracted. “I do, too, but I was actually thinking about something else; something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about but we haven’t had the chance to discuss.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“Back at that house, when you and I drank that entire bottle of Wild Turkey and started going at it like a pair of rabbits, we didn’t use anything,” he remarked. He took note of how Jo had been grinning at the memory, and then how it faded when she realized what he was getting at. “I was so messed up on that shit and too focused on how good you felt, that I didn’t even bother with the pull out method. It never even came to mind. I wasn’t thinking straight. I wasn’t thinking of much of anything, to be honest, except the endgame.”  
  
Jo listened, staring into the fire, and further interlocked her fingers with his. “Well, I guess there’s nothing we can really do now,” she said with a shrug. “It’ll be a waiting game to see if anything happens, or doesn’t happen, and if something does, then we’ll handle it.”  
  
As Rick looked over at her, he found she was already looking back and was even smirking faintly at him. “You’re taking this a lot better than I thought you would.”  
  
“Well, there’s no Governor this time around. I’d say that’s a good start right there,” she quipped. “Plus, I got you from the get-go, should something… _develop_. You were there at the end of my pregnancy with Hope and you proved yourself plenty capable of bringing her into the world. I’m pretty damn sure you can do it again if it’s just us.” Leaning forward and holding his eye, she added, in a lowered voice, “But let’s not count our chickens before they’ve hatched.”  
  
Rick nodded, looking out into the darkness before them. “Well, we’re close enough to Terminus now and hopefully they have people that could help us if something really did come about because of our lapse in judgement the other night,” he spoke, reaching a foot out and kicking dirt onto the fire to smother the flames. “We won’t have to be alone much longer.”  
  
“But, if Hope isn’t there…”  
  
“Then we move on until we find her, and we’ll keep our fingers crossed it happens before anything… _develops_. But, if Hope _is_ at Terminus, and if the folks there are taking people in, they have to be strong. They have to have a system. It could be really good for us.”  
  
“I wonder if the whole thing's legit, though.” Catching his wink, Jo smiled and took her hand back from him, just as the cracking of a branch echoed from the woods behind them.  
  
Twisting around, Jo reached behind her, grabbing the hilt of her sword in its scabbard, but hesitated in removing it while Rick moved to stand up. He placed his hand on the handle of his Colt and looked back into the dark trees, but it was too dark to see anything.  
  
When no other sound came, Rick smirked; assuming it was just a squirrel in the trees, and not a walker preparing to amble out onto the road toward them. As he sat back down beside Jo, he tossed a look over at the truck to see if he could glimpse Sophia, but she must’ve been lying down and possibly already asleep because he couldn’t see her through the broken windshield of the Suburban.  
  
“ _We_ let people in,” he continued, referring to them bringing strangers into the prison.  
  
“We did,” she agreed. “Then again, so did The Governor.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah, it's always the same, isn't it? Don't get to know until we know,” he remarked. “Maybe this place isn't even there anymore.”  
  
Before he could say anything else, there was a gun suddenly pressed against the side of Rick’s head. He tensed up immediately and Jo twisted around to reach for her sword again, only to find a gun pointed in her face as the second man removed the sword and tossed it aside. From the corner of his eye, Rick could tell the second man was the same man who had noticed Rick lying under the bed before he was rendered unconscious in that master bedroom from the house they’d fled.  
  
“Oh, dearie me,” came a voice that was somehow familiar to Rick. “You screwed up, asshole.”  
  
Rick mentally cursed himself, his nostrils flaring as his hands went up slight in a sort of surrender.  
  
It was the grey-haired Claimer with the bouncy ball.  
  
“You hear me? You screwed up,” the man informed as four other Claimers came out of the woods with guns trained on Rick and Jo; the former of the two, shaking slightly with an increasing mix of fear and rage. “Today is a day of reckoning, sir. Restitution. A balancing of the whole damn universe.”  
  
Jo cast her eyes with confusion and terror upon Rick and the man with the gun to his head. She didn’t understand who these men were or what they wanted, but they weren’t friends, that’s for sure. Then, the sound of a hand on glass drew her attention over toward the Suburban where a heavyset man was flashing what looked to be a bowie knife at Sophia, who was sitting upright and terrified inside the Suburban.  
  
“Shit, and I was thinking of turning in for the night on New Year's Eve,” the grey-haired Claimer declared with an amused laugh. “Now who's gonna count down the ball dropper with me, huh? Ten Mississippi, nine Mississippi, eight Mississippi—”  
  
“Joe!” came another voice from the darkness; this one familiar to Jo and caused her to look up as she, and everyone else, saw Daryl walking out into view.  
  
Jo was about to respond to him, when she realized he was talking to the man with the gun to Rick’s head.  
  
“Hold up,” Daryl continued, stepping forward with his crossbow slung over his shoulder, leaving Rick and Jo to wonder why the hell he was with these men.  
  
“You're stopping me on eight, Daryl.”  
  
“Just hold up.”  
  
“This is the guy that killed Lou, so we got nothing to talk about,” one of the other Claimers informed, keeping his gun aimed primarily on Rick.  
  
“The thing about nowadays is we got nothing but time,” Joe, the Claimer, retorted; suddenly sounding less hostile. “Say your piece, Daryl.”  
  
The archer took a step closer, apprehensive as he gestured to Rick and Jo. “These people, you're gonna let 'em go. These are good people.”  
  
“Now, I think Lou would disagree with you on that. I'll, of course, have to speak for him and all 'cause your friend here strangled him in a bathroom.”  
  
Jo looked at Rick, finally putting two and two together that these were the man guys from the house.  
  
“You want blood, I get it,” Daryl assured. Dropping his crossbow to the ground, he held his arms out at his sides. “Take it from me, man. C’mon.”  
  
Claimer Joe stared back at Daryl in disbelief. “This man killed our friend. You say he's good people. See, now that right there is a lie. It’s a lie!”  
  
Daryl dropped his arms down, realizing he couldn’t convince the man to stop, just as the Claimer, who’d been aiming his rifle at Rick, came over and bashed the butt of his rifle into Daryl’s chest. As the wind was knocked out of the archer, he dropped to his knees just as another Claimer grabbed him up and began to drag him over to the Suburban.  
  
“No!” Rick shouted, his hands still raised.  
  
“Teach him, fellas. Teach him all the way,” Claimer Joe commanded.  
  
“No!”  
  
As Daryl was thrown against the vehicle and began to receive a brutal pummeling, the overweight Claimer threw open the back passenger door to the Suburban and grabbed Sophia’s arm. As he pulled her out, she cried in fear, which pulled Jo’s attention over to her surrogate daughter; fearing the girl’s safety over her own.  
  
“Please, _no!_ ” Jo shouted.  
  
“ _You leave her be!_ ” Rick growled, attempting to stand up defiantly but was merely shoved back down by Claimer Joe, as the couple were forced to watch the overweight Claimer hold Sophia up against him with his knife up to her throat.  
  
As Jo struggled to find some way to come to Sophia’s defense, the Claimer with the gun pointed at her face smirked down at her.  
  
“Don’t worry, you’ll get yours. You just wait your turn.”  
  
Curling her lips and practically snarling at him like a lioness defending her cubs, Jo pooled some saliva in her mouth and responded by spitting up at him. The Claimer’s response, however, was to smack her across the face with the barrel of his gun, which did nothing to soothe the awakened beast inside of Rick.  
  
His nostrils continued to flare, his entire body was shaking with rage and he fought to find a way to protect his people without receiving a fatal gunshot wound to the head.  
  
“Listen, it was me,” Rick insisted, somehow reining himself in. “It was just me.”  
  
“See, now that's right.” Claimer Joe leaned down, maintaining his gun against Rick’s head. “That's not some damn lie. Look, we can settle this. We're reasonable men,” he insisted, all the while Daryl was receiving blow after blow and barely able to get a decent swing in. “First, we're gonna beat Daryl to death. Then we'll have your lady, here. Then the girl. Then I'm gonna shoot you and then we'll be square.”  
  
Jo tensed up even more. The thought of being raped by someone else, again, in her lifetime was bad enough, but the idea of it being done to Sophia, who was so young, was beyond appalling. She couldn’t even think about the blood trickling down the side of her face from where the gun had cut her across the cheek when she was struck with it. Jo was too engrossed with all the terrible things she wanted to do to these men if they even looked at Sophia the wrong way, let alone put a finger on her inappropriately.  
  
As Claimer Joe laughed, the overweight Claimer tossed Sophia to the ground. The girl began to cry as the man knelt down and climbed on top of her, which caused Jo to see red.  
  
“ _Don’t you fucking touch her!_ ” she barked.  
  
“Ooh, you’re a feisty one,” Claimer Joe quipped. “We’ll have some fun with you, that’s for sure, sweetheart.”  
  
Rick’s eyes were also focused on the situation with Sophia as he seethed. “Let her go,” he bit out threateningly.  
  
“Stop your squirming,” the overweight Claimer demanded of the teenager under him, while he laughed creepily.  
  
“Let her go,” Rick repeated, taking in some steadying breaths.  
  
Without thinking much on it, he jerked backward and bashed the back of his head against Claimer Joe’s face, just as the gun went off beside Rick’s ear. As the pain from how hard he hit Claimer Joe mixed with the ringing in his ears from the gunshot, Rick found himself a little disoriented at first as he leaned forward and struggled to climb to his feet.  
  
When his senses came crashing back to him, Rick stood upright and turned around in time to get a punch in; striking Claimer Joe in the face and noting he was already bleeding from his nose from where Rick struck him with his head. However, Claimer Joe got a punch in as well, knocking Rick right down to the ground.  
  
“I got him,” Claimer Joe announced as he stepped forward and kicked Rick in the chest.  
  
As Rick rolled over onto his knees and tried propping himself up, he looked to his right and saw Daryl still receiving a beatdown and, straight ahead, Sophia was still struggling with the overweight Claimer atop her. His eyes tried focusing on Jo next, who had reached up and swatted the gun away that was pointed at her face, only to receive the back of that particular Claimer’s hand upside her head, knocking her back off the log she’d been sitting on, previously with Rick.  
  
“C’mon, get up!” Claimer Joe shouted at him. Rick attempted to, but his footing slipped. “C’mon! Let’s see what you got!”  
  
Jo rolled over and looked in the girl’s direction. “Sophia!” she called out, willing her to find some way to get some sort of upper hand. And, when Jo couldn’t be any more terrified for her surrogate daughter, the disgusting, poor excuse of a human being that was on top of Sophia abruptly flipped her over to lie on her stomach as he struggled to undo his pants. “No! _No!_ ” Jo screamed bloody murder.  
  
“Leave her be,” Rick repeated as soon as he got to his feet. He barreled toward Claimer Joe but the other man merely caught him, encircling his arms around Rick and keeping him from being able to lift his own arms.  
  
Rick was able to watch out the corner of his eye as Jo began backing away from the Claimer he’d watched fall unconscious days earlier. She was crab walking backward, kicking one leg out at the creep when he grabbed and caught her ankle and began to drag her away from the side of the road. She was lashing out with her hands, trying to scratch him; anything. Every gesture or move Rick’s people tried to make to get out from under the men keeping them down seemed to be to no avail.  
  
Rick couldn’t just stand there and watch his friend get beaten to death, or the woman he loved and the daughter of another friend get brutally raped and killed. They had to survive. Even if he didn’t, they _had_ to. For Hope, for Carol and for everyone else that might’ve survived the prison.  
  
Mostly for Hope.  
  
He didn’t want his little girl, wherever she was and if she was still alive, to grow up an orphan so soon.  
  
Rick could barely even wrap his mind what the girls were going through. Jo, especially; having to experience being raped, again, when she thought that horrible part of her life was over, only to have to relive it differently. The idea of any man touching either Jo or Sophia in such a way made his blood boil and all he saw was red.  
  
“What the hell you gonna do _now_ , sport?” Claimer Joe antagonized.  
  
It was like opening the floodgates for Rick. He suddenly stopped thinking and just reacted, and as viciously as the man holding him in place deserved.  
  
Without warning, Rick bared his teeth and bit down hard into Claimer Joe’s neck, driving them down deeper and then ripping a chunk of flesh away. Claimer Joe screamed as blood instantly gurgled out, spilling down his neck and shoulder, as well as spraying out upon Rick’s jacket as blood also seeped down into Rick’s beard. As the grey-haired man stumbled backward, clamping a hand over his gushing wound and choked to death on his life fluid, Rick leaned upward and spat out the chunk of flesh and mouthful of blood.  
  
As Claimer Joe fell backward, his grip on Rick’s jacket released, and he fell lifeless to the ground. Rick stood there in somewhat of a daze at first, not realizing the other Claimers had stopped what they were doing and found themselves stunned over what Rick had just done. They all seemed to take a step back from whoever they were beating or trying to force themselves on as if Rick was suddenly this tornado of death that was coming for them.  
  
And he was.  
  
The distraction was also what Rick’s group needed.  
  
The overweight Claimer sat up off of Sophia, looking terrified over at Rick, which gave Sophia the opportunity to roll back over onto her back, bring her leg up and kick the man hard in the crotch. As he doubled over in pain, the teenager rolled to her side and successfully grabbed the man’s bowie knife that previously been out of reach for her. She held it out threateningly with both hands; that if he came any closer, she would slice his throat open.  
  
Then, as all that was going on, Jo grabbed for the gun that had still been pointed at her. She got her hand around it and turned the Claimer’s wrist before aiming the gun up at the underside of his chin and pressed her finger down on the trigger. As the top of his skull blew out from the gunshot, his body collapsed and she removed the gun from his hand. Daryl saw his moment and swung, clocking one of the Claimers on him right in the side of the face with enough force to knock him down and, when he was down, Daryl stomped down on his head. Jo then got a kill shot to the head in with the other Claimer that had been beating Daryl.  
  
Turning, Jo aimed the gun at the overweight Claimer who had managed to stand back up, despite the pain to his crotch Sophia had caused. His hands were up in surrender, but Jo didn’t care that he was giving up.  
  
“I didn’t hurt her, I didn’t hurt her,” he pleaded.  
  
“You were going to.” Jo dropped the gun to the ground and stalked up to Sophia’s side, grabbing the bowie knife from the girl’s hands. “Never mind my girl. You’re getting me instead.”  
  
Snarling, Jo lunged herself at the overweight Claimer and brought the blade down into chest, stabbing him over and over and over again. Even as he dropped to his knees, she wouldn’t stop. She just kept stabbing him while shouting in his face as he looked up at her with stunned eyes that began to gloss over as his life slipped away. Even after he was clearly dead, she kept stabbing him.  
  
Jo would’ve kept going until she felt hands on her arms as someone stepped up behind her. Thinking it was some other Claimer, she spun around and lashed out with the blade. Jo recoiled, however, when she saw it was Rick.  
  
She let the blade fall out of her hands as she turned away from him briefly to see that Daryl had made his way over to Sophia and held her protectively in his arms while the tears she had been crying dried on her youthful face.  
  
“It’s done,” Rick murmured, grabbing Jo by the hand and pulling him over to him.  
  
“Is it?” she asked, somewhat unfocused. Jo looked down at the copious amounts of blood splatter down her shirt and jacket, as well as all over her hands and even a little bit on her pants. Bringing her eyes up and over, she gave Rick a look, staring him in the eye and somehow not noticing how red from blood his mouth and beard were. “Rick?”  
  
He nodded at her and then glanced over at Daryl long enough to receive a nod from the archer, who was letting him know he’d be okay and Sophia would be okay. They would all be okay. Turning back to Jo, he realized how he must look to her, and how it might put her off, so he took half a step back from her, only to be surprised when she grabbed tightly onto his jacket and closed the gap between their bodies. Snaking her hands around his waist, she rested her head down on his shoulder and hugged him tightly, never wanting to let go.  
  
Just as Rick lifted his hands up to cup the back of Jo’s head and reciprocate the embrace, Jo leaned back from him. He watched as she lifted her right arm and held her sleeve out, bringing it down across his mouth to wipe some of the blood away. He stopped her mid-wipe, however, and shook his head. He didn’t want any more blood on her, both literally and figuratively.  
  
Staring up into his eyes, Jo then proceeded to lean her face toward his, but Rick hesitated in giving her the kiss she was seeking. He was trying to wrap his mind around what had just happened and how brutally resourceful he had to get, and just the overall viciousness of it all.  
  
Taking the hint that he was feeling conflicted about everything, Jo withdrew from him. She turned away and walked over to Daryl and Sophia to take over as mother hen by wrapping the girl in her arms instead.  
  
Rick just stood there, looking around at the bodies of the Claimers and took a shaky step back to start figuring out their next move. He walked over toward the driver’s side of the Suburban, stepping over two of the bodies and leaned his back against the vehicle before slowly sliding down to sit on the ground. He heard the back passenger door on the other side of the vehicle open and it jerked a little as he could tell someone was climbing inside. Rick didn’t get up to see who it was specifically, nor did he ask. He just sat there, pulling his knees up and staring at the darkness in front of him, and he couldn't help but think of a saying he’d heard of once before.  
  
He didn’t remember who said it anymore but he knew it went something like, “if you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back at you.”  
  
It seemed rather fitting at the moment.  
  
There was so much running through Rick’s mind at the moment, so much darkness, that he couldn’t really wrap his mind around much of anything. He couldn’t focus on what he needed to focus on. He was merely replaying the last fifteen minutes or so over and over in his head like a record with a skipping needle.  
  
Part of him wanted to cry, part of him wanted to scream and another part of him simply wanted to sigh in relief.  
  
He had just told Jo it was done, that what they’d had to do was over.  
  
But was it really?  
  
Would it ever be over?  
  
If Terminus was a bust and if they never found Hope, would always have to live like this? Would they ever be able to live their lives like before, at the prison, when things were good? Would they ever find a home to call their own? Would they ever have peace of mind?  
  
Rick couldn’t even focus on the fact that Daryl had begun pulling the bodies away off the road and piling them up in the woods. The Claimers that hadn’t received fatal blows to the head, he used the bowie knife Jo had dropped and stuck those Claimers in the skull with it to prevent them from reanimating.  
  
Dealing with them when they were alive was more than enough.  
  
Afterward, Daryl walked off into the woods for a while, possibly to have a cigarette and trying to wrap his mind around everything on his own, the same as Rick.  
  
Meanwhile, Jo had climbed into the Suburban with Sophia and was consoling the teenager; letting the girl lie down and rest her head in Jo’s lap. She stroked the girl’s hair and hummed soothingly, partially to lull Sophia to sleep as well as to distract her anxious mind.  
  
“It’s okay,” Jo murmured when Sophia began crying a little. “It’s okay. It’s over and done with.”

 

* * *

  
Throughout the rest of the night, Daryl had sat down beside Rick; neither sleeping or talking. They just sat there in silence, staring out at the dark woods before them or down at the ground below them. Rick wasn’t sure if Jo and Sophia had fallen asleep at all, but he was aware that, at some point, he no longer heard Sophia’s muffled tears; a sound that broke his heart to a thousand pieces.  
  
He had hours to sit there and reflect and realize they had all done what they had to in order to survive and there shouldn’t be shame in that. The Claimers were bad people and deserved what they got. Who knows who else they may have unjustly hurt and how many more they might’ve hurt if Rick, Daryl and Jo had not killed them all. They did the good people left in this world a favor, of that Rick was certain.  
  
After a while, the sky overhead became lighter. The transition of colors at sunrise was rather beautiful and something that made life seem simple and peaceful. When the orange glow from the slowly ascending sun gave way to a clear, light blue sky, Rick watched, out the corner of his eye, as Daryl got up to his feet and walked over to one bags to unzip it. He pulled out a water bottle and then made his way back over to Rick with both the bottle as well as a red handkerchief from his back pocket.  
  
Rick looked up and watched as Daryl twisted off the cap to the bottle and poured some of the water onto the red material, and then handed it over.  
  
“We should save it to drink,” he remarked in a low, quiet voice.  
  
“You can’t see yourself,” Daryl replied and then gestured up at the Suburban, which Daryl had, at some point during the night, covered the windows with some old clothes. “ _She_ can.”  
  
Whether Daryl was referring to Jo or Sophia, Rick wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter, either way. He agreed with the other man’s sentiment. In the light of day, he didn’t want to look like the monster he had felt like he became in the night.  
  
Accepting the wet handkerchief, Rick began to clean his face off while Daryl sat down beside him.  
  
“I didn't know what they were,” Daryl commented after a moment.  
  
Rick nodded. “How'd you wind up with them?”  
  
“I took a bit longer than expected when I was out hunting and when I got back to the house, ya’ll were long gone. I didn’t know what happened so I tried following what I thought was your tracks through the woods. Turns out I was actually following them assholes. Guess I’m off my game.”  
  
“When’d you find them?”  
  
“The next day. I caught up to them at a crossroads and was surprised to find out it wasn’t you and Jo and Sophia. I got to thinking something must’ve happened, like, something real terrible and I gave up for a while,” Daryl explained. “But then they were there and they kinda just took me along with 'em. I mean, I knew they were bad, but they had a code. It was simple. Stupid, but it was something. It was enough.”  
  
“And you were alone,” Rick said, understanding completely.  
  
“They said they were looking for some guy. Last night they said they spotted him. I was hanging back. I was gonna leave. But I stayed. That's when I saw it was you three.” Daryl turned and looked at Rick for a brief moment, and sounded guilty, as if last night was somehow his entire fault. “Right when you saw me. I didn't know what they could do.”  
  
Rick studied the way the other man was clearly being himself up mentally. “It's not on you, Daryl. _Hey_ —it's not on you,” he insisted as Daryl looked over at him again; this time more so holding his eye. “You being back with us here, _now_ — that's everything.” Daryl still didn’t seem convinced he was faultless, or at the very least he was still just heavy-hearted about it all having happened either way. So, to drive his point home, Rick added, “You're my _brother_.”  
  
They both fell silent for a few moments, looking forward at the woods across the road, letting Rick’s declaration set in, and it went a long way.  
  
Shane had always been the closest thing to a brother, next to his actual brother he hadn’t seen or spoken to in years, and Merle was Daryl’s actual brother, who had never really been there for him when he needed it and who Daryl wasn’t even sure was still alive. The older Dixon had left the prison days before The Governor’s attack, in what would be seen as ironic after the fact, because The Governor was who Merle had left the prison to go find.  
  
Both Rick and Daryl were without their brothers and even though the two of them had become great friends since Hershel’s farm, now it was confirmed they were family, regardless of blood ties.  
  
“Hey, what you did last night,” Daryl finally spoke. “ _Anybody_ would’ve done that.”  
  
“No, not that,” Rick insisted.  
  
“Something happened. That ain't you.”  
  
“I scared myself last night. I never thought that I would have to go that far to protect the people I love. I knew I had it in me. I’ve known for a while,” Rick remarked, wiping some of the blood off his fingers. “Maybe I should’ve become the man I was last night back at the prison when The Governor arrived. Maybe I could’ve done more. Maybe more of us would be alive and we’d all still be together.”  
  
“You gotta take your own words to heart, Rick,” Daryl quipped. “That’s not on you. You don’t have to be everyone’s savior.”  
  
“I was their leader, though.”  
  
“I don’t remember voting for you.”  
  
Rick looked up at Daryl and both men chuckled. “Well, no one else campaigned against me. I won the election by default.” Tipping his head, Rick became somewhat more serious. “All I’ve ever done was for everyone else. And I feel like it was for nothing. Carl, Patricia, Dale, Hershel, T-Dog, Glenn, Maggie...Lori,” he continued. “I wonder if there was something I could’ve done differently that would mean they’d still be alive.”  
  
“You can’t think like that. What’s done is done and none of us had any control over anything that happened. It was all bad luck, or The Governor.”  
  
“I should’ve taken a more active role in trying to flush him out.”  
  
“And if you did, suppose he killed you months ago, and then where would we all be?” Daryl shook his head and eyed Rick. “A lot of terrible shit has happened to us Rick, and we lost some people, but look at what we still got. Our lives, for one,” he asserted, gesturing up at the Suburban they were leaning against. “We got Jo and Sophia, and I know somewhere out there is Carol and Hope. I _know_ it. We have each other, we have our _family_ , and that’s more than enough to keep me going and think about what’s ahead of us and not what’s behind us.”  
  
Rick nodded, taking that all in. “You’re right.”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “I _know_ I’m right.”  
  
From inside the Suburban, Jo was sitting up; having been fully awake for a couple of hours. She had barely slept and now she simply listened to the voices of the two men outside the vehicle. Glancing downward, she could tell that Sophia had woken up, but remained lying there silently as Jo continued to stroke her hair in a motherly fashion.  
  
Eventually, however, Sophia sat up and greeted her surrogate mother with a faint smile.  
  
The poor girl had been pretty traumatized the night before, but it seemed as though all the tears she had shed throughout the night had washed the initial pain of the experience away and now she had begun to bury it deep down. It was a testament to her growing resilience, something everyone needed to have these days. Although, despite being able to hide her inner wounds pretty well, it was her outer wounds that were still visible and proof that something terrible had happened.  
  
Jo had lifted a hand and brushed her fingers gingerly along the girl’s right cheek which was scratched up pretty bad from having her face shoved roughly into the ground the night before.  
  
“You doing better?” Jo asked. She didn’t bother to ask if she was okay. None of them were okay, but they weren’t doing terrible.  
  
Sophia nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“I’m glad.”  
  
“Thank you for staying in here with me last night,” the teenager continued. “I know you probably wanted to be with Rick after what happened.”  
  
Jo narrowed her gaze. “I’m happy being with either of you, and you needed me more.” With a small smile, she brushed some hair behind Sophia’s ear and added, “And you’re welcome.”  
  
A mere few minutes later, Jo and Sophia had climbed out of the Suburban on the right side. After shutting the door behind them, they stretched, yawned and looked over the hood of the vehicle to take in the sight of Daryl standing up and looking back at them with a nod of his head.  
  
“Mornin',” he greeted.  
  
“That it is,” Jo retorted. She watched as the archer looked down where she knew Rick to still be seated and then looked back over at the two females. “Did either of you sleep at all?”  
  
Daryl shook his head. “Nah. You?”  
  
“I did for a little while,” she replied, and then gestured toward Sophia who had walked off toward one of their bags. “Her more than me.”  
  
Walking around the front of the vehicle to approach Jo, he whispered, “She doing okay?”  
  
“She’s doing better, or at least she will be.”  
  
“Good, good,” he nodded.  
  
As Jo leaned against the hood, she noticed Rick standing up. He turned and looked over at her, his face considerably cleaner than the night before, and tossed a handkerchief over the hood to Daryl. His eyes and his overall expression seemed softer in the daylight. He’d had the time to sit on the recent happenings and it showed.  
  
“Hey,” he said to her.  
  
“Hey yourself.”  
  
A small smirk began to appear on her lips as she slowly stepped around the front of the vehicle, past Daryl, and over to the driver’s side where Rick stood. Standing before him, she placed one hand on the side of the truck and one hand on the front of his jacket. Simultaneously, they each leaned their forward and pressed their foreheads together.  
  
“You okay?” he asked her quietly, sliding a hand around her waist while Daryl went over to check on Sophia.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“I’m okay,” he insisted.  
  
Jo smirked even more, lifting her head away from his before giving a slight nod. “I know.”

"How?"

“'Cause I’m okay, too.”

Rick tilted his head to the side and looked over his shoulder up the road, toward the back of the Suburban and then pulled Jo’s hand off his chest and slipped it into his hand. “Come over here with me for a minute.” With a nod of his head he gestured behind him and led her toward the back of the vehicle, where he opened the back doors and had her sit down on the edge. Hesitating to say anything, Rick simply shoved his hands in his pockets and looked down at the ground, kicking at an irrelevant twig underfoot.  
  
“What’s up?” Jo inquired, trying to pry from him whatever was on his mind.  
  
Looking up at her, Rick let out a sigh. “About last night—” he began.  
  
Jo cut him off, however, by holding up a hand and shaking her head. “I heard your entire conversation with Daryl. You don’t have to go into it,” she assured. “We both did what we had to do. It was—”  
  
“—vicious,” he finished.  
  
“It was.” She nodded in agreement. “It was also necessary.”  
  
“Afterward, when I pushed you away, I’m sorry about that. I thought I couldn’t get past how I felt about what I did and how I must’ve looked. I projected that onto you and didn’t want you near me,” he explained, stepping closer to stand between her slightly parted legs with his hands still shoved in his pockets. “I spent all night going over everything in my head, every detail. I was scared of how easily I could lose myself in order to ‘do what I have to do’ to keep you or anyone else safe. I would do anything, without hesitation, and I wouldn’t regret it one bit, but it doesn’t mean it doesn’t still scare me of what I’d have to become in the process.”  
  
Jo narrowed her gaze up at him. “And what do you think you’d become?”  
  
“A monster.”  
  
As she continued to maintain eye contact with him, Jo could see how distressing that term in which he applied to himself was. It clearly pained him and, even though he claimed he would willingly become a monster to save the people he cared about, she could see he wished it wouldn’t have to come to that.  
  
He had always been the good guy, and becoming the bad guy, a shell of the man he believed he once was and she knew him to still be, was practically a living nightmare for him.  
  
Jo shook her head. “You’re not a monster, Rick,” she insisted, standing him and placing her hands on either side of his face. Her fingers laced into his considerably cleaner beard, gently tugging at the short, bristly curls. She smiled up at him. “You’re my husband. That’s what you are.”  
  
His aggrieved expression faded away and was quickly replaced by a more enamored one. Rick watched out the corner of his eye as she dropped one hand from his face, lowered it down over his chest and worked its way into his pants pocket. Letting his gaze drop, he noticed she had pulled out the two, silver wedding bands he had found for them more than a week before.  
  
“Aren’t we due to get married?” she inquired. “We said we’d wait a week. I think it’s been a little longer than that.”  
  
A smile began to take up residence on his lips. “You wanna get married now?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Now’s just as good a time as any," she remarked. With her free hand, she grabbed his arm and led him back toward the front of the Suburban where Daryl and Sophia were crouched down, sharing a can of pineapple slices.  
  
Daryl looked up at the pair and could sense something was up. “Everything alright?”  
  
Jo nodded, and Rick did the same.  
  
“We need the two of you to do something for us,” she informed.  
  
“Oh, yeah?” Intrigued, Daryl stood up while Sophia watched from the log she was sitting on. “What d’ya need?”  
  
“Be our witnesses,” Rick added.  
  
“I don’t get it,” Sophia commented.  
  
“Rick asked me to marry him back at the prison,” Jo explained, and then held up her left hand. “I’ve been wearing this black twist tie around my ring finger as a sort of engagement ring for a little over a week.”  
  
Rick locked eyes with his ‘brother’ and smirked. “The original plan was to get married at the prison with everyone around, but life never goes as planned. Now, before life throws anymore wrenches our way, we want to make it as official as we can these days, and we need witnesses for that.” Rick gestured at both Daryl and Sophia. “You two can be our Best Man and our Maid of Honor.”  
  
The teenager set the can of pineapple slices aside and stood up with a smile playing at her mouth. “You’re getting married?”  
  
“It’s just gonna be a quick exchange of vows and rings.” Jo looked between her and Rick, and their bloodstained clothes. “It’s not exactly a fancy to-do.”  
  
Daryl stuck his fingers into his mouth, licking them clean one at a time. “Alright, then; have at it.”  
  
Jo and Rick looked at the archer and the teenager and then back to each other. Jo opened the palm of her right hand and held out the ring that would go on her finger over to Rick. As he took it from her, they smirked as he then held onto her left hand with his left hand.  
  
“I, Richard Grimes, take you, Joanna Autry Moore, to be my wife. I promise to do whatever I have to in order to keep you safe, I promise to always look for you if we ever get separated, I promise to continue searching for our daughter together with you and, _when_ we find her, not if, I promise to continue loving her and any other children we may have together. But, mostly, I promise to love you until my last dying breath, and even afterward when I’m some shambling corpse on the side of the road somewhere.”  
  
Jo snickered at his vows, but was moved by them regardless. She watched as he slid her ring over her finger and smiled.  
  
Looking back up at him, Jo winked. “I, Joanna Autry Moore, take you, Richard Grimes, to be my husband. I promise to fight for you, tooth and nail, and to also always look for you if we ever get separated. I also promise to continue loving you until the day I die,” she vowed. “I hope that when it happens, we die at the same time, because I don’t want to live a day without you and I don’t want to leave you behind either. Oh, and I promise to always stand beside you when the days get rough and you feel like giving up. When you start feeling like the world is on your shoulders, look at me and know I’m sharing the weight with you. You won’t ever have to go it alone.”  
  
Saying nothing else, Jo slid his ring on over his left ring finger and then grinned up at him.  
  
Daryl cleared his throat. “Alright,” he spoke, slapping his palms together. “By the power invested in me by no one in particular, I now pronounce you husband and wife, so…congratulations and kiss the damn bride.”  
  
Rick and Jo both chuckled. They didn’t need to be asked twice, though. Bringing his hands up to either side of her face, Rick pressed his lips down upon Jo’s as she rested her hands on either side of his torso, reciprocating the kiss.  
  
Before they had the chance to deepen the kiss, they were distracted by a copious amount of dead leaves falling over their heads and looked over to see Sophia had apparently scooped a handful up and tossed them into the air.  
  
“We don’t have confetti or rice,” the teen remarked with a shrug.  
  
Pulling Jo into his arms and hugging her tightly against his chest, Rick gave both Daryl and Sophia a nod of his head. “Thank you.”  
  
“Yes, thank you,” Jo agreed.  
  
Daryl shrugged and slapped them both gently on the arms. “Weren’t nothing,” he insisted. Then, jokingly, he asked, “So, where you two going on your honeymoon?”  
  
Rick rolled his eyes. “Funny.”  
  
“Well, that’s over and done with,” the archer remarked, lifting one of the bags up off the ground. “Let’s get ready to head out.”  
  
The newlyweds nodded, watching after Daryl and Sophia for a moment before looking back at each other.  
  
“Ready to hit the road again, Mrs. Grimes?” Rick asked with a bright smile.  
  
“I was born ready, Mr. Grimes.”  
  
As they leaned and kissed again, there was nothing but love and hope between them. There were no signs of the monsters inside either of them that were capable of doing the terrible things they dreaded having to do.  
  
There were no monsters; only a husband and a wife, and a determination to find their daughter.


	29. Sancturary

_“Despite all my rage I am still just a rat in a cage_  
_Then someone will say what is lost can never be saved.”_  
_—_ Smashing Pumpkins

* * *

  
Back on track to Terminus, no pun intended, the foursome traveled along the railroad track for the better part of the morning and into the afternoon. Sophia and Daryl brought up the rear, walking alongside each other; the archer finding a new sense of paternal protectiveness over the teen after the unpleasant events from the night before. In front of them, Rick and Jo walked hand in hand, while holding onto the shoulder straps of their respective bags and looking straight ahead at the seemingly never-ending track.  
  
Up a few feet and over the side of said track was a collapsed sign, partially covered by dead leaves. Rick approached it curiously and kicked the leaves off with the toe of his boot, revealing it was another map for Terminus. The foursome haphazardly gathered around it, giving it a brief looksee before bringing their gaze upward again in the direction they were headed.  
  
“We’re getting close,” Daryl remarked. “Be there before sundown.”  
  
Rick nodded, making eye contact. “Now we head through the woods. We don’t know who they are.”  
  
“Alright,” Daryl agreed.  
  
After the night before, their walls were definitely up.  
  
Slipping their hands out of each other’s grips, Rick and Joe reached for their weapons of choice; Jo wrapped her hand around the hilt of her short sword, prepared to unsheathe it, while Rick’s right hand hovered over the handle of his Colt Python. Daryl took lead as the foursome stepped down the incline from the tracks and slipped silently through the trees. The only sound they could hear was the gentle crunch of dead leaves underfoot and the occasional twittering from a bird here or there. Other than that, all was silent as the grave.  
  
Looking over at Sophia, Jo gave her a nod. “Put your hand over your gun like Rick’s doing,” she whispered, directing her gaze toward the man who was now her husband and waiting for Sophia’s gaze to follow. “You need to be prepared. We don’t let our guard down until we know for sure that we’re safe.”  
  
Sophia nodded silently, though it was obvious the teen was still somewhat apprehensive from everything she’d just been through. Forcing herself to gain composure, she bit her lips together and her hand hover over the hand of the gun at her side, mimicking Rick as the four of them continued to weave their way through the woods.  
  
A very short while later, they came upon the edge of the woods that was blocked by an expanse of chain-link fencing with plant overgrowth on either side. Daryl gestured toward it and turned around to look at the two females, placing a finger to his lips to ensure they remained silent. Rick, dropping his duffel bag which contained the bulk of their weapons, those they had taken off The Claimers, stalked up toward the fence first and looked out, taking in the sight before him.  
  
Quickly, Daryl, Jo and Sophia stood around him and followed his gaze through the chain-link to the large, red brick building. In each of the boarded up windows were black letters that spelled out the named of Terminus, signifying they had, indeed, reached their destination.  
  
It was quiet, looked considerably clean from the outside, and almost felt too good to be true that this sanctuary could exist.  
  
“We all spread out, watch for a while, see what we see, and get ready.” Rick looked first at Jo, and then over to Daryl, his right hand man. “We all stay close.”  
  
Daryl nodded, lifting his crossbow, and headed off along the left side of the fence. Sophia wandered off with him, not wanting to be separated from anyone, which was understandable. As Jo began to move along the right side of the fence, she raised her hand, which she had just recently dropped back to her side, and once again grabbed hold of the hilt of her short sword. A hand on her shoulder made her stop and look back, as she found Rick staring at her.  
  
“You wanna stick with me?” he inquired.  
  
“You lookin’ for a quickie so we can consummate our marriage before God knows what may happen to us next?” she teased.  
  
Failing to keep a straight face, a grin appeared on Rick’s lips as he gave a tilt of his head and a shrug. “The thought may have crossed my mind.”  
  
Jo snickered at him. “Save it for the honeymoon, Mr. Grimes.”  
  
As she turned and walked away, Rick’s grin spread and he shook his head as he looked briefly. “I’m holding you to it, Mrs. Grimes,” he retorted, but more under his breath than necessarily out loud for her to hear.  
  
He liked the sound of that; calling her Mrs. Grimes.  
  
It had been a while since Rick had a missus and he didn’t realize how big the hole was that Lori had left in his life, when they mutually agreed to separate, until he met Jo and began to understand that those stirrings deep inside of him, in regard to Jo, was him falling in love again. Realizing that, and how wonderful it felt, and even more so when the feeling was reciprocated, was like being given food when you didn’t even know you were starving. He had become so used to that ache, sadness and anger for so long that it had numbed him. He’d become desensitized, so accustomed to being alone, despite being part of a group, that the thought of ever finding someone else, especially in this new world, was so foreign an idea. It was merely a dream and real life was the nightmare he thought he was destined to live in for however much life he would be able to live.  
  
But then there was Jo, and the dream became reality, and he had love again. He had a  _family_ again. Not just the group from the prison; but a wife, and a child and the prospect of trying to have more children, this time together with Jo, in the near future, God willing.  
  
Even though Hope was missing, and even though they had been through more shit in such a short period of time than people should ever half to go through, Rick knew he would always fight for what he had. He would fight tooth and nail to protect the ones he loved, and he had already proved the tooth part the night before. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for any of them, especially his wife and child.  
  
The Claimers, were they still alive, would be able to attest to the lengths he was willing to go to.

 

* * *

  
After checking out the perimeters of the fence, the foursome regrouped just as Rick was burying the duffel bag of weapons, including his Colt. Jo sauntered up behind him, letting her hand absentmindedly graze the back of his head, twirling a finger around one of his curls as he looked up at Daryl, who looked curiously down at him.  
  
“Just in case,” Rick muttered, tossing dirt onto the bag with a tiny shovel.  
  
Once the bag was buried, Rick took out a knife and cut a notch into the closest tree to help him remember where the bag was if and when they came back to it. Looking upon one another, Rick then led the way back over toward the fence. He hooked his fingers into the chain-link and pulled himself up, scaling it was more ease than he would’ve been able to earlier in the week when he was still recuperating from the severity of his wounds given to him by The Governor. He was still hurting from the more recent ones, but those he was able to grin and bear with very little discomfort.  
  
Straddling the top of the fence for a moment, Rick cautiously looked from his left to his right, keeping an eye out for any unfriendly types. When he was sure they were in the clear, he jumped down; landing lithely to his feet but staying crouched down with the different gun from the bag he’d decided to keep with him. Just as he began to slowly stand up, Jo, then Daryl and Sophia came over the fence after him and got their own weapons ready.  
  
In silent agreement, the four quickly cut across the tracks inside the Terminus compound and hustled over toward the nearest building. There was a metal door which was slightly ajar that they took advantage of. With a nod of his head, Rick pulled the door open fully and let Daryl slip in first with his crossbow raised.  
  
Echoing off the brick walls of some sort of anteroom was a woman’s voice.  
  
_“…Those who arrive, survive. Follow the tracks to the point where all lines intersect. There are maps at the crossings to help guide you with your journey.”_  
  
Daryl reached the archway entrance into the large warehouse of a room where the voice was coming from. Jo had slipped in right behind him, followed by Sophia, and then Rick bringing up to rear to watch their backs. Jo looked briefly over her shoulder toward Rick who nodded back at her. It was a silent communication of her asking if they were good to go forward and him confirming they were clear from the direction they’d just come from.  
  
“Sanctuary for all, community for all,” the woman continued to speak, like a mantra, as Jo tugged on the back of Daryl’s vest to signal for him to move forward.  
  
As the four of them slipped into the room, somehow unnoticed by all the people milling about on the opposite side of the warehouse, Rick sauntered over to the woman, who had white hair and was speaking into the microphone of some sort of ham radio set up. The other three, however, seemed more curious about the people at the other end, where maps for Terminus were being made.  
  
“Those who arrive, survive. Terminus: sanctuary for all, community for all.”  
  
“Hello,” Rick greeted the white-haired woman, tersely.  
  
“Those who su—” She cut herself off, looking up at Rick with surprise, taking her headphones off.  
  
“ _Hello_ ,” Rick repeated, a bit more loudly for the others to hear him as he looked over at them.  
  
As Rick, Jo, Daryl and Sophia stood in a line, facing the others, one of the ‘map-makers’ turned around. When he saw they were newcomers, and clearly not one of his own people, the young man with brown hair and a rather handsome face let his shoulders drop before he let out an exasperated sigh.  
  
“Well, I bet Albert is on perimeter watch,” the young man remarked in a way that sounded like Albert, whoever Albert was, was habitually inept at guard duty. Dropping a paintbrush down onto the table he’d been standing at, the young man stepped forward, away from his fellow map-makers to casually approach Rick’s group, but maintaining a safe distance. “You here to rob us?”  
  
“No,” Rick replied with complete honesty in his voice. With a nod, he began to walk forward, and holstered his gun at his side. “We wanted to see you before you saw us.”  
  
The young man smirked. “Makes sense,” he commented, though there was a bit of agitation dripping from his voice, which was more likely than not due to being caught off guard by these newbies. Shaking it off, he walked forward with his arms out at his side, his personality rather pleasant. “Usually we do this where the tracks meet.” With his arms out wide, he officially greeted them, “Welcome to Terminus. I’m Gareth.” Scanning the foursome, he added, “Looks like you’ve been on the road for a good bit.”  
  
“We have,” Rick confirmed with a nod. “I’m Rick, that’s Sophia, Daryl, Jo.”  
  
Gareth gave them a lame wave of his hand and smile. When they didn’t respond one way or the other, he continued to try and break the ice with them. “You’re nervous, I get it. We were all the same way,” he insisted, stepping closer. “We came here for sanctuary. That what you here for?” He looked at all four of them, but settled his gaze upon Rick last; easily sizing up that Rick was the leader of the group.  
  
Rick nodded again. “Yes.”  
  
“Good. You found it.” Looking over his shoulder, he called out, “Hey, Alex.” As another young man came hurrying forward, Gareth looked back toward the foursome as if to express something in confidence to them. “This isn't as pretty as the front. We got nothing to hide, but the welcome wagon is a whole lot nicer. Alex will take you, ask you a few questions. Uh, but first, we need to see everyone's weapons. If you could just lay them down in front of you.”  
  
Rick turned to his right as he exchanged looks with his group before eventually returning his gaze toward Gareth. If they didn’t comply and this place was legit, they would have to make nice and be team players. Temporarily dropping their defenses was a bullet they’d have to bite.  
  
“Alright,” Rick acquiesced. Removing his gun he crouched down and laid it upon the ground.  
  
“I'm sure you understand.”  
  
“Yes, I do.”  
  
As the other three followed Rick’s example, setting their weapons down, they all stood back upright, waiting for what came next, which was Gareth and Alex stepping forward to frisk them from head to toe. The two young men, started with Rick and Daryl first, as they seemed to pose the greatest threat.  
  
“I'd hate to see the other guy,” Alex commented, looking up at Daryl as he patted down his sides.  
  
“You would,” Rick assured.  
  
When they moved to Jo and Sophia next, Jo turned and watched as Sophia visibly tensed up and tried to ignore the strange man’s hands roaming her body, looking for hidden weapons. Jo bit her tongue and felt anxious on behalf of her surrogate daughter, knowing the girl was probably trying to block out the recent memory of that overweight Claimer running his hands over her in a similar fashion.  
  
“Did they deserve it?” Alex asked Sophia.  
  
“Yes,” she answered without any hesitation.  
  
Frowning, Jo forced herself to look away at Sophia. Instead, she turned and looked down at Gareth who was patting his hands firmly over her hips and down the length of her legs. She tried to ignore the apologetic smirk on his lips as he stared back up at her when he lifted her pant leg and stuck his fingers into her boots.  
  
“Sorry,” he remarked. “We can’t be too careful.”  
  
“I wouldn’t be, either,” she countered.  
  
As he cast a contemplative look at her, Jo couldn’t tell if he took her comment as a simple quip or a veiled threat.  
  
Standing back up alongside Alex, Gareth slowly brought his gaze away from Jo, and then took his time focusing on each one of them. “Just so you know, we aren't those kind of people, but we aren't stupid either. And you shouldn't be stupid enough to try anything stupid. As long as everyone's clear on that, we shouldn't have any problems. Just solutions.” With a nod, he added a simple, “Okay” and then turned to walk away.  
  
Alex reached down and handed Jo’s sword to her, which she took back hesitantly. When he tried to reach for Daryl’s crossbow, Daryl grabbed at it first. Alex backed off and then handed Sophia her gun, and then Rick his.  
  
As latter returned his gun to its holster, Alex clapped his hands at his sides and smile nervously. “Follow me.”  
  
As they walked off behind the young man, they came to a heavy metal door which he pushed open, leading them all out into a sunny courtyard of sorts that suddenly seemed reminiscent of the Prison. There were flower and vegetable gardens alike, laundry lines strung up, small handful of people seated at canopied tables and even a barbecue was going.  
  
“So how long's this place been here?” Daryl wondered, sauntering up alongside Alex.  
  
“Since almost the start,” Alex responded. “When all the camps got overrun, people started finding this place. I think it was instinct, you know? Follow a path. Some folks were heading to the coast, others out west or up north, but they all wound up here.”  
  
“Hi,” the chestnut-haired older woman at the barbecue greeted with a pleasant smile, looking at each of the four newcomers. “Heard you came in the back door; smart. You'll fit right in here.”  
  
“Hey, Mary, would you fix each of these new folks a plate for me?”  
  
Jo looked directly at Alex, unaware of how much Rick was scrutinizing every detail of the place. “Why do you do it? Why do you let people in?” she questioned.  
  
She wanted to know their motives. She knew the motives of why the Prison group took people in: because they were good people trying to do good by others. However, she hadn’t been on the receiving end of an invitation to join a group in a long while and was apprehensive; wondering if the Terminites were truly as hospitable as they were coming off.  
  
“The more people become a part of us, we get stronger. That's why we put up the signs, invite people in. It's how we survive.”  
  
As Rick continued his visual dissection, putting his former cop’s eye to the test, there were just too many things that didn’t sit well with him, throwing up too many red flags in his mind. Reaching over, he tapped his fingers to Jo’s arm and made a subtle gesture with his head over to the guy wearing prison riot gear. A woman seated at one of the tables was wearing a poncho identical to the one Daryl had worn back at the prison, which he had last seen Carol wearing in A Block when Daryl was looking in on her.  
  
Jo was starting to put two and two together with him as they locked eyes with each other.  
  
“Here,” Alex offered.  
  
He took a paper plate of cooked meat handed to him by Mary and passed it along to Sophia, who timorously accepted. As he held a second plate out to Jo, Rick suddenly stepped between them and smacked the plate out of Alex’s hand; both plate and meat falling to the ground.  
  
“No,” Rick announced.  
  
Without missing a beat, he snaked an arm around Alex’s neck, holding the young man against him, akin to a human shield, as he placed a gun to his head. Immediately, Sophia dropped her plate and grabbed for her gun when she noticed Daryl and Jo had drawn their weapons just as quickly; the four of them taking formation so that they had their backs to each other and could see anyone that approached from any direction.  
  
“Where the hell did you get this watch?” Rick growled, pulling a pocket watch out of one of the pockets from Alex’s cargo pants.  
  
Jo looked over her shoulder and at what Rick was holding up, noting it was identical to the pocket watch Hershel had given Glenn months ago, and she couldn’t understand how it would’ve gotten here to Terminus. Both Glenn and Maggie were dead now. Did the Terminites find the Prison just after it fell and scavenged it?  
  
The foursome looked out at the Terminites, each reaching for their own guns while Alex held his hands up defensively.  
  
“Where the hell did you get this watch?” Rick repeated, more angrily this time, if that was at all possible.  
  
“You want answers, you want anything else, you get ‘em when you _put_ down that _gun!_ ” Alex exclaimed.  
  
Rick turned, moving the younger man with him and looked up toward the top of one of the buildings. “I see your man on the roof with a sniper rifle. How good is his aim?” he demanded. “Where’d you get the watch? _Where’d you get the watch_?!”  
  
“Don’t do anything!” Alex shouted up to the sniper. “I have this! You just put it down! _You put it down!_ ” Trying to maintain his composure, Alex attempted to reason with Rick. “He won’t listen to me. There’s a lot of us.”  
  
“ _Where_ did you get the _watch_?”  
  
“I got it off of a dead one. I didn’t think he’d need it.”  
  
Jo and Daryl looked at each other, both a little confused, but also very agitated.  
  
Glenn was dead and buried. There was no way Alex would’ve gotten it from him, unless he somehow found himself at the Prison just after its fall, found where Maggie buried Glenn, dug him up and found the watch on it. It was about ninety-nine percent unlikely. One of their own, a survivor, would have taken it, maybe for Maggie, thinking she made it out alive, to give it to her when they all met up again. _That_ was the most likely situation.  
  
Did the Prison survivor in question then come to Terminus? What happened to them? Where were they now?  
  
Rick turned Alex with him again, directing him toward two of the other Terminites. “What about the riot gear, the poncho?”  
  
“Got the riot gear off a dead cop.”  
  
Rick turned, again with Alex, to find Gareth standing there.  
  
“Found the poncho on a clothesline,” Gareth claimed.  
  
“Gareth, we can wait,” Alex muttered.  
  
“Shut up, Alex.”  
  
“ _You_ ,” Rick spoke, eyeing Gareth, “talk to _me_.”  
  
“What’s there left to say? You don’t trust us anymore."  
  
“Gareth—” Alex began.  
  
“Shut. Up.” Gareth held up a hand to silence the anxious young man.  
  
“Gareth, please.”  
  
“It’s okay,” Gareth insisted; his voice calm as he kept his right hand raised and took half a step closer toward Rick and Alex. “Rick, what do you want?”  
  
“Where are our people?” Rick demanded.  
  
“You didn’t answer the question.”  
  
Gareth closing his hand into fist was a new red flag for Rick who acted quickly by turning away, moving Alex into the sniper’s line of fire, which killed Alex with a single gunshot to the head.  
  
Immediately, gunfire began to ring out throughout the courtyard and most of the Terminites scattered as Rick began to fire back in every direction and also grabbing Alex’s gun off his body.  
  
“Go! Go, get back!” Rick shouted, grabbing Sophia by the arm and shoving her toward the way they had originally come and then taking lead as Jo and Daryl followed behind. He had to stop dead in his tracks when the sniper on the roof shot at the ground a foot in front of him, and a wave of panic, of feeling trapped, momentarily washed over him.  
  
Daryl waved them over to the other end of the courtyard. “C’mon!”  
  
Gunfire followed them and eventually blocked them off of their other escape route. Rick shot upwards, trying to avoid actually looking where he was aiming for fear of giving the unknown gunmen a clear shot of his head. With the gunfire ricocheting off the ground around them, the only option they had was to duck backward into what looked like a garage of some sort where large vehicles were parked. At the other end, a metal door was closed on them, and they stopped.  
  
“Here!” Daryl gestured to a gate.  
  
As they ran up to it, the archer gave it a rattle but it was locked. Turning around, Rick pointed over to a door marked ‘A’ on the other side of the garage. Pushing the door open, the four of them darted outside into what appeared to be a smaller courtyard, scattered with large wooden crates, pieces of shattered wood, and slightly charred windows on the buildings. There were even broken down, shot up cars. There were basically old bullet holes in just about everything. It looked like a war zone and as they wove around the crates and the cars, the gunfire from the roofs was always just barely at their heals, as if it was forcing them forward.  
  
Just when they would start to head in one direction, gunfire would resume, caging them in, so to speak, forcing them to go in a different direction.  
  
Upon passing through another courtyard, they saw two shipping containers; one stacked on top of the other. And what’s more is that there were bangs coming from inside and people shouting for help.  
  
“What the hell?” Daryl question with a slight growl to his voice.  
  
“Keep going!” Rick shouted, as they darted into an opened door with a letter A on the wall beside the entrance.  
  
Despite the chaos and the frantic need to just find safety or, better yet, an escape, Jo couldn’t help but notice all the signs, both literal and in the grander scheme of things.  
  
When they next found themselves in a room scattered with lit candles. On the floor, painted in white, were names and locations of people, and even a few personal belongings beside the names. As the foursome slowed down, they attempted to take it all in while trying to gauge a way out. The entire room felt morbid, and yet spiritual at the same time, as if they had just stepped into a graveyard or a church during a funeral service.  
  
On the walls, painted in black, was an odd mantra that stopped Rick dead in his tracks.

  
  
**NEVER AGAIN. NEVER TRUST. WE FIRST, ALWAYS.**

  
  
“What the hell is this place?” Daryl wondered, looking around.  
  
“These people aren’t trying to kill us, Rick,” Jo spoke, stepping forward and wrapping a hand around Rick’s.  
  
When he looked down at the gesture, he then brought his concerned blue eyes up to her face to find her already looking back at him. They silently stared for a moment or two and he nodded, as if they’d just had a telepathic conversation. “They were aiming at our feet,” he remarked.  
  
“They wanted us to come this way,” she added.  
  
Rick sighed, and nodded. Turning away, he looked over at a door on the other side of the room with another ‘A’. He looked away from it and gestured to a different door. “There,” he announced.  
  
As they made their way toward that particular door, someone closed and locked it on them before they could reach it.  
  
“Here,” Daryl said, pointing at the ‘A’ door.  
  
While he and Sophia ran toward it more willingly, Rick and Jo felt more hesitant. However, it _was_ the only other foreseeable way out for them.  
  
“Go,” Rick decided.  
  
They’d have to take their chances with the unknown.  
  
As soon as they were back outside, gunfire was once again at their feet, directing them toward the fences, but as soon as they got near enough, a slew of Terminites stood up from the plant overgrowth on the other side of the fence, with automatic weapons trained on them. Daryl came sliding to a stop first, and the other three quickly followed suit. On the different roofs were different snipers, weapons pointed on them as well.  
  
They were like lab rats who had been led through a dangerous maze, and what the end game was…well, they weren’t completely sure.  
  
The railcar marked ‘A’, which was a few yards away, wasn’t particularly lost on either Rick or Jo either.  
  
“Put your weapons down _now!_ ” Gareth shouted from one of the lower roofs.  
  
Rick looked over at Jo, almost as if apologizing to her before looking up at Gareth. Jo, meanwhile, focused her attention on Sophia who looked like she was going to start hyperventilating from fear.  
  
“ _Now!_ ” Gareth bellowed, angrily.  
  
Daryl tossed one of his arrows down first before dropping his crossbow. Rick and Sophia quickly joined, by dropping their guns. Rick also threw his extra clip aside while Jo crouched, slowly lowering her short sword upon the concrete ground; all the while never taking their eyes off the Terminites on the roof. Mainly Gareth.  
  
“Ringleader, go to your left,” Gareth announced. “Train car, go.”  
  
Rick looked at the railcar and scowled, hesitating; his fist balled tightly at his sides.  
  
“You do what we say, the girl goes with you. Anything else, she dies and you end up in there anyway.”  
  
Rick looked at Sophia, who he felt responsible for in the absence of her mother, Carol. Giving her a reassuring not, he then cast a brief look over at Jo who nodded back, silently telling him that no matter what, they would all be together.  
  
Begrudgingly, Rick began to stalk over to the railcar. When he made it to the end of it, mere feet from the set of wooden steps leading up to its door, Gareth’s voice rang out.  
  
“Now the archer.”  
  
Rick looked back over his shoulder to see Daryl shooting daggers with his eyes toward the prick on the roof before following after Rick.  
  
“Now Xena, Warrior Princess.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. She could hear the amusement in Gareth’s voice despite shouting the words out with venom. Giving Sophia another look of assurance, with a pained heart, Jo had to force herself to walk away from her, if that’s what it took to keep the teen safe. As she did, though, she more or less walked backwards to keep an eye on Sophia, to keep the girl in her sights. It was as if she was trying to say, “As long as I can see you and you can see me, it’ll be okay.”  
  
But it clearly wasn’t okay. It was far from okay.  
  
“Stand at the door; ringleader, archer, warrior princess, in that order,” Gareth shouted out.  
  
As Jo joined Rick and Daryl at the railcar, standing directly behind Daryl, she brought her gaze momentarily over to Rick who felt her eyes on him and looked over his shoulder at her. He could see the tears of anger and fear brimming her green eyes, and it made him angrier. He knew her anger and her fear wasn’t about herself, it was about what could happen to Sophia. In that moment that was all Jo cared about and, honestly, it was all _any_ of them, Rick and Daryl included, cared about.  
  
“ _My daughter!_ ” Rick roared, officially claiming the teenager as his own, whether or not Carol was still alive out there.  
  
Jo was his wife and Jo still considered Sophia as a daughter, therefore Sophia was his daughter as well.  
  
She was his family now, his child, just as much as Hope was.  
  
“Go, kid,” Gareth called out to Sophia.  
  
Making eye contact with Rick, whose fierce declaration of who she was to him made her heart swell, Sophia found it easier to walk forward with less fear as she joined the three of the most important people in her young life.  
  
“ _Ringleader, open the door and go in_.”  
  
“I’ll go in with _her_ ,” Rick shouted back. He couldn’t see Gareth from where they were standing, but his voice sure carried.  
  
“Don’t make us kill her now.”  
  
Biting back on his rage, Rick expelled a breath and looked at the heavy door before him. Taking the steps one at a time, he reached forward and slid the door open but stopped to look back at Sophia. Daryl and Jo quickly joined him inside, letting the darkness envelope them as they waited impatiently for Sophia to appear. When the teenager eventually made her way up the stairs, a Terminite made their way around from behind the railcar to close to door behind her. At the same moment, both Jo and Rick descended on Sophia and wrapped their arms around her, grateful they were at least all together.  
  
Just as they moved toward the one end of the railcar, a cough behind them from the other end stopped them where they stood.  
  
Turning around, Rick took a step forward and could barely make out a group of huddled figures several feet away, just as one of them walked forward to stand in one of the slight slivers of light.  
  
It was Carol.  
  
“Rick?” she inquired.  
  
From behind Carol, Tyreese stepped forward, followed by Morgan, Karen, Sam, Ana, Mika and the young woman with pigtails who had cut Jo’s hands free when The Governor attacked.  
  
“You’re here,” Rick remarked with a feeling of relief washing over him.  
  
Jo stepped forward, out of the darkness, as did Daryl, who walked quickly over to Carol, alongside Sophia; both the archer and teenager hugging the grey-haired woman.  
  
“You’re here,” Rick repeated, looking upon each face individually.  
  
When Rick noticed the girl with pigtails, who he remembered just as well as Jo, he tensed slightly.  
  
Morgan seemed to sense the questioning gaze directed at the new girl. “Her name’s Tara. She’s a friend,” he insisted. “She helped save us,” he added, gesturing between himself and Mika.  
  
“She saved me, too,” Jo spoke up, nodding at Tara, acknowledging that she remembered her and still appreciated what she had done for her. “Back at the Prison, she helped me.”  
  
Rick looked to his side, at Jo, and watched as she gave him a nod. She was his wife; the queen to his king, after all. He trusted her opinion. It was her seal of approval that he sought, above all others. If she gave the final word, insisting she was okay with someone who briefly stood alongside The Governor, then so was he.  
  
“Yeah,” Daryl smiled, offering a hand to Tara, who shyly too it. “Now you’re a friend of all of us.”  
  
The declaration brought a smile to Tara’s lips, but she bowed her head slightly, seeming either sad or guilty or both. “For however long any of this lasts,” she frowned.  
  
“No,” Rick spoke, catching everyone’s attention. Grabbing tightly onto Jo’s hand, he maintained his grasp on it as he leaned toward the crack in the door and attempted to peer outside. “They’re gonna feel pretty stupid when they find out.”  
  
“Find out what?” Tyreese wondered.  
  
After a few moments of hesitation, Rick gave Jo’s hand a squeeze and then looked back at the others with a potent mix of mischief and vengeance in those beautiful blue eyes of his.  
  
“They’re _fucking_ with the wrong people.”


	30. Escape

" _Hell is empty and all the devils are here."_ _—_ William Shakespeare

 

* * *

  
Merciless was the resolve of everyone inside the railcar. Without the weapons they had arrived to Terminus with, and not knowing what grisly fate awaited them at the hands of their captors, the group of survivors from the prison went about making do with what they had on them. Anything that could turn into a weapon was; jagged pieces of wood from the floor or wall, prongs from belt buckles, shoelaces, zippers from jackets, anything. They couldn’t even take the proper time to catch up with each other and find out how they each got out of the prison, or if they knew of any other survivors out there.

For Rick and Jo, it was clear they were wondering about Hope. Their daughter was not present in the railcar and when asked about it, when they assumed she might’ve had her, Carol said she never saw where Hope had gone or who had gotten out with her.

With their thoughts about their daughter balanced equally between the hope that she was still out there, somewhere, with someone and the fear that she may not have survived much longer after being spirited away from the prison, Rick and Jo worked even more feverishly at fashioning themselves some weapons. They would get their aggression out on their captors one way or the other; not just because they deserved it, but because Rick and Jo needed a scapegoat for everything they were feeling and going through.

“Thank you for getting Sophia out,” Carol muttered, wrapping the ends of one of her shoelaces around both of her fists. She was crouched down beside Jo and looked up at her fellow woman before giving a nod of her head over her shoulder toward the back corner where Sophia was huddled with Mika; both of whom were holding tightly onto jagged pieces of wood broken off for them by Morgan moments before. “I was so worried I’d lost her again, but this time for good.”

Jo shook her head. “Daryl got her out,” she corrected. “He looked after her before they found Rick and me holed up in a house.” Jo sighed and cast an eye toward the other end of the railcar where he was furiously using the chain from Hershel’s pocket watch to carve off a piece of wood from the wall. “He was in really bad, physical shape after we got away. He could barely walk and see out of his left eye. He needed to rest before we got back on the road. Neither of us was doing really well mentally, either.”

“Tyreese told me about Lori,” Carol remarked, bringing her voice to a hushed whisper. “About what she did to spare you.”

“Lot of good it did,” Jo quipped sadly. “We still lost the prison and who knows who else. Now _I’m_ the one who lost my daughter. Talk about irony.”

“Maybe, but Lori sacrificed herself so that you had the chance to get out there and find your daughter. You can’t let what she did be in vain.”

Jo locked eyes with the grey-haired woman beside her and frowned. “I'm not. I’ll be forever grateful to her. She gave me chances to do a lot of things.” She paused. The belt around her right fist with three broken prongs could only be tightened so much. Turning her left hand, she admired her wedding ring and cast a subconscious glance over at Rick.

Carol took note of the ring and her curiosity got the better of her. “Did you and Rick…?”

Bringing her attention back to Carol, Jo looked back down at her ring again and smirked. “We did,” she confirmed, without having to spell it out, “This morning, on the side of the road, with Daryl and Sophia as our witnesses.”

“Oh,” Carol smiled a warm smile. “I wish I could’ve been there. I wish we all could’ve.”

“That was our plan initially,” Jo remarked. “We wanted to do it in the courtyard, in the prison, with everyone present after the illness died down and things got back to normal. But, you know how the saying goes: if you want to make God laugh—”

“—tell him your plans,” Carol finished, with a small grunt of a laugh. “Yeah.”

After a quick moment of silence between them, Jo focused on Carol’s profile, watching how the older woman looked down at the shoelace wound tightly around her knuckles. “You look better,” she observed. “Healthier.”

“I was lucky.” Carol frowned slightly as she cast her eyes back up at Jo. “Not everyone was.”

“Nope,” Jo agreed.

_“Shut up!”_ came a shout from a man outside the railcar.

“Alright, got four of them pricks coming our way,” Daryl announced from where he stood as lookout at the door, peering through the slight crack in it.

Everyone suddenly got to their feet, even Sophia and Mika, although the adults forced them to stay near the back. Rick moved like a gazelle as he made his way over toward the door beside Daryl, looking over each and every one from their group and, as always, lastly upon Jo, who stood just behind him with her right fist raised and the broken prongs pointed outward. Each person got into fighting stances as they waited on what would happen next.

“Y'all know what to do,” Rick spoke. “Go for their eyes first, then their throats.”

A flash of the night before entered Jo’s mind and she knew it did in Rick’s when he looked back at her once more.

_“Put your backs to the walls on either side of the car now!”_ the man outside the railcar demanded of them.

Footsteps echoed on the roof, drawing many of their attentions upward, as a latch was rolled open and some sort of canister was dropped down to the floor. The second they all saw it looked to be either a smoke or flash bomb, their eyes all went wide.

“Move!” Jo shouted.

She instinctively reached out and grabbed Rick, pulling him down with her as they drew their faces close to the ground just as the canister expelled a sudden blast of smoke that quickly filled the railcar. Jo felt his left arm go around her upper back, pulling her tight against him, just as instinctively, before trying to get back to their feet. Everyone was coughing, though, and their vision was, no pun intended, clouded. They could barely see a foot in front of their faces as the railcar’s door clanged open and they slowly began to make out the figure of a man in a gas mask stepping inside.

Without hesitation, Rick reacted first, throwing a hefty punch at the man’s head.

Retaliating with the same lack of hesitation, the masked man grabbed Rick by the fur collar of his jacket and tossed him out of the railcar as two other Terminites with gas masks approached the door and trained guns on the inhabitants inside.

“Step back or we shoot the kids first,” came a threat from the once again opened latch from above.

On instinct, Tyreese and Morgan both flanked the girls, blocking the aim of the gun just barely sticking through the latch. Spitting in the direction of the other Terminites, Jo wasn’t really surprised when they grabbed her by the hair and yanked her forward.

“You like it rough, sweetheart? We’ll give you rough.”

Jo lost her foot as she was unceremoniously tossed down the wooden stairs like a rag doll. She had enough sense, however, to throw her hands out in front of her to somewhat break her fall, although it resulted in mild pain from the pavement scraping against the skin of her palms, mixed with the pain of her knees hitting the ground just as hard. Looking over to her right, she saw Rick lying on his side, looking a bit dazed as the Terminite he’d punched ripped off his masked and kicked Rick in the face, causing him to  _—_ what Jo hoped  _—_ lose only momentary consciousness.

“No!” she shouted, as she heard others being pulled out from the railcar.

How many others she couldn’t tell at the moment, because one of the Terminites had shoved her down onto her stomach and began to tie her hands behind her back while a second Terminite bound her legs together at the ankles. Lastly a gag was tied around her mouth, preventing her from shouting at them anymore.

There were a total of eight Terminites there, and four from the railcar, to be exact. Rick, Jo, Daryl and Morgan were all in the same position; being bound the same way at their hands, ankles and mouths. As Jo noticed Rick coming back to the land of the living, he was grabbed up by two of the Terminites and he began to wriggle defiantly in their much stronger grip while they began to lead him away.

As they were dragged away from the railcar, they were brought toward one of the buildings and led inside where the sound of some sort of electrical saw filled the air, followed by a sickening noise of something being sliced into.

Her eyes still watering and hazy from the smoke, Jo tried her best to focus on what she was seeing.

There were men at metal tables, wearing aprons, covered in blood and cutting up what looked to be human bodies. Jo wasn’t sure she had seen that correctly; squeezing her eyes shut to wash away the rest of the smoke clouding her sight with fresh tears. When she opened her eyes back up, she noticed three large bins, each with a different word on them: burn, feed, wash.

What the fuck was going on?

Jo spotted Rick at what looked to be a metal trough, with Daryl on his immediate left, and Morgan on Rick’s immediate right. Jo, however, was brought over to the trough as well and dropped to her knees, to the immediate left of Daryl. Grimacing when the zip tie around her ankles was tightened, she was forced to try and remain upright and not fall completely forward without having her hands free to keep her balance. Her heart beating wildly in her chest and casting her eyes immediately to her right, Jo found Rick staring back at her with fear in his eyes as a man stood near, sharpening a large knife.

Four other hapless souls were brought into the room, which was starting to have the feel of a slaughterhouse, and brought down to kneel at the trough on Jo’s left. She turned away from Rick, long enough to look at the four men she didn’t recognize, and then she looked down into the trough, at her reflection.

_Oh, God, please don’t let this be how I die_ , she pleaded frantically in her mind.

She could sense another presence or two behind her and, turning her head slightly, she could make out a bald guy wearing a clear, plastic apron. He was taking a few practice swings with a metal baseball bat, like that of a baseball player before his turn up to the plate.

The eight people in total at the trough were each breathing heavily, able to put two and two together about what was going to happen to them and who exactly the Terminites were and what they did with the people that came to them for sanctuary.

Of all the things Jo had seen in her life so far in this new, terrible world, she never actually believed she would ever cross paths with actual cannibals.

It made her want to throw up in her mouth, and not just from the stale, metallic smell of blood hanging heavily in the air, but from being able to see bodies being cut up a few yards away on surgical tables, as well as the image in her head of the same thing happening to Rick and the others.

To end up as food for walkers was one thing, but to end up as food for the living?

For Rick, despite his fear and rage storming within him, he was feigning a calm exterior fairly well. He cocked his head to one side, listening to the sound of his neck cracking reverberating up into his ears as his nostrils flared and he bared his teeth a little like a dog ready to bite.

As he looked down at Jo, finding her looking back at her once more, his gaze softened somewhat; feeling as if she wouldn’t be so scared if he looked more reassuringly at her. Whatever happened, he wanted his eyes to be looking at her with love, not with fear or anger. If this moment was their last, he wanted the last image they had of each other to be that of their love for each other.

However, as the man with the bat and the man with the sharpened knife walked over to stand behind the unfortunate soul at the far left of the trough, both Rick and Jo, along with Daryl, Morgan and the other three unknowns found themselves turning to their left. They looked in time to see the man with the bat swing the bat against the back of head of the man at the very end. As soon as he slumped over, either unconscious from the blow to his head, or dead, the second man with the knife slit the poor guy’s throat. Blood splashed out and down into the trough flowed freely and brought frightened cries and shouts from the other unknown men, and Rick’s group immediately tensed.

Rick’s nerve endings were beginning to feel like they were on fire, realizing he was about to watch the same thing happen to the woman he loved, who had only been his wife for half a day, and that made him more furious than anything. That monster he feared becoming, while not the _same_ variety of monster as these men holding them captive, was starting to crawl its way up to the surface again; the same monster from the night before who ripped out a man’s throat with its bare teeth without a second thought was growing thirsty and struggled to be let loose.

As the second bound man met the same fate as the first, Jo began to shake violently in fear. She was scared beyond measure of what was going to happen and she prayed it happened just as quickly. It was the suspense of knowing her fate, though, that was eating at her. The only comfort she had was in Rick’s eyes and she turned her head to the right to seek them out again and wasn’t surprised at all to find them on her.

How she longed to just kiss him one last time and tell him she loved him, and hear him say the same thing. She wished she could hold her daughter one last time, or to at least see her from a distance and know she was still alive and safe out there in the world, but she had officially resigned herself to this being her last moments of life.

She was so wrapped up in these upsetting thoughts and on focusing on Rick’s gaze, while Daryl breathed heavily in his own panic between them, that she didn’t even realize she was crying.

Rick’s heart broke at the sight of her tears.

He knew at that moment she had accepted their fate and was saying goodbye to him.

But, no; that was unacceptable to him.

Remembering the jagged piece of wood he’d carved off the wall and slyly stuck up into his pant leg, Rick pulled it out and began to try cutting as quickly and as fervently as he could at his bound hands, hoping he could somehow free himself in time.

The third man dropped from the bat to his head and the slicing of his throat as Gareth sauntered in, holding an opened notebook in one hand and pen in the other.

“Hey, guys. What were your shot counts?”

“Thirty-eight,” the man with the bat, replied nonchalantly, as Gareth began to write in his notebook.

As the bald man swung his bat and the fourth unknown man kneeling to Jo’s immediate left fell, arterial blood splatter sprayed the side of Jo’s face and neck moments later. The blood from the first four men began pooling together; running off toward the drain at the center of the trough and it was enough to draw Jo’s attention away from Rick at the same time that the bald man stepped up behind her. Tensing up, Jo looked forward and closed her eyes tightly, waiting for the strike to the back of her head that would bring on the darkness and take her to join her father somewhere on the other side.

“Hey! Your shot count?” Gareth pestered.

The swing to the back of Jo’s head didn’t come and Jo’s eyes slowly opened back up.

“Crap, man, I'm sorry.” She couldn’t see him, but she figured the man speaking was the one with the knife that had been slitting the throats. “It was my first roundup.”

“After you're done here, go back to your point and count the shells. Kaylee won't be gathering them until tomorrow,” Gareth remarked, jotting something down in his notebook.

“Hey,” Morgan’s muffled voice echoed from behind his mouth gag. “Hey, let me talk to you.”

Gareth began to walk forward, pointing at Rick’s group and then the fallen men at the other end. “Four from A, four from D?”

“Yeah,” the ‘Batter’ confirmed.

“Hey, let me talk to you for a minute,” Morgan pleaded as Gareth rolled his eyes. “Let me talk to you for a minute. Let me talk to you for a minute.”

Pulling Morgan’s mouth gag down, Gareth sighed. “What?”

“Don't do this. We can fix this.”

“ _No_ , you _can't_ ,” Gareth replied, moving to return the gag in place.

“You don't have to do this!” Morgan barked, stopping the younger man in his tracks. “Just let us go, drop us off miles away from here without any weapons near a horde of walkers if you must. Just _don’t_ do this. _Please_. You don't _have_ to do this. We can go our separate ways and never see each other again. We can live our lives. We can _live_. All of us.”

"What's your name?"

"Morgan."

“Well, _Morgan_ ; there’s no _us_ ,” Gareth gestured between himself and Morgan and then reached forward and returned the gag to Morgan’s mouth.

“You don’t have to do this,” Morgan pleaded, his voice once again muffled.

Closing his notebook and setting it to the ground with his pen, Gareth crouched down on the other side of the trough, across from Rick and pulled Rick’s gag out of his mouth with both hands. Rick practically sneered at the gestured and then looked the younger man dead in the eye as Gareth slapped him playfully on the shoulders.

“I saw you go into the woods with a bag, and you didn’t come out without it,” Gareth revealed, his expression just as deadpan as Rick’s. “Had to pull my spotters back before we could go look for it.” He cast a glance down over the dead foursome and then over to the nerve wracked Jo before returning his gaze to Rick. “What was in it? You hid it, right? In case things went bad?” He smirked slightly. “Smart. _Still_ , we'll find it. But it's too dangerous to go out there right now.”

Getting up to his feet, Gareth only moved down the trough about two feet before he knelt back down. Pulling a long knife out, he reached forward with his free hand and grabbed Jo by the collar of her jacket, pulling her face a mere inch or two away from the tip of the blade. Amusement coursed through him as watched the way Rick tensed upon Jo, specifically, being threatened; a wry smile creeping up to the corners of his lips.

“What was in it?” he compelled, somewhat lighthearted in his tone. “I'm curious. And, it was a _big_ bag.”

Rick hesitated in answering; trying to calm his rage in case he said something that angered Gareth enough to harm Jo either way.

“You really gonna let me do this?”

Rick cocked his head to the side, but maintained eye contact. “Well, let me take you out there,” he rasped; his voice dry, with a hint of menace to it. “I’ll show you.”

Gareth smirked. “Not gonna happen,” he replied with a shake of his head as he pulled Jo’s face even closer to the tip of the blade which now hovered directly in front of her eye. “ _This_ might.”

“There’s guns in it,” Rick spit out hastily, as his eyes darted to Jo in restrained panic. “AK-47, .44 Magnum, automatic weapons, nightscope. There's a compound bow _and_ a machete with a red handle.” Finding his gumption and knowing that if Gareth went ahead and killed Jo, he would fight to his last breath to take the son of a bitch down with him. Letting an impish, threatening grin take up residence on his lips, he added, “That’s what I’m gonna use to kill you.”

Smirking back at Rick, Gareth let out a short chuckle and leaned back; releasing his grip from Jo’s jacket and sheathing his knife at his side. Getting back up to his feet, he moved back down to hunch over the trough in front of Rick, replacing Rick’s mouth gag and patting him twice on the shoulders.

“Thanks,” he commented. Reaching down for his pen and notebook, Gareth gestured to the man with the bat and the man with the knife. “You have _two_ hours to get them on the driers. I'm gonna go back to public face. Now's the time we can get messy, but we need to dial it all in by sundown.”

“Got it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Before the ‘batter’ could raise his back up toward Jo’s head and they could resume the task of killing everyone at the trough, two gunshots outside echoed in the air. Gareth immediate reached for the walkie-talkie attached to his hip and clicked it on.

“Hey, Chuck?” he radioed.

Just as Jo sensed the ‘batter’ was taking his swing behind her, she tensed up again and closed her eyes.

A single gunshot, however, ceased all movement again.

Jo opened her eyes and looked upward, thanking her stars for the stalling in her imminent death. She turned to her right and looked over at Rick who was looking behind him at the two men, but just as he looked back in her direction, an immense explosion rocked the entire building around them. The ground underneath them shook as well, knocking both Gareth and the man with the knife to their feet. Daryl fell forward slightly over the trough; momentarily losing his balance. Morgan and Rick fell completely over onto their sides, while Jo slumped over against the dead man on her left and used him for leverage to push herself back upright.

_“Hey, what the hell was that? Do you copy?”_ a voice over Gareth’s walkie-talkie asked.

Pulling himself up to his feet, Gareth pointed at the ‘batter’ and the ‘butcher’. “You stay here.”

“Gareth, these guys aren't going anywhere,” the ‘batter’ reasoned.

“Stay here until I know what's happening!” Gareth yelled, running out of the room.

“So we just sit here?” the ‘butcher’ questioned, throwing his arms out at his sides in frustration.

The ‘batter’ shrugged. “Got a job to do,” he replied, which caused Jo to tense up yet again when she realized she was still next in line to be slaughtered like the four men at her left.

She couldn’t see that Rick was working furiously at once again trying to cut the zip ties around his wrists with the jagged piece of wood while gunfire began to echo rather consistently outside. While the ‘batter’ took a few more practice swings with his bat, the ‘butcher’ stalked off around the other side of the trough, not content with remaining still while was sounded like a war was suddenly being fought outside.

“You there, Gareth?” the ‘butcher’ asked, bringing his walkie-talkie to his face.

“He's busy,” the ‘batter’ insisted.

“You smell the _smoke_? You hear the _shots_? He could be dead. The _hell_ we doing here? The whole place could be going up.”

The ‘batter’ walked around over to him. “You went on _one_ roundup and you blew protocol. We don't deal with security. That ain't our job. _This_ is.”

The ‘butcher’ turned away, starting to stalk off as he muttered under his breath.

“Hey, _look_ at me,” the ‘batter’ called after him.

“What?” he questioned, just as Rick popped up behind the ‘batter’ and rammed his jagged piece of wood into the neck of the ‘batter’ and then stalked toward him. “No, no, no, no, no!”

Too late.

Rick shoved the ‘butcher’ back against a table, shoving his makeshift weapon up under the guy’s jaw and once in the heart. As the body dropped to the ground, Rick stood up straight, looking briefly down in disgust at the table, upon a dead, naked man whose limbs had been severed, before turning around and running back to his people.

Instinctually, Rick cut Jo’s zip ties first, and then Daryl’s who was beside her. As she stood up, she pulled the gag down from her mouth and offered Daryl a hand to help him up to his feet as Rick moved on to Morgan.

“If they got problems, we got a chance,” Rick remarked.

“It sounded like a bomb,” Jo said; ping-ponging back and forth between relief at not dying like a pig at the slaughter and the resounding anxiety of not knowing what the hell was going on outside or what happened next.

“It sounds like a damn war,” Daryl commented.

“Right there,” Rick called out, gesturing to the table Daryl and Jo were stalking over toward, where there was a small selection of knives ready for the taking.

Morgan clamored to his feet, knitting his brow together. “What the hell are these people?” he questioned.

Daryl picked up a carving knife from the table and muttered, “These ain’t people.”

Each of them grabbed a knife to arm themselves with as both Daryl and Morgan walked over to the two dead men, prepared to stick their new weapons into the dead men’s respective heads.

“Don’t,” Jo insisted, catching Rick’s eye. “Let ‘em turn.”

As Daryl and Morgan backed off, they both turned and looked over at Rick and Jo, nodding in agreement that the ‘batter’ and the ‘butcher’ didn’t deserve to be put down before reanimation. They deserved to become walkers; to return as mere shells of their former selves and never know the true dignity of death.

Just before all four of them moved to leave the slaughterhouse, Rick stepped up to Jo. He reached his free hand up to the side of her face, letting it graze her cheek and then moved toward the back of her head where he snaked his fingers into her golden hair and immediately pulled her lips against his own in a frantic kiss. The gesture filled them both with a welcomed sense of calmness as they drank in each other’s breath, wishing they could just make time stand still for a little while so they could just thank their lucky stars for another chance.

How they had survived all these recent, terrible incidents was beyond them.

Maybe there really _was_ a God who was looking out for them.

Whatever it was, it was enough to further ensure they continued to never take each other for granted.

“You okay?” Rick asked her when he pulled his mouth away from hers.

Jo nodded. “I am now.”

A ghost of a smile toyed with appearing on his lips, but the severity of the task at hand, of getting out of there alive, brought only seriousness to his face. “Good.”

The four of them darted out of the slaughterhouse the same way Gareth had gone, which took them to a small corridor. Toward the end of it was a door that led to some sort of anteroom with large, heavy machinery and on the far side of the room was another room with barred doors, and one of them was open. When they stepped up to the bars and peered inside, their stomach turned at what they saw.

Apprehensively stepping inside, there were skinned, human torsos and other bodies parts strung up like you’d normally see of pigs and cows in a butcher shop. On the tables were small bins of more body parts, still fresh with blood. The metallic smell of blood was more pungent in the air, and not as stale as the slaughterhouse they’d come from.

Covering the back of her free hand to her mouth, Jo had to force down the urge to vomit, but it was to no avail. Her stomach had already soured and she darted over to a corner where she wasted little time in hunching forward and throwing up what felt like the entire contents of her stomach and then some. A little bit splashed onto the tips of her boots but that didn’t bother her as much as the smell in the room and the sight of all those body parts like that. Of all the things she’d seen and experienced, this just seemed worse. There would be no unseeing it, ever.

She felt a hand on her lower back and assumed it was Rick. When she stood up straight and looked over her shoulder, she saw it was actually Morgan.

“Better?” he wondered sympathetically.

“I just need to get out of this room.” Jo gripped her knife tighter in her hand and forced herself to breathe through her mouth instead of her nose while wiping the corners of her mouth with the handkerchief Morgan had offered her. “Thanks.”

Morgan nodded and then turned away, grabbing up a second weapon from a table, a machete.

“Cross any of these people, you kill ‘em,” Rick advised. “Don’t hesitate. They won’t.”

As they began to weave around the room and grab up different or extra weapons, Daryl broke off a metal pole to use while Rick seemed content with the knife he had taken from the slaughterhouse. Jo, however, had followed in Morgan’s footsteps, choosing a machete to go along with the carving knife in her other hand.

Making their way over toward a door that tell led directly outside, screams for help and snarls from walkers could be heard. Approaching the door, they looked out its window and saw the two shipping containers from earlier; the one stacked on top had its doors open but the one on the bottom was closed and that’s where the cries were coming from, and that’s what had drawn four walkers over.

“We run, we can get by ‘em,” Rick remarked, referring to the walkers. “They’re distracted.”

“We gotta let those people out,” Morgan insisted, as Rick looked at him. “We have to be better than this. We are still good people.”

With a nod of his head, Rick pushed the door open and the four of them hurried outside to find there were plenty more than the walkers they initially saw. There were a lot, actually, wandering about, and each walker surrounding the shipping container noticed the foursome and started to follow after them.

Each of them taking down a walker with relative ease, the foursome went straight up to the shipping container as Morgan struggled to get it open.

“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon,” Rick urged, as he, Daryl and Jo kept an eye out for any other nearby walkers that posed a serious threat.

As soon as Morgan was able to yank the door open, a man came sprinting out, shouting and looking clearing insane. He ran over toward Jo first, grabbing onto her shoulder, getting right in her face.

“We’re the same! We’re them!”

“Back off!” Rick growled pulling the deranged man off her.

The man then turned to Rick and grabbed at him, laughing as he shouted, “We’re the same!”

As Rick shoved the man off of him as well, the man began to just stand there, holding his chest as he continued to laugh. His laughter was caught off, however, by a walker that descended upon him and bit into the side of his neck.

Rick gestured for them to continue forward, but Jo stopped to stalk over to the bodies of the deranged man and the walker feasting on him. He might be crazy, and she didn’t know why or how he ended up in that container, but if he was a captive of the Terminites, then the he was an ally in her eyes and he deserved a quicker death. She hunched forward and rammed her machete into the walker’s skull and as she yanked it out, she repeated the gesture, but this time sinking it into the skull of the deranged man, who she realized had actually already died, so he wouldn’t reanimate.

In the throes of her actions, she didn’t realize the walkers ambling nearby until Daryl grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her back against the shipping container. There were so many of them wandering past and the foursome couldn’t tell how many more there would be or which way they could escape to.

Feeling the need to, Rick reached his free hand out and gave Jo’s arm a brief squeeze and pulled her over toward him a little bit.

“We gotta double back,” Morgan announced, peering around the right side of the container as the parade of walkers continued to go by.

Rick shook his head. “A is that way. We go back, we don't know where we are.”

“We don't really have a choice, do we?” Daryl muttered.

As gunshots from above took out a few of the walkers, Rick gripped his blade in his hand. “Just wait here,” he said before hurrying over to a broken down white car.

“Rick—Rick!” Jo called out nervously. She hated when he separated from the group to lead some sort of attack on his own. She worried something would happen that there would be nothing she could stop from happening.

As he sat crouched down beside the car, Terminites came walking forward with automatic weapons, blasting off limbs and firing kill shots to the heads of walkers coming from the opposite direction. He was oblivious to the walker coming up behind him until it was almost too late. Fortunately for him, Jo and Daryl had noticed it and Daryl was on that walker with the pipe through its head before Rick could completely turn around.

When the walker dropped between them, both men gave each other a nod; it was a silent exchange of a ‘thank you’ and a ‘you’re welcome.’

As the Terminites went past, Rick got antsy, waiting for the right moment. When a straggling Terminite brought up the rear, Rick darted out, with Daryl covering him, as he threw an arm around the Terminite’s chest, stabbed him in the back and then caught the man’s assault rifle before he dropped, dying, to the ground. Letting go completely of the carving knife he’d been carrying, Rick began to fire the assault rifle at the heads of the Terminites in front of him, taking them down one by one, along with a few of the walkers.

Upon spinning around to make sure there was no one or nothing behind him, Rick crouched down and took the extra magazine off the dead Terminite at his feet and looked over at Daryl with a nod of his head.

They could do this.

They could get out and _survive_.

As he ran back over, walkers not shot down by Rick made their way toward the shot down Terminites who were still alive on the ground; screaming as they were about to be eaten alive by the undead. Their demise was of no concern to Rick’s group. They were getting what they deserved. The ends justified the means and all that.

However, despite taking down as many walkers and Terminites as Rick had, the distraction he created wasn’t enough. There were too many of both still wandering around. Their path in the direction they wanted to go, which would’ve been quicker, wasn’t the safest bet nor was it the easiest path.

“We’re gonna have to double back,” Rick conceded, giving a nod to Morgan, who was the one to first say as much.

Morgan nodded back at him and turned around, taking lead to head in the direction they’d originally come out from, which meant passing through the butcher shop, so to speak, trying to ignore the dangling human torsos and severed limbs, back to the corridor and through to the slaughterhouse again. The bodies of the four unknown men as well as the ‘batter’ and the ‘butcher’ still remained. Neither of the six men, total, had reanimated just yet, which made making their way through the slaughterhouse a breeze.

At the opposite end of the room was the entrance they more or less remembered coming through and slipped through it, finding their way through another string of corridors and minor buildings and another onslaught of walkers ambling about, agitated and perpetually hungry.

As one walker practically barreled into Morgan, trying to clamp its teeth down onto his arm, Rick swiveled and took one shot to take the walker down and then swiveled back without missing a beat. The entire move took, _maybe_ , three seconds and he seemed unfazed by it. Even as he stalked forward, with his curls damp and hanging around his face, and taking out numerous more walkers, none of it fazed him too much. He was thinking only of getting to their people, getting them out of the railcar, if they were even still there, and all of them making it out of Terminus alive.

Rick was unfazed, but Jo wasn’t.

Granted, she had seen him killed so many walkers by this point that she couldn’t even put a number on it anymore. She’d seen him kill people as well. They were bad people, mind you, but people nonetheless. That wasn’t what struck Jo. Not the amount of kills he’d made, because he had to make them in order for him and the people he loved to survive, but how he did it. There was something in the way he moved; the mix of lithe and staccato motions. It was like choreographed dancing and his overall prowess made got Jo feeling both proud and even more attracted to him than ever.

That man who could kill you without blinking his eye if you crossed him or threatened to harm his loved ones, that man who could put the fear of God into your heart with a simple piercing gaze with those beautiful blue eyes of his, that man who could love fiercely and smile so brightly; that was her man.

_That_ was her husband.

Running alongside him with a carving knife in one hand and a machete in the other while Daryl and Morgan flanked them on the left and right, respectively, Jo threw Rick a brief glance while all four of them took out the walkers in their path to the railcar.

“I can’t wait to have our wedding night,” she said to him without realizing she had said it out loud.

Rick tossed her an impish look over his shoulder. With a shake of his head, he glanced briefly down the assault rifle in his hands — a Norinco Type 56 assault rifle, to be exact — while letting out a quick chuckle. “Yeah, and I’m still holding you to it, Mrs. Grimes.”

Daryl rolled his eyes. “This really an ideal time to make moon eyes at each other?” he asked, slicing his carving knife deep across the decomposed face of a walker to his left. “We got walkers and enemy fire up our ass and you two are making plans to bone.”

“Considering the fate we just escaped, you better believe I’m thinking about _boning_ my _wife_ the first chance I get,” Rick retorted, casting Daryl a roguish smirk.

The short bubble of laughter that escaped from Jo’s throat felt wonderful to her as they pushed forward through the smoke and the undead. Daryl just shook his head at Rick’s response, but it was obvious the archer was just as amused by the dialogue between the couple. Morgan, on the other hand, wasn’t so much amused as he was surprised, and not by the subject matter, per se, either.

“Did I miss something?” Morgan asked. “ _Mrs_. Grimes? Your _wife_?”

Rick looked over his right shoulder, giving Morgan a brief look. Even though the man on his right kept a straight face, Rick could tell his tone was lighthearted by the smile in his voice.

“He made an honest woman of me this morning,” Jo quipped, kicking a walker in the stomach to get it away from her long enough to raise her machete and take its head clean off. The body slumped immediately to the ground and as the head dropped, it rolled in such a way that Jo actually had to jump over it so that she didn’t trip as they continued to run. “Or I made an honest man out of him,” she added with a shrug. "Either way, yes.”

“Congratulations are in order, in that case,” Morgan declared, ramming his own machete straight into a walker’s eye to see all brain function.

“Thanks,” Rick muttered as he reached the railcar first.

Running up the steps, he reached for the door while the other three took places below to keep the walkers at bay in order for the others to escape their confinement.

Yanking the railcar door wide open, Rick looked inside at everyone standing there, most likely having expected it to be one of the Terminites. They had all jumped into startled fighting stances but were visibly relieved to see it was thankfully Rick instead, while also stunned by the extent of the utter chaos outside.

“Come on! Fight to the fence!” Rick shouted, turning to fire the assault rifle at more walkers making their way over.

As everyone began to spill out of the railcar, Daryl pointed in the direction they all needed to go, shouting, “Go! Go! Go!”

When Sophia and Mika ran out with Carol between them, both girls then ran right up to Jo, relieved to see her alive and well, hugging her at either side of her before Jo pulled them off.

“I appreciate the hugs, girls, but we gotta keep moving,” she remarked, looking up at Carol and handing her the carving knife so she had something to defend herself and the girls with. “Here. Take it.”

Carol did, and nodded. “Thanks.”

With their makeshift weapons they’d thrown together inside the railcar, the group made their way through the growing throngs of walkers surrounding the area. Rick directed them toward the fence, urging them hastily along.

They were all in such a rush and more or less having to focus on their own, personal well-being, that no one had realized Sophia had gotten separated from the group as three walkers enhanced on her and began to corner her against a wall. Her scream alerted her mother and, as any mother would, Carol ran straight toward her child without thinking of herself.

“No!” Carol yelled, grabbing the shoulder of the walker nearest Sophia and yanking it back, but in her determination and focus on the three walkers and her daughter, did not see the fourth walker approaching her from behind until it was too late. As it sunk its teeth into the flesh of her shoulder, Carol let out terribly pained wail and reacted by spinning around to slash the carving knife across the walker’s face. “Sophia!”

The teenager kicked a foot into the kneecap of the walker to her immediate left, giving her enough space to run to her wounded mother, but more walkers were beginning to descend on them both.

“No, no, no!” Carol cried out.

This wasn’t the end she wanted for her daughter, or herself; to be mauled by a small horde of walkers at the same time. She had fought so long and hard all her life to always make sure her daughter was protected and, even though she knew her time was officially numbered, Sophia still stood a chance.

Pulling Sophia close, she kissed the top of her daughter’s head and tried not to shed a tear. “I love you, so much, baby.”

“Mom, I’m sorry,” Sophia whimpered into her mother’s chest.

“It’s not your fault,” Carol replied, and then shoved her daughter away from her at the moment she saw that Jo had noticed what had happened.

As Jo ran forward, crying out both Carol and Sophia’s names, Rick turned toward them as well to see the state the grey-haired woman was in. The older woman lifted her arm and began to bang the carving knife against the brick wall behind her, drawing the attention away from her daughter and as the walkers began to descend upon her, Carol made direct eye contact with Jo.

“You take care of my daughter like you did before!” she shouted. “You _promise_ me!”

Tears stung Jo’s eyes and she wanted to cry out that it didn’t have to end this way, but Jo wasn’t an idiot. She could see that Carol had been bitten and this was how she was choosing to leave the world. She was choosing to die then and there; to sacrifice herself in order to ensure her daughter’s safety and survival, as any good mother would.

“I will!” Jo cried out.

Carol smiled briefly through her own tears as the walkers began to bite down upon her limbs and tear into her flesh. Her warm blood sprayed out and the screams of pain from her lips were absolutely gut-wrenching.

“No!” Rick yelled, aiming his gun at the heads of the walkers’ surrounding Carol.

“Do it, Rick!” Carol managed to shout out to him.

He knew immediately what she meant.

With a look to Jo, he nodded at her and she nodded back; grabbing Sophia and pressing the girl’s face to her chest and then spinning her around so that she wouldn’t have to see what happened next.

Changing his aim, Rick cocked his head slightly. “I’m sorry,” he called out to Carol.

“It’s okay.”

Rick was suddenly reminded of Lori, and how she’d sacrificed herself so Jo could live. She had said the same thing to him then as Carol was saying now.

With a steadying breath, Rick aimed the assault rifle at Carol’s head and pulled the trigger.

Carol’s head jerked backward and blood splashed the wall behind her. Her entire body dropped almost instantly and Rick let out a howl as grief and anger washed over him. He retaliated against the unsolicited and unwarranted demise of his friend by firing at each of the walkers that attempted to feast upon her.

“Rick, we have to go.”

Jo’s words pulled him back to reality and he spun around at the sound of her voice. Sophia was sobbing, but she was able to run and cry at the same time as Jo led her away and over toward the fence where Tyreese was standing to help the others over.

Not far off, Gareth appeared on one of the roofs, shooting at Rick, but Rick spun back around in time to get a shot in at the prick. It wasn’t a kill shot by any means, but it took Gareth down regardless. Looking briefly over at his current right, he noticed the ‘batter’ had finally reanimated after death and was now among the other approaching walkers.

Turning away, he joined the others at the fence, noticing that Daryl must’ve already gone over and he was unsure if the archer knew about Carol’s fate. He knew the two of them had grown closer while at the prison, although, to what extent, Rick had never been sure. He could never tell if the pair had just been really good friends or if there had been something more along the line of romance between them. Either way, Daryl wasn’t going to take the news well.

Tyreese grabbed Sophia and practically tossed her over the fence, which was covered by a blanket of some sort so no one got hurt on the barbed wire on top, and then lifted Jo over. Rick was next, and Tyreese was last; barely making it over before walkers began to descend upon the fence.

 

* * *

  
Into the woods the group moved together, the majority not even realizing Carol wasn’t with them anymore until Sophia’s sobs grew louder. One by one they all turned, curious to know why the girl was crying and when they saw that Rick and Jo looked just as devastated, their minds began to run and they began to do a mental headcount.

It was Daryl, of all people, to voice it.

“Where’s Carol?”

When Rick made eye contact with him and shook his head, Daryl’s shoulders slumped and he shook his head as well in response.

“No!” Daryl shouted. “We—we gotta go back and get her!”

“She’s gone,” Jo muttered.

There was a collective gasp among the group when they realized what was being said; that Carol hadn’t survived Terminus with them.

“Was it those pricks? Was it a walker?” Daryl demanded, stepping right up into Rick’s face. He was angry and it was understandable. “Fucking tell me who's responsible, Rick!”

“Walkers surrounded me,” Sophia spoke up through her slowly quieting sobs. “My mom…she…she saved me from them, but one of them bit her. She got me away by sacrificing herself.”

Daryl sank back from Rick and threw his hands up to clamp over the top of his head, and then dropped down to his knees. His face distorted in grief and he hunched forward, not knowing how to handle this news.

“I shot her,” Rick admitted. “She asked me to, and I did it.”

“She didn’t suffer long?” Daryl asked.

“It all happened so fast. I didn’t know it was happening until I saw Jo was running away from the fence and, crying out. It just…it happened so fast.”

Sophia pulled away from Jo and looked up at her as Jo frowned sadly back at her. “I’m so sorry, honey.”

“It’s my fault,” the teen mumbled with tear-stained cheeks. “Everything was so crazy and I got turned about, and then those walkers were right there and I couldn’t move.”

Jo placed her hands on the girl’s shoulders and shook her head. “Hey—no…that wasn’t your fault,” she insisted. “It was terrible and unfortunate, but it wasn’t your fault. Don’t you _dare_ blame yourself; not _ever_. It could’ve happened to _any_ of us, do you understand me?”

Slowly, Sophia nodded as Daryl pulled himself back up to his feet. He stepped over to the teen and touched a hand to her arm. When she turned to look up at him, he held his arms out and she stepped into them and hugged him without hesitation. Sophia wasn’t dumb. She knew Daryl had loved her mother in some way that was more than just a friend. Maybe he hadn’t exactly been her mother’s boyfriend, but they had been close to it. The loss they felt was probably greater than what everyone else was feeling in the group.

For Sophia, it was the loss of her mother. For Daryl, it was the loss of the woman he was a little bit in love with.

As the pair hugged out their grief together, Rick sauntered over to Jo and pulled her into his arms as well. It didn’t take long for her to give into her own sobs of grief the moment she felt the comfort of his embrace around her. She closed her eyes tight as she pressed her face into his chest. Rick placed his lips to the top of her head and then rested his chin there, hugging her even tighter as his own tears stung his eyes.

He glanced around, seeing that everyone else was trying to process this news and deal with it the best they could. Only Tara, Sam and Ana, who had really never got to know Carol, if at all, seemed the most unaffected by her death, although they were respectful of the grief everyone else was feeling.

“Well, spank my ass and call me Sally,” came a gruff, Southern drawl from a few feet away. “If ya’ll ain’t the most depressing sacks of shit I ever did see.”

Everyone turned their heads to see none other than Merle Dixon standing there with a shorter man standing somewhat hidden behind him. When each person looked upon him with a mix of surprise of seeing him there and ire for the tactlessness of his remark, he stepped back a bit, holding up his good hand and his bayonetted stub.

“Shit, what’d I say?”

“We just lost Carol,” Karen informed as she held tightly onto Tyreese.

Merle looked around at the somber faces and the smirk he’d been wearing faded away. “Fuck. I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” He looked upon his little brother, who had taken a step away from Sophia and faced him apprehensively. “Sorry, brother. I know she meant something special to ya.”

Daryl nodded, chewing his bottom lip. “She did,” he confirmed after a moment.

Sophia took her leave of him and wandered back over to Jo and was readily pulled in to share in the embrace between Jo and Rick. They were a family now, after all. Rick had declared as much earlier before their captivity in the railcar.

Rick looked over the top of Jo’s head and over to Merle. “How’d you find us?”

Merle turned his eyes upon the group leader and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I got back to the prison and found it in flames and blown apart in sections. Saw that damned tank in the courtyard and all them dead bodies, both human and walker, all scattered about like bird shit; realized something terrible went down. I got outta the truck I came back in and started calling out for Daryl, here,” he gestured toward his brother. “Tried looking inside C Block, but I didn’t see anyone alive. Then I found this dipshit driving up to the prison, apparently looking to bring some lady doctor back to Woodbury.”

Stepping aside, Merle revealed it was Milton Mamet standing behind him; the scientist that had been “employed” by The Governor as his “assistant” during his tenure as that fortified town’s leader.

Jo’s face turned into that of a scowl.

Her last memory of that little man was how he examined the progression of her pregnancy with Hope while she was chained like an animal in that dark, windowless basement room The Governor kept her locked in for months. She didn’t think she could ever forgive Milton for never taking a stand against The Governor and helping her when she could tell Milton didn’t like what was being done to her. At least Merle had the nerve to do something about it and eventually bail on both The Governor and the security Woodbury offered to do the right thing.

When Milton saw Jo, he seemed to understand what she was thinking and shrank a bit into himself as guilt plastered over his face and he avoided further eye contact with her. Instead, he seemed to find something interesting with the ground around his feet.

“Brought him with me as I tracked some footprints leading away from the prison, and then I lost them after a while, but found we found the signs for Terminus,” Merle continued to explain. “We came across one of those guys from that place setting up a rocket flare. He was talking into a walkie-talkie. The people being described from the other end sounded a lot like Daryl and Jo, so I knew he weren’t good people. Didn’t give him much of a chance to explain what was going on there. He was starting to run his mouth too much, smug sumbitch. Took his weapons and his rocket flare. You can thank Milton for that explosion. It was his idea. Stuck the flare in the end of a gun and pointed it at that gas tank. Boom!”

Merle mimicked an explosion with his good hand and smiled.

“What happened to the guy from Terminus you found?” Tyreese wondered.

“He killed him,” Milton spoke up.

Everyone focused their attention briefly over at the man with glasses before looking back upon Merle, who was shrugging.

“Like I said, he was a smug sumbitch and clearly one of the bad guys,” Merle remarked, not in the least bit regretful.

Rick nodded. “It was the right call,” he assured. “They _weren’t_ good people.”

“What were they, exactly?” Milton wondered, curiously.

Dragging his damp eyes over toward the smaller man, Rick stared blankly at him. “The worst kind.” Pulling himself away from both Jo and Sophia, he stepped over to Merle and reached for the man’s hand. Merle didn’t hesitate in offering it and Rick looked him in the eye and nodded appreciatively. “Thank you for what you did.”

He was referring to the explosion; the distraction that gave them their chance to escape. Well, most of them.

Merle nodded back. “Weren’t nothin'.”

“It was everything,” Rick insisted.

Nodding as well, and overcome with so many feelings all at once, Daryl stalked up to his older brother and threw his arms around him. As both men hugged it out, glad each other was still alive and well, everyone else seemed to be wondering what their next move was.

“We shouldn’t be standing around here. Their fences are down. Those skin-eaters could make their way through into the woods and come this way,” Sam commented, a bit nervously as he held tightly onto Ana’s arm while she leaned into him.

Rick threw a look over his shoulder at the blonde man. “We need to get the guns and supplies I buried. They’re nearby. I marked a tree. We go along the fences, use the rifles, and take the rest of them out.”

“We just got out of there by the skin of our teeth,” Karen reminded. “We lost Carol.”

“I _know_ ,” he bit out somewhat harsher than he’d intended, “but those assholes don’t get to live.”

“But we got out, Rick,” Tyreese muttered, feeling his girlfriend’s sentiment. “It’s over.”

“It’s not over until every last one of them is dead.”

Tyreese stepped forward, a little angry now. “The hell it isn’t. That place is on fire and full of walkers. And like Sam said, their fences are down. They’ll run or they’ll die. I’ll be damned if we risk any more of our lives because of that place.”

“You didn’t see what they’re capable of doing,” Rick pressed, moving closer to Tyreese, biting back on his anger as best as he could. “What they’ve done to people and what they’ll continue to do if we let them live.”

“After everything and everyone we’ve lost lately, I’m voting for us to be a little selfish. I don’t care about them. I care about us. I care about keeping _us_ safe _now_. We need to get our _asses_ the _fuck_ away from this place and find someplace else for us to go.”

Rick scoffed, prepared to argue further, when Jo reached her hand out to his shoulder, giving it a squeeze. He faltered and looked back at her, catching her eye and the shake of her head, which was enough to rein him in. Taking a few steps back from Tyreese, Rick threw his hands up in a sort of surrender.

“Fine,” he conceded, but his tone was anything but compliant. “We’ll let them _live_. But we still need to get the shit I buried. We need weapons to protect ourselves from what’s out there.” Rick gestured through the woods, in the opposite direction of Terminus. “But, and I swear on the life of my _children_ , if those people from back there survive, _any_ of them, and if they find us and they hurt or…” Rick shook with barely maintained rage over what he knew the Terminites were capable of and fearing it happening to his people. “If they hurt any of us, I’m holding you accountable and they won’t have time to kill you, because I’ll have gotten there first.”

“Rick,” Jo admonished.

Rick jerked away from Jo’s grasp and threw his hands back up as if to apologize, but not actually saying as much. “Let’s get moving then.”

Turning away, Rick began to move through the trees toward where he buried the bag of weapons and supplies. They were all only a few yards from the right spot. As soon as Rick noticed the tree with the notch he’d made into it earlier in the day, he crouched down and uncovered the shovel he’d hidden under some leaves and then began digging up the bag. Morgan walked off to help Rick, while everyone else seemed to stay put and wait for them to return.

Jo remained where she was with Sophia, and Mika quickly hurried out from where she’d been standing behind Tara. She ran up to Jo and hugged her tightly around her waist and then hugged Sophia as well.

“I’m sorry you lost your mom,” Mika muttered to the older girl.

Sophia tried to smile appreciatively. “Thanks,” she mumbled. “I’m sorry about your dad and sister.”

“Thanks.”

Lifting her head, Mika looked up at Jo, resting her chin on Jo’s stomach in the process. “We’re gonna go and find Hope now, right? And then we’ll all be a big family again, like at the prison?”

Jo smirked through her drying tears and nodded, running her hands over each other girl’s heads. “Yeah, we are.”

Mika lowered her head down as she smiled contentedly. “Good.”

“Yeah,” Jo agreed, but her tone wasn’t as content.

 

* * *

  
After the bag of weapons had been recovered, Rick took lead as the group made their way away from the direction of Terminus. Merle had been dictating directions to the hunting cabin he and Milton had come across where they found the Terminus resident on the walkie-talkie. While the others waited outside, Rick went into the cabin with Merle to get the Terminite's weapons Merle and Milton had left behind.

Although he knew Merle said he’d killed the man, for whatever reason, he hadn't been expecting to find the body inside.

Slumped against the wall near a table with a bulky duffel bag on it, a young man sat with two or three stab wounds to the chest, one of which must’ve punctured the heart, and one to the side of the young man’s left temple. His head was leaning forward and, by cocking his own head slightly, Rick could tell the young man’s eyes were still open.

Despite not expecting to find the man dead in the cabin, he wasn’t in the least bit remorseful. Like the others back at Terminus, the young man got what he deserved. You don’t get to be that kind of person and do horrific things to people and still get to live. This wasn’t the old world. There was no judge and jury. There was no judicial system, no due process.

You had to make a choice of who lived and who died.

If someone attacked you or the people you cared about, if they hurt or killed innocent people in general, the offender didn’t get to live.

The world was terrible enough with the dead trying to kill people.

The living shouldn’t have to worry about its own kind.

_Do unto others as you would have done to you._

That was the parable from Rick Grimes’ Sunday school days that came to his mind as he sauntered out of the hunting cabin, distributing a few of the weapons from Merle’s bag to his people. Once everyone was squared away with a form of gun or blade, Sophia and Mika included, Rick look upon each person; grateful he had all of them and he wanted to keep it that way.

Tyreese wasn’t wrong in not wanting to risk their lives, and to keep them all safe.

He just couldn’t help feeling like the other shoe would eventually drop and their luck would run out again.

It always did.

“You’re such a pessimist.”

Rick turned and found Jo standing at his side, snapping him out of his thoughts with the calming sound of her voice. “Hmm?”

She lifted a hand and brushed an errant curl off his forehead and then lightly touched the bruise on the side of his head that Claimer Joe had given him the night before. “The far off look and the frown,” she commented. “You’re thinking negative thoughts, aren’t you?”

He focused his eyes upon hers and smirked. “You think you know me so well.”

Jo responded with her own smirk. Moving her hand behind his head, she snaked her fingers within his brown locks and pulled his head down so that she could kiss his forehead. “I wouldn’t marry someone I didn’t,” she quipped, pulling back from him.

They studied each other’s faces for a minute and then both turned and looked off at the others.

“What do you think?”

“About what?” she wondered. “Where we should go next?”

“Well, yeah—that,” Rick nodded, “and the girls.”

Jo realized he was looking over toward Sophia and Mika. “They’re ours now, aren’t they?” She shrugged and turned back to look at Rick. “We’re a family, all of us, collectively as a group, but those girls are both orphans now. They deserve a set of parents, don’t you think?”

A smile pulled at the right side of Rick’s mouth. “Never thought I’d be surrounded by daughters.”

Jo let out a chuckle and patted her hand upon his arm. “Maybe you’ll get one that you helped create someday.”

“I don’t know that I could handle four daughters,” he remarked. “That’s four times the stress of keeping assholes away from them.”

“Well, it’s not like you’ll be doing it alone.”

Eyeing Jo up and down, Rick nodded and placed a hand on the small of her back; leaning in to kiss her properly on the lips. “Sorry about shrugging you off like I did earlier,” he apologized, unintentionally changing the subject. “I was just angry and upset with everything and still am. What we saw in those rooms, losing Carol…” He gestured subtly over toward both Tara and then Milton, respectively. “I don’t know who they are or if I can trust them as far as I can throw them.”

“Tara, I’m certain you can. She cut my hands free at the prison and I could see in her face she didn’t want to be there. The Governor was charming, I’ll give him that. He knew how to lead the masses with little more than a wink and a smile. She probably gave her some sob story that was easy to believe, making us out to be the bad guys and not the other way around. If I’d been in her position and didn’t know him like we did, I’d have followed him to battle, too, probably.”

Rick nodded. “What about the other guy? I never caught his name but I saw your reaction to his presence.” He tried gauging another reaction out of her then by merely bringing her initial one up. He watched her as she looked over toward the man with glasses. “Merle said he was coming to bring Dr. Stevenson back to Woodbury. He must be from there. Did you know him?”

“That’s Milton Mamet, who was The Governor’s so-called assistant,” she revealed to Rick, who tensed at hearing the name uttered, and Jo knew he remembered her mentioning Milton before. “Still alive and well, apparently.”

“Can we trust him?”

“Merle can, it would seem.”

Rick cocked his head slightly. “Can _you_?”

Jo shrugged. After a moment, she looked back at Rick, to find him still looking at her. “We’ll find out.”

Stepping away from Rick, she walked over to Sophia and Mika and began to talk to them quietly. From what Rick could tell, by the way she was gesturing to their weapons they’d been given, she was merely giving them a brief rundown of safety precautions or something along those lines.

“We good to go, Rick?” Daryl asked.

Wiping his hands together with a small piece of cloth from his back pocket, Rick looked up toward the sky, above the trees at the black pillar of smoke that came from the direction of Terminus. “I don’t know if the fire is still burning.”

“It is,” Mika piped up. “The smoke's black. If it was white, the fire wouldn't be burning anymore.” The girl smiled and blushed slightly when she realized everyone was suddenly looking at her. “I miss science class; except for when we had to do stuff like cut up planarian worms.”

“I remember doing that,” Sophia chuckled a bit. “It was so gross.”

“I know,” Mika giggled back.

“I’d give anything for that to be the worst thing I had to do these days.”

Jo flashed a look over at Rick. She knew he’d heard Sophia’s remark, as everyone did, and she was trying to suggest they move on and get as far away from there as possible, if only for the teenager’s sake of helping her deal with the terribly recent loss of her mother.

“Yeah, we need to go,” Rick announced.

“Yeah, but where?” Ana asked, aloud; holding onto Sam’s hand as if glued to it.

“It doesn’t matter as long as it’s somewhere far away from there.”

After making sure everyone had everything they needed, Rick once again took lead, but eventually fell back once they reached a set of train tracks again. He let Merle and Daryl head the group at the front and everyone else either paired up or walked single file, one behind the other. Rick and Jo let their wards, Sophia and Mika, walked in front of them, keeping them close, while they walked side by side as well.

Coming upon a map for Terminus on a pole and its corresponding sign above it, Rick paused and crouched down. Jo stopped as well and watched as he gathered up some coagulated blood from the rail onto his fingers. Standing back up, he reached out to the sign and began to cross the Terminus mantra on the top sign about it being a community for all. Then, above, he added the word “NO” above “SANCTUARY.”

Taking the cloth back out of his back pocket, Rick wiped off his fingers as best as he could and then just tossed the cloth to the ground.

With a nod at Jo, he wrapped his hand around hers and they hurried along to catch up with the others on the tracks.

He was tempted to call out to the Dixon brothers and have them all head into the woods, but something compelled him to keep silent.

Giving Jo’s hand a tender squeeze, Rick looked forward.

 


	31. Family

_"Family is the most important thing in the world." —_ Princess Diana

* * *

  
Upwards of two hours later, the group stepped off the tracks and decided to take a moment to rest at a railroad crossing. What little they had in the way of food and water left in the bags Rick had buried were evenly distributed but used sparingly. No one knew how long it’d be before they found new supplies and their usual hunter, Daryl, was down his crossbow; having been forced to leave it behind at Terminus, the same as Jo having to leave behind her sword, even though she still wore the scabbard on her back.  
  
Seated just below the defunct railroad crossing sign, Jo passed her adoptive daughters, Sophia and Mika, a water bottle to share and opened up a can of jellied cranberry sauce. Mika made a face at it, but Sophia didn’t seem to care.  
  
“You gotta eat it,” Jo insisted, bringing the can directly in front of the younger girl. “There’s gonna be a lot of food we’re not gonna like, but we can’t afford to be picky. You gotta eat what’s available.”  
  
Mika frowned, but nodded. “I know,” she acknowledged, sticking her small hand into to the can and pulled a slippery slice out.  
  
“My dad hated it when my mom bought this kind of cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving,” Sophia remarked, staring blankly at the ground as she took small bites of the jellied slice in her hand. “If she didn’t make it homemade along with everything else, he’d get so angry. One year, she was so busy trying to make everything else from scratch that she forgot to buy fresh cranberries so she had to use this stuff. When he realized that was all we had, he grabbed the dish she had it sitting in and threw it at the wall, and then he made her clean it up and go to the store and buy fresh cranberries. She came back empty-handed because the stores were closed, because it was the holiday and he hit her pretty bad.”  
  
Mika stared back in horror at the teenager. “Your dad sounds like a monster.”  
  
Sophia shrugged. “He’s dead now so it doesn’t matter. I don’t really think of him as my dad anymore anyway.”  
  
Jo watched how Sophia lifted her face and glanced over at Rick. She was starting to smile as if remembering something nice, and then turned toward Jo when she realized the woman’s eyes were on her.  
  
“What Rick said at Terminus, when they made us head into the railcar, about me being his daughter,” Sophia began to ask, “do you think he meant it?”  
  
Knitting her brow together, Jo lifted a hand and pushed some of Sophia’s hair behind her ear. “He definitely meant it.” She looked between both girls. “He thinks of both of you girls as his children now, just as I do.”  
  
“Really?” Mika wondered, her face lighting up.  
  
Jo nodded. “Really.”  
  
Biting her lip, Sophia looked over at Mika and then smiled. “So I guess that makes us sisters now,” she remarked. “I always wanted a sister.”  
  
Mika practically beamed as if she had just woken up on Christmas Day to find a massive amount of presents just for her under the tree. “I’ll be happy to be your sister.” Shoving the rest of the jellied cranberry in her mouth, she chewed quickly and swallowed it down and then wiped her hand on her pant leg. Without much notice, she got up onto her knees and threw her arms around Sophia’s shoulders.  
  
Jo watched both girls as Sophia reciprocated the gesture and her heart practically swelled to three times its size. This was the kind of thing they all needed in their lives right now. Something good and happy and not everything they’d just gone through.  
  
When Mika and Sophia separated, the younger of the two launched herself at Jo next, hugging her tightly.  
  
“Can I ask you a question?” Mika whispered in Jo’s ear.  
  
“Of course you can,” Jo insisted, running a hand over the girl’s back.  
  
“Do I have to still call you Jo or can I call you mom now?”  
  
Jo leaned back and looked the child in the face in all seriousness. “What do you want to call me?”  
  
Mika glanced shyly down at the ground, but leaned close as she continued to whisper. “I miss having a mom, and saying ‘mom’ would make it real.”  
  
Grabbing both girls’ hands, Jo gave them a squeeze, but she lowered her head to gauge a look back from the younger of the two. “You can call me mom if you want, honey. I won’t mind it at all.” When Mika looked up and smiled, Jo brought her glance over toward Sophia. “When you’re ready, if you want, you can do the same.”  
  
Sophia nodded appreciatively. “Thank you.”  
  
“You’re welcome.”  
  
Mika sank down to sit on the heels of her shoes and couldn’t seem to sit still anymore. She was practically bouncing. Giggling nervously, she muttered, “We’re a family. That’s so awesome.”  
  
Her remark brought a chuckle to Jo’s lips, which caught Rick’s attention from where he stood, keeping an eye out for any walkers while Morgan took point on the opposite end from where their group was congregated. His eyes scanned his wife and two adopted girls and the expression on his face was a bit hard to read from an outsider’s point of view. Inwardly, though, he felt considerably happy; all things considered.  
  
They’d lost so much, and so many people, but that loss only brought them all closer together.  
  
He’d lost his son, his friends, his ex-wife and he didn’t know where his and Jo’s daughter was, or if she was alive, but he had gained a new wife and two more daughters. He still had friends. They were his brothers and sisters; his family. There was always a silver lining, he supposed.  
  
Looking away from his girls, Rick turned his attention toward Tara, who was standing awkwardly off to the side, holding her gun, which was aimed down at the ground she was staring at.  
  
Rick stepped up to her and, as soon as he caught her attention, he gave her a nod of his head. “You didn’t want to be there, at the prison. That’s why I tried to talk to you,” he commented. “Jo told me how you helped save her. And you helped save Morgan and Mika’s lives.”  
  
“Morgan saved mine,” she insisted.  
  
Rick smiled and gave a slight tilt of his head. “That’s how it works with us, right?”  
  
Tara seemed a little surprised by his kindness. “Right,” she agreed. “Hey.” Moving her hand off her gun, letting it just hang there by its strap, she lifted her hand and made fist.  
  
Staring at it, Rick chewed at the inside of his lip and smirked when he realized what she was trying to do. Letting out an amused sniff, he lifted his own fist up as well and bumped it against hers.  
  
“Get something to eat,” he advised. “We’ll start back at sunup.”  
  
Stepping away from Tara, he made his way over to Jo and the girls, and crouched down beside them. All three looked up and each smiled at him a little differently than the other. Mika’s smile was bright and unabashed; Sophia’s smile was small but a little sad; and Jo’s was warm and contemplative.  
  
“We should find someplace with more cover for tonight,” Jo suggested. “It won’t be safe out in the open like this.”  
  
Rick nodded and snickered somewhat under his breath. “Yeah, I know,” he agreed, eyeing her. “I was coming over here to say as much.”  
  
Jo’s smile grew a little more. “Great minds?”  
  
“Seems like it.” Placing a hand on her shoulder, he looked at the can of jellied cranberries. “As soon as everyone’s had a bite to eat, we’ll move into the woods over there to sleep. We keep two people on watch at all times. We haven’t exactly gotten far enough away from Terminus as I’d like, but it’s gonna be dark real soon and we can’t be traveling at night. We got precious cargo to keep safe.” As he looked at the girls, he removed his hand from Jo and then placed each of his hands on both Sophia’s and Mika’s shoulders instead, albeit briefly. “Eat up.”  
  
With a nod to all three of them, Rick stood back up and made his way over toward Daryl and Merle. Jo watched him as he walked away, figuring he was going to talk to them next about the plans for the night. When she brought her focus back to Sophia and Mika, she flashed them a small smile and then helped herself to another slice of jellied cranberry.

 

* * *

  
After night had fallen, the group of thirteen sat around a small fire in the woods, about fifty yards in from the railroad crossing. The girls were asleep, huddled next to each other, to the right of Rick and Jo. The latter sat together, with Rick’s back up against a thick, tree trunk and Jo leaning back against his chest, between his legs, which were bent upward at the knees. Jo was using his upper thighs as arm rests while he had his arms draped over her shoulders and the side of his face pressed against hers. They were both staring into the flickering orange flames before them while Merle was recounting some of the shit he’d seen while he’d been away from the prison when everything was going to hell for the others.  
  
Everyone was listening intently, or just using the lull of Merle’s voice to take their minds off the shit storm that had been their lives recently. Rick turned his head slightly so that his lips brushed the top of Jo’s ear, and he ever so gently left a kiss there. Sensing the gesture, Jo smirked and turned into the kiss and then tilted her head back and cocking it to one side so she could look up at him a bit. They made eye contact and just studied each other for a moment, smiling small but loving smiles at each other.  
  
Rick leaned more toward her ear again with his lips. “I’m sorry you lost your sword again,” he muttered quietly.  
  
Jo shrugged. “Shit happens,” she accepted. “At least we’re alive. Well, most of us.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“And I can always find another one.”  
  
“True,” he nodded in agreement. “I feel bad that Daryl lost his crossbow, too. That was like a third arm to him.”  
  
“Yeah, but another crossbow will be easier to find than another sword. If we come upon a sporting goods store somewhere, we can scavenge it for supplies.”  
  
“You don’t think a sporting goods store won’t be picked apart to the bare minimum?” Rick leaned his head back to stare at her profile. “What makes you so optimistic Daryl will find another crossbow there?”  
  
“Most people will have gone straight for guns and knives. Crossbows are trickier to use and will most likely have been left untouched. Guns and knives are the go-to weapons of choice.”  
  
Rick nodded. “I suppose you’re right.”  
  
“I know I’m right.”  
  
Chuckling a little, he brought his lips closer to her ear again. “I’m sorry we won’t get our wedding night.”  
  
“Why do you say that?”  
  
Rick gave a slight gesture to his head, referring to everyone else. “We’re in the woods, close together with everyone, and what with just losing Carol, I figure us celebrating privately is both unlikely and maybe a little badly timed.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Do you really think anyone here would care?”  
  
“Not really, but I was actually thinking you might not be in the mood and that I’d come off as an insensitive prick for wanting to make love to my wife at a time like this.”  
  
“You’re not a prick, and you’re not being insensitive,” she assured. “There are always going to be times like this. Doesn’t mean we stop living our lives. Otherwise, what would be the point to any of it?”  
  
Rick nodded. “I guess you’re right.”  
  
“I thought we covered this?” Jo sat up slightly and turned a bit more to face him, resting one hand on his knee and the other on his shoulder. In doing so, it forced his arms to slip off her shoulders and drop to his sides. “I _am_ right,” she added with a smirk he mirrored.  
  
“How quickly I forget,” he joked. Staring back at her for a moment, with neither saying anything else, Rick leaned in and kissed her lips. “What should we do then?”  
  
Even though she responded by shrugging, the look on her face was anything but indecisive. Jo narrowed her eyes at him in a way that suggested she was trying to get him to read her mind. Having become somewhat of an expert in reading between her lines, Rick shook his head and dropped his gaze to avoid revealing how amused the smile on his face was so no one else could catch on to their unspoken conversation.  
  
“Alright then,” he muttered.  
  
Using the tree trunk to push himself up to his feet, he held out a hand to help Jo up as well before brushing some dead leaves and dirt off his ass. As soon as they were both upright, a few gazes from the others turned their way and Rick acknowledged a few.  
  
“What’s up?” Tyreese wondered, sitting the same way with Karen that Rick and Jo had just been sitting.  
  
“Jo needs to use the bathroom. I’m gonna go with her to keep an eye out and watch her back,” he lied, garnering a withering look from Jo, suggesting she was going to hit him once they were alone, for using her taking a piss as their excuse. “We might check the perimeter. Make sure everything’s kosher.”  
  
Tyreese and Karen both nodded, accepting the excuse, as did the others for the most part. It was the Dixon brothers who were more attuned to the couple’s true intentions.  
  
“Holler if you need a hand,” Merle quipped, wiggling his eyebrows at the pair.  
  
Daryl looked at his older brother and snorted before looking back at the fire. “If something comes up that you can’t handle, be sure to let us know.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she muttered.  
  
Rick shook his head at the brothers and then placed his hand on the small of her back as he began to lead her away from their temporary encampment.  
  
“Stay safe,” Merle continued. “Protect yourselves from unwanted developments.”  
  
“I’m gonna skin him alive,” Rick whispered to Jo as they continued to walk through the trees, further away from the others.  
  
“Get in line,” she retorted.  
  
There was no way the others weren’t catching on to Merle and Daryl’s double meanings by now and that brought a blush to Jo’s face, even though it went unnoticed in the dark. Plus, they’d just used the excuse of going to the bathroom and didn’t bother taking a roll of toilet paper from their supplies with them. The others, if they _weren’t_ catching the Dixon brothers’ drift, would catch on soon enough on their own.  
  
In relative silence the couple walked, side by side, until they were far enough away but still at a close enough distance to hear if something went wrong and they needed to get back to their people in a hurry. They made it toward the edge of the woods and could see the railroad crossing through the trees with great ease. Leaning her back against one tree, Jo looked out toward the tracks and the road that intersected it, not paying attention to the fact that Rick was looking at her instead.  
  
“We don’t have to do this tonight. It’s not like we’re obligated to.”  
  
Jo turned her head and looked at him with a smirk. “Having second thoughts?”  
  
“I’m not,” he insisted. “Are you?”  
  
Hesitating to answer, Jo shook her head. “No, but I feel a little guilty now, the more I think about it.”  
  
“Guilty about what?” Rick stepped up toward her and placed his hands on her hips.  
  
“We can be together however which way we want,” she replied, noticing the smirk that began to appear on Rick’s lips. “I don’t feel guilty being together just after losing Carol. It’s not that. If anything it’s something we _should_ do, if only just to remind ourselves that we’re still alive. It’s more the fact that I know Daryl loved Carol, possibly more than he thought we knew or that he let on. He’ll never get that chance to be with her like we can be together. I mean, that’s even if he wanted to be with her this way.” Jo dipped her head and hooked a finger through one of Rick’s belt loops, pulling him closer to her. “We’re not rubbing it in his face, are we? I wouldn’t want to do that to him.”  
  
Rick dipped his head as well, pressing his forehead to hers. “I think he’d understand. I don’t think he expects us, or Tyreese and Karen, or even Sam and Ana, to stop living our lives and carrying on as couples just because of his unfortunate lost opportunity,” he insisted. “I hate that we lost Carol. She was an amazing friend, like a sister. It hurts a lot that she went out the way she did just after reuniting with her daughter again. It sucks. And it’s always gonna hurt, just like all the losses we’ve experienced and will still experience. But life doesn’t stop.” Rick brought a hand up to her face and ran her fingers along her cheek and back into her hair. “We don’t stop living. We don’t stop fighting. We don’t stop.”  
  
“Everybody stops sooner or later.”  
  
“Well,” Rick cocked his head to the side. “Technically, even when we stop these days, we still keep going. It’s almost kind of poetic, in an absolutely horrifically depressing way.”  
  
Jo sniffed and nodded. “True.”  
  
Leaning in, Rick brushed his nose against hers and then pressed his lips to her lips. “We just gotta make the best of the time we got is all.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
Rick kissed her again, a little deeper. “Thank you for being my wife.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “You’re welcome?”  
  
Lifting his other hand up to her face as well, Rick ran both sets of fingers within her blonde tresses and continued to claim her lips while pressing his hips against hers. Jo moved her hands around his waist and up his back, underneath both his T-shirt and jacket. As he began to grind a little into her, he elicited a small mewl from her lips which was his cue to drop his hands to her waist where he began to fumble with the buttons on her pants.  
  
The excitement of being together again, for the first time since that night at the house, had them both feeling a little jittery, but in a good way. Everything they’d gone through recently, all the terrible things they’d seen and been forced to deal with, needed this moment as an outlet. It was going to be a moment of love, there was no doubt about that, but it was also going to be a way to channel all their frustrations into something. Instead of holding it all in and getting angry at the wrong person at the wrong time, they could use this release to calm their nerves.  
  
Rick had unzipped his pants and undone his belts but let Jo do the honors of pulling them down off his hips. Because of the weight of his utility belt, his pants dropped quickly and pooled around his ankles while he was still working on getting her pants off her hips. The entire time, Rick barely broke his lips away from her except for when he moved them to her neck, burying his face there. Once they were both bare from the waist down, Rick moved his hands to her ass and hoisted her up a little against the tree she was still leaning back upon, using it to assist him. Jo’s feet were still stuck in her pants because her boots were still on, but she was able to spread her legs well enough for him as he pressed himself at her entrance.  
  
“You don’t have a condom in your pocket, do you?” he wondered, suckling at the skin along her collarbone.  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, do you?”  
  
“No.”  
  
She sighed. “Well, we’ve already been reckless once. We can either stop before we start, you can pull out before the end or we say ‘fuck it’ and worry about the consequences later.”  
  
Rick pulled his head up from her collarbone and stared her in the eye. His blue eyes were glazed over with lust and she could tell right there they would not be stopping this ride once it had begun.  
  
With a smirk, Rick slowly lowered her down onto him; burying himself as deep as he could go and muffling their groans by covering her lips with his own. Jo’s hands wrapped around his shoulders to help hold herself up and, although she couldn’t properly wrap her legs around his waist because her feet were still stuck in her pants, she made do by gripping his waist with her knees.  
  
Rick began to thrust up into her, fast and a bit rough, and he received no complaints from her, even when her bare ass scratched against the tree bark. She was simply just enraptured by how good he felt inside her. She loved feeling him sliding in and out, hitting her sweet spot every other thrust. She did her best to roll her hips while in that position, knowing from their past experiences that he enjoyed that movement very much. And, sure enough, when a guttural moan escaped his throat afterward, she knew she’d made the right gesture.  
  
Leaning her head back, parting her lips from his, she watched as he grit his teeth and practically glared into her eyes. If she had no willpower, whatsoever, she would’ve come right then and there from that look of his alone. Biting her bottom lip, Jo lifted her arms up from around his shoulders and raised them over her head to grip the tree trunk above her.  
  
It wasn’t taking long for either of them and after plunging deep into her a few more times, Rick found himself having to quickly wrap her completely in his arms to prevent her from falling when his orgasm hit. His body went rigid for a moment and then he began to tremble while everything seemed to go black. He nearly thought he’d passed out. But, when everything came back into focus, he found himself staring into Jo’s heavy-laden eyes while she made, what he thought, was the cutest and sexiest face ever as she, too, was coming down from her own orgasm.  
  
“Shit,” she breathed, dropping her head down onto his shoulder. “That’ll never get old.”  
  
“No, it won’t,” he agreed, as he felt himself still twitching somewhat within her.  
  
Slowly, he began to slide out of her and then set her down to her feet, and it seemed to take every ounce of strength in her to remain upright because, after all that, her legs felt like jelly. Leaning back against the tree for support, she tipped her head back and watched as he casually bent down to grab his pants and pull them up. Jo couldn’t even bother to pull her own up just yet. She just stood there, content, as she watched him tuck himself back into his pants and redo his regular and utility belts.  
  
“This has been one eventful wedding day,” she murmured.  
  
Rick smirked; looking briefly down at the utility belt to make sure the metal prong went into the right notch. When he managed to lift his eyes back up toward Jo’s face, he began to crouch back down and placed his hands on either of her calves.  
  
At first, Jo thought he was going to pull her pants up for her, but then he knelt down and looked up at her through his eyebrows as he began to run his hands up the backs of her legs; purposely slow. As soon as he cupped her ass in his hands, she knew they weren’t done yet. All doubt of that was quashed the moment he pressed his mouth upon her mound and dragged his tongue along her warm, slick folds.  
  
“Oh, shit,” Jo groaned as quietly as she could as his tongue dove forward. Her fingers were instantly entangled within the curls on top of his head and every ministration he began to make had her seeing more stars than were visible in the night sky above. “Shit, shit, shi—ahhh, oh God…”  
  
Even though Rick was busying himself with this new task, Jo’s mutterings were far from lost on him, and it brought a grin to his lips as he continued to give her legs more of a reason to feel like jelly.

 

* * *

  
Bright and early the next morning, Jo woke up when Rick did. He was lying behind her, the big spoon to her little spoon, and the movement from him sitting up pulled her away from her dreamless sleep. Rolling onto her back, she stared up toward the canopy of trees and then glanced to her right to see Rick was zipping up his jacket and then looked back at her when he realized she was awake.  
  
“Morning,” he greeted, leaning down and placing a kiss her lips.  
  
“Morning to you, too, Hot Lips Houlihan,” she quipped as soon as he sat back up.  
  
Rick snickered and shook his head. “Don’t make that nickname be a thing.”  
  
“Didn’t you ever like watching _M.A.S.H._ as a kid?” she wondered with a mischievous grin as she sat up.  
  
“Yeah,” he confirmed. “But I don’t to be stuck with the unfortunate nickname of the Head Nurse.”  
  
“I take it you saw the movie, then, to know how she got the nickname.”  
  
“I did. Many a moon ago,” Rick remarked, brushing his hand through her hair and picking out a few leaves for her.  
  
“What’s the plan for today, Rick?” Sam asked curiously from the other side of fire pit, which was nothing more than a few smoldering embers by that point. “Where do we go from here?”  
  
Rick lifted his blue eyes away from his wife and over to the blonde man they had taken in during the shit storm that was the sickness at the prison. A few others were up and looking his way as well, curious for the details.  
  
“We’ll stick to that road at the railroad crossing,” he replied. “We’re gonna need food and supplies. It should lead us to some houses or buildings with something.”  
  
“Are we just gonna keep on wandering from place to place from here on out? Will we ever find a new home for all of us?” Karen wondered. Tyreese was still asleep beside her, trying to catch up on some rest after having taken a watch during the night.  
  
Turning, he looked over at Jo and held her eye for a moment before looking down at the grass between his legs. “We need to find Hope. That’s our goal right now.” Reaching his left hand out, Rick gave Jo’s right leg a squeeze. “We need to know what happened to her and who has her.”  
  
Karen nodded understandingly. “I wish we could tell you we saw who took her when we were trying to get away from the prison. It was just so crazy and there was smoke everywhere. Carol was trying to go back for Sophia, but there was no clear route for us back to C Block at the time. We didn’t _have_ time. If we didn’t leave when we did, we wouldn’t have made it out at all.”  
  
“None of us wanted to leave,” Daryl remarked, stepping up from around a tree a few feet away with a few squirrels slung over his shoulder. Jo wondered exactly how he’d managed to snag them without his crossbow. “We left because we had no choice.”  
  
Rick nodded and looked around at all the awake faces. “We’ll keep going until we find her or find out what happened to her. The rest of you don’t have to come with us. If we find someplace that’s safe and can be a home to grow in, you can stay there and make lives for yourselves.” He looked at Jo, studying her profile, and then looking her in the eye when she realized he was staring. “We can’t stop until we know.”  
  
“I ain’t stopping,” Daryl insisted.  
  
Merle walked up, wiping his bladed prosthetic with a handkerchief. “Where Daryl goes, I go,” he declared. “You can count me in.”  
  
“Tyreese and I will follow wherever you two go. We want to make sure your little girl is safe out there, too,” Karen added her two cents.  
  
“We’ll be there, too.” Rick turned and saw it was Sophia, beside him, who had spoken. She was awake and looking up at him. “We’re family. Family sticks together, right?”  
  
Rick smiled and nodded. “That’s right.”  
  
“Where you go, we _all_ go,” Morgan announced, making a circular gesture with his index finger to refer to their entire group. “We ain’t splitting up for anything.”  
  
Rick nodded again, small smile of pride appearing at the corners of his mouth.  
  
There was a quote from ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ that popped into his head suddenly.  
  
_You can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family._  
  
Well, these people _were_ his family and he _did_ choose them to be that and not just friends.  
  
Harper Lee could kiss his ass.

 

* * *

  
As they day wore on, Team Family was making their way along the old country road that had intersected with the railroad tracks but they had yet to find anywhere worthwhile to stop. There had been one gas station that was completely cleared out of anything they could use or need, and then one farmhouse about a hundred yards up off the road, but it was obvious there hadn’t been anyone living in it for a few decades. It was completely dilapidated and overgrown with moss.  
  
None of them even bothered to look there.  
  
They all knew it would be pointless.  
  
However, after not even thirty more minutes of walking, a few small buildings began to rise up over the horizon and the closer they got, the easier it was to tell that it was a small town and they were about to walk right down the middle of Main Street.  
  
Their weary eyes became more alert as they walked forward with their weapons raised and ready to be used. They slowed their pace and looked around them apprehensively, practically daring anyone or anything to jump out at them. Their movement through the street stirred a several walkers that had been standing virtually dormant near a handful of vacant storefronts. There most likely hadn’t been anyone through this way in a while to rile them up. Now they had a sort of renewed vigor to them.  
  
The walkers turned their heads, the scent of living flesh gently wafting through the air and drawing their sightless gazes toward Team Family. As their jaws began to chomp at nothing, their arms stretched outward and their legs began to shuffle them forward like wind-up toys accessing the last remnants of juice from their clockwork motors.  
  
“Stick together. Don’t break formation,” Rick declared. “Use your blades.”  
  
Pulling his red-handled machete out, Rick took lead and stalked over toward the first batch of walkers coming their way. With one swift slice downward, he lodged the blade into the first walker’s skull. Kicking the walker in the chest, thereby knocking it backward, he used that as a way to help him yank the blade back out before moving onto the next walker.  
  
One after another the walkers were dispatched of. Only one in particular seemed to almost gain the upper hand when it tried clamping its rotting teeth down on Ana’s arm. Sam was quick enough to reach out and stab it through the eye with the pole Daryl had originally fled Terminus with.  
  
As soon as each and every foreseeable walker had been put down, the group stood in the center of town, taking in the carnage they’d left in their wake. Decomposing bodies were strewn all over the street or draped over a few broken down cars, surrounded by their own entrails, putrid blood and brain matter. Although, it was nothing the group wasn’t used to seeing, which was considerably depressing to think about; that this was commonplace now.  
  
“Everyone okay?” Rick called out among them all. With nods of confirmation all around, Rick scanned the buildings on either side of them. “There are a few places we can check for supplies. We’ll split up into groups of three or four and whatever we find, that we can use, we take.” Looking over at Daryl, Rick gestured to Sophia. “Daryl, you take Sophia with you, and Tara. Try the gas station’s mini mart,” he suggested as the archer nodded and waved both females over toward him. “Tyreese and Karen, it looks like there’s a nursery just up the road. Take Sam and Ana with you. There could be some fresh fruit and vegetables still growing. At the very least, check some of the abandoned vehicles for anything we can use.”  
  
Tyreese turned and looked at the younger couple, waiting for them to join him and his girlfriend while Rick glanced over at the rest. He knew Merle could handle himself and whoever went with him and, even though he didn’t trust Milton as far as he could throw him just yet, Rick knew he could be useful from what Jo had explained of the man’s knowledge of science and some medicine.  
  
“Merle, Morgan and Milton can check the pharmacy. Any medication we could use, like aspirin or penicillin or whatever that might be lying around, don’t hesitate to grab. Jo and I will take Mika and check that consignment shop; see if we can find some fresh clothes we can all wear.” Giving everyone another look, Rick shifted his weight from one foot to the other and then looked down at his wristwatch. “Alright, I say we take no more than an hour. If you get done before that, come right back here to this spot. Don’t go anywhere else.”  
  
Once everyone had their task, they turned away from each other and headed off with their allocated group; each wary of the area around them and not once letting their guards down. Certain the others would be okay, and if not he knew they would holler for help, Rick nodded to Jo and then gestured for her and Mika to head toward to consignment shop.  
  
The building was considerably kitschy from the outside; painted red with large sign over the front window with mismatched letters stating exactly what kind of business it was. There were a few oversized flowerpots just below the window, all with dead flowers drooped over the edge and there were multi-colored pinwheels and ceramic garden gnomes stuck in the pots as well.  
  
Rick made a face which Jo noticed as soon as they reached the door.  
  
“What?” she inquired.  
  
“That gnome with the blue shirt playing the banjo,” he replied, gesturing to it. “Lori’s mother gave us the same one when we bought our house. We hated it, but we wouldn’t tell her mother that. We refused to put it in the front yard and stuck it in the far corner of the backyard where we attempted to grow tomatoes one year.”  
  
Jo smirked. “You attempted tomatoes, too?”  
  
“Yeah, neither of us had the patience for it.”  
  
“Same here.”  
  
Grabbing Mika closer to her and holding her back from the door, Jo let Rick take lead as he held his machete up and pushed the door open. He stuck a foot out to keep the door from swinging back and closing on them before sticking his head in and moving slowly forward. It wasn’t too dark inside, thanks to the large front window and the sun shining inside at a favorable angle. With the machete in his right hand, Rick held his left hand up, indicating for Jo and Mika to wait. Scanning the interior with wary blue eyes, Rick tapped the blade against the door, letting it rattle slightly and then gave a whistle, as if trying to get a dog’s attention.  
  
Careening his head to the left, he could tell there was a set of stairs that led to an upper level that contained either more used clothing or storage of some sort. He couldn’t tell until he checked it out personally, and he also couldn’t tell if there was anything or anyone squatting upstairs either. However, since nothing answered to noise he’d made, Rick felt it was secure enough that they could all head inside. Beckoning the ladies forward with his left hand, he kept the door open for them and let it shut slowly once they had stepped by him.  
  
“You two stay down here while I check and see what the upstairs is like,” Rick commented, eyeing Jo mostly.  
  
“We should stick together.”  
  
“If I need you, I’ll holler.”  
  
Jo narrowed her eyes, but relented. “Alright,” she sighed. “Just be safe.”  
  
Rick smirked. “When aren’t I?” Before Jo could open her mouth, he looked at her pointedly and added, “Don’t answer that.”  
  
With a smile, Jo shook her head and then ushered Mika over toward racks of clothes directly in front of them while Rick sidestepped along the wall and over to the base of the stairs. While mother and adoptive daughter began to peruse the selection before them, Rick took the steps two at a time. He removed his Colt from its holster and switched hands with the machete. He was a better aim with his right hand than his left when it came to his gun.  
  
At the top of the stairs, Rick looked around and realized the upstairs was completely open. It was more of a loft, really, but unlike the downstairs where there was nothing but used clothing, the upstairs was used furniture. There were even used appliances and toys along the wall farthest from him. He counted, and there looked to be at least five couches, two loveseats and there was a stack of about four mattress wrapped in plastic propped up against another wall.  
  
The right side of his mouth raised in a half smile as a thought came to mind. Pocketing said thought until later, Rick stepped warily over to a slightly worn armoire that caught his attention when a slightly rattling noise could be heard coming from inside of it. Placing his gun back in its holster, he felt the machete would be more useful if he needed it and he wove around the used couches and loveseats and a few tables here and there. The moment he came upon the double doors to the armoire, he reached his left hand out and grabbed one of the knobs. Bracing himself with a fighting stance, Rick sucked in a steadying breath and then yanked the door open.  
  
Nothing.  
  
But the rattling continued, meaning it came from the other side.  
  
Clenching his jaw, Rick grabbed the other knob and whipped the other door open, just as a bird came flying out, flapping its wings and darting over his head to seek safety from the large human.  
  
In his surprise, Rick blurted out a few choice expletives and stumbled backward. The backs of his knees hit the arm rest for a couch and he fell down upon the cushions and rolled off onto the floor in one, embarrassingly quick move. Landing on his side, Rick winced and was just thankful no one was around to see him react and fall over like that. He knew Merle would’ve been the one to really take the piss out of him over it.  
  
“Rick! Are you okay?” Jo called up from downstairs.  
  
Frowning and mentally chastising himself, Rick managed to get back to up his feet without any other mishaps. “Yeah,” he called back. “I, uh…I fell.”  
  
There was no response at first, until a moment later he heard two pairs of giggles. Rick rolled his eyes and shook his head.  
  
“As long as you’re alright,” Jo answered.  
  
“I am,” he assured. “Glad I could amuse you two.”  
  
“Is it clear up there?”  
  
“Yeah. Just furniture,” he replied. “Couches and tables and appliances. Finding anything good down there?”  
  
“There’s a particularly gorgeous, fuchsia prom dress, circa 1985, that I think I could pull off.”  
  
Rick looked toward the ground and smirked. “You could wear a garbage bag and still look good,” he quipped.  
  
“I’ll keep that in mind.”  
  
Glancing at the wall of appliances and toys, Rick stalked over and scoured the shelves. “It looks like there’s some Barbie dolls up here,” he informed. “Mika, you wanna come up here and pick one or two out?”  
  
“Yeah!” he heard the girl’s excited response.  
  
Moments later, the sound of light yet heavy footsteps ascended the staircase and soon enough, the little blonde head appeared. Mika looked around for Rick and when she found him he gestured over to the wall. As she approached, Jo joined them both upstairs as well not ten seconds later.  
  
“Their hair has seen better days, but haven’t we all,” Rick remarked pulling a few of the dolls off the higher shelves for Mika to look at.  
  
“Thanks,” Mika gushed, kneeling down and spreading each doll out before her to decide which she liked best.  
  
While the girl went about that task, Jo sauntered over to her rugged husband with a knowing look. Hooking her own machete into the strap at her side, she then reached her hands out to grab onto the lapels of his jacket and pull him closer. As soon as there was merely an inch or two between their bodies, she smoothed out the material of his jacket of nonexistent wrinkles and then looked him in the eye.  
  
“That was sweet of you,” she stated, flashing him a small smile.  
  
“Yeah, well, I figure she could use something to cheer her up after everything that’s happened,” Rick replied, glancing down at his adoptive daughter who was too engrossed in the dolls to realize he and Jo were talking about her.  
  
Lifting her right hand, Jo brushed her fingers over his beard and then shoved and errant lock of hair off his temple before leaning up to kiss him gently on the lips. “You’re a good man, Charlie Brown.”  
  
Rick snickered and, then, after a moment he returned her kiss. His eyes lingered on her lips when they parted from each other and a smirk toyed at his mouth. “Were there any clean shirts downstairs? It’d be nice to be a clean man as well as a good man.”  
  
“Yeah, there were.”  
  
“Good.” He nodded and looked around, giving the loft another once over.  
  
“What made you curse up a storm and fall?”  
  
Bringing his gaze back to Jo, Rick sighed and gestured toward the bird perched on top of a secondhand hutch. Jo turned around to look where Rick was pointing and when she saw the bird, she laughed.  
  
“However did you survive?” Jo teased.  
  
Giving her a playful shove in the arm, Rick shook his head. “Shut up.”

 

* * *

  
When the hour was up, Rick and Jo, along with Mika were waiting outside, leaning against an abandoned car when the other three groups began to make their way back from their assigned locations to scavenge.  
  
“How’d you make out?” Rick asked Daryl, the first to return with Tara and Sophia.  
  
Daryl held up a garbage bag. “Lighter fluid, matches, some bottles of soda that ain’t ever been opened,” he began to rattle off. “Bug spray.”  
  
“Any toilet paper?” Jo wondered.  
  
Daryl shook his head. “Nah. We checked the shelves, bathroom and even the back storage room. No shit paper anywhere. The place had been picked apart, though, before we ever got there. We’re lucky to have grabbed what we got.”  
  
“Hey,” Rick eyed, “every little bit counts.”  
  
Merle, Morgan and Milton returned next, with one bagful of whatever medications they could find and another bag of mostly toiletries items, like shampoos and what the others would later learn was a couple of boxes of tampons for the ladies in the group. What would be most surprising was that it was Merle who had thought to look for those things. Tyreese’s group returned last, with the biggest overhaul. They each carried bags filled with what looked to be mostly greens.  
  
“You had the right idea about the nursery,” Karen remarked, setting her bag down on the hood of the car Rick, Jo and Mika were leaning against. “A few of the glass panels in the roof were broken, so rain was able to get in and help the plants grow. We got asparagus, bunching onions, kale, rhubarb, artichokes and sweet potatoes.”  
  
“There was also a big ol’ pear tree and a couple of peach trees behind the nursery,” Ana commented. “Sam climbed up into the pear tree and plucked off what Tyreese couldn’t shake off from the lower branches.”  
  
Sam grinned and nodded. “Nothing like climbing a tree to make you feel like a kid again.”  
  
“Rick found some Barbie dolls for me,” Mika offered, holding up the two dolls she had chosen for all to see.  
  
The adults looked down at her and smiled, a few chuckling.  
  
“That was really nice of him,” Morgan remarked, flashing a grin at both Rick and Jo.  
  
“Yeah,” Mika agreed, turning the dolls around so she could look at them better with a big smile on her face.  
  
Rick pushed himself off the car and gestured over his shoulder at the consignment shop with his right thumb. “The store is clear. It’s safe and there’s plenty of clothes for all of us to choose from. Clothes and shoes are downstairs and upstairs there are couches and mattresses.” He looked upon each person. “I think we should there tonight. We deserve at least one good night’s sleep because we don’t know when we’ll get the next one. We’ll have something decent to eat for dinner and when we turn in, we’ll sleep comfortably. There’s a spot for everyone.”  
  
Daryl shrugged, tossing his garbage bag of loot over his shoulder. “Sounds good to me,” he remarked and began to stalk off toward the consignment shop.  
  
His tone and gait suggested he was still in a dark mood from losing Carol. Sophia seemed to mirror him as she quickly followed behind.  
  
Tara sidled up beside Rick and Jo and offered a shy smile. “I found this,” she said, pulling a package of Bic ‘Silky Touch’ disposable razors for women, holding it out primarily for Jo to see. “I figure, we don’t need to go au natural unless we want to.”  
  
Jo took the package briefly in her hands to look it over and smiled. “The simple things, huh?”  
  
Nodding, Tara smiled a little bigger and took the package back and shoving it once more into her bag. “Yeah.”  
  
As everyone made their way toward the consignment shop with their respective finds, Rick turned and looked at Jo, placing a hand on the small of her back. “After you,” he insisted.

 

* * *

  
That evening, Team Family was congregated in the loft of the consignment shop, picking at the remains of makeshift stew Jo and Karen had thrown together. Using a few cans of chicken broth that had already been part of the group’s stash, they went outside with Daryl and the squirrels he’d caught earlier that morning. While he skinned the animals and cut the meat from the bones, Karen poured the chicken broth into a 2-quart cooking pot she’d snatched from the shelves of appliances, along with a cooling rack. Jo had placed the rack across a few bricks and lit a fire underneath with small pieces of wood she’d found, and then Karen set the pot over the rack so they could boil the broth. Then, they threw in cut up pieces of bunching onions, artichokes and sweet potatoes. While they waited for all that to come to a boil, the two women chatted about menial topics as Daryl began to roast the pieces of squirrel over the rack as well. Once the meat was cooked enough, Jo asked him to toss it into the pot.  
  
“Good eatin’ tonight,” Daryl commented.  
  
“Been a while,” Karen added her two cents. “I think the last time I remember a good, hearty meal with all of us together was that night we were gathered at the prison to toast Bob after he died.”  
  
Daryl chewed on his thumb nail and grunted. “Dumb shit only went with us to that Big Spot ‘cause Sasha was goin’ and he had a thing for her.”  
  
“And Sasha had a thing for Morgan,” Jo remarked, gouging a like-minded nod from the archer. “It’s like some sort of Shakespearean romantic comedy that ended up as a tragedy.”  
  
“Story of our lives.”  
  
“I wonder if Morgan knew about her crush on him?” Karen questioned.  
  
Jo shrugged and looked into the pot. “It doesn’t matter now, does it?” She looked at Karen and then over to Daryl; the latter of whom was staring at the ground with a faraway look. “They’re gone. Morgan’s not. We can’t dwell on the past anymore if we want a future.”  
  
Karen sighed. “Still sad, though.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo agreed.  
  
The three of them fell silent after that. While the two women took turns stirring their stew concoction, Daryl turned away and kept watch. Not that there was much to watch for; they were cooking in the back alley behind the consignment shop and there was barely room for them to be back there, let alone for any walker to make its way toward them.  
  
Once the stew was determined to be done, Daryl lifted the pot up; using his handkerchief and a towel to prevent burning himself on the metal handles. Karen kicked some gravel and dirt onto the short flames, snuffing the fire out and then they led the way back into the shop and up the stairs to present the meal. Since there were only so many bowls to go around and no silverware, they used the empty cans or took turn eating.  
  
The meal was a surprising success. The chicken broth in place of water gave it the added flavor it needed but, because there were thirteen of them, they could only have one small portion a piece to make it spread further among them all. That was fine, though. To curb the extra hunger, they ate a pear or a peach for dessert.  
  
After dinner was over, they went about making their sleeping areas up. Merle and Daryl each claimed a couch, as did Morgan, Tara and Milton; the latter offering to take one of the loveseats instead but was told it was fine if he took a couch. Tyreese and Rick began to pull the mattresses down from where they stood propped up against a wall and removed the plastic wrap from them. Tyreese and Karen took one to use, Rick and Jo took another, Sam and Ana the third and the last one Sophia and Mika would share. Everyone had a comfortable place to sleep and that’s what mattered.  
  
With the meal finished, sleeping arrangements sorted out and clothing picked through, they used the downtime to utilized the employee bathroom downstairs and sponge bathe themselves and attempt to wash their hair. Afterward, when everyone was gathered around their couches or mattresses once night had officially fallen, Rick suggested they all call it a night so they could get an early start in the morning; to make the best of daylight.  
  
As he lay on his back with an arm propped up under his head, Rick used his other arm to curl around Jo’s shoulders and hold her close against him. He was staring up at the ceiling, listening to the sounds of everyone shuffling around as they got comfortable, or the muted cacophony of breathing or even snoring from some.  
  
It was a sound of comfort to Rick. It was a sound that reminded him of life back at the prison. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend he was back there and everything was fine; that there had never been a sickness, they had not lost any of their friends and The Governor had never attacked. Listening to everyone and feeling Jo curled tightly against him was home to him.  
  
“Rick?” came a small whisper to his and Jo’s left.  
  
Lifting his head, he looked to see Mika crouched down beside their mattress, clutching one of her Barbie dolls to her chest.  
  
“Yeah?” he asked curiously. “Can’t sleep?”  
  
Mika bit her lip and shrugged. Without saying anything, she stood up and tiptoed around to Rick’s side of the mattress and then sat down, cross-legged, on the floor beside him. “Can I ask you something?”  
  
“Sure,” he nodded.  
  
The girl seemed shy and hesitant, as if she was worried that whatever she was going to say would get her in trouble. “Jo said you think of Sophia and me as your daughters now. Is that true?”  
  
Rick narrowed his gaze. Letting what she asked him sink in, he smirked and nodded. “Yeah, I do.”  
  
A small smile appeared on Mika’s lips. “Okay.”  
  
“Was that it?”  
  
Mika shook her head. “No,” she replied. “I asked Jo if I could call her ‘mom’ and she said yes, and if she’s my mom now and she’s your wife, and you think of Sophia and me as your daughters, then can I call you ‘dad’ or do I call you Rick still?”  
  
Jo had been listening to the entire exchange and propped herself up on her elbow, peering over Rick’s chest at the girl, allowing Rick to prop himself up as well to get a better look at her. Reaching a hand out, he patted Mika’s knee and smiled.  
  
“Do you wanna call me ‘dad’?”  
  
Mika hesitated for half a second; trying to figure out what reaction she might get from him depending on how she answered. Then, she nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“Well, then: there you go,” he replied, giving her knee a squeeze. “I promise to take care of you and love you like you were my own flesh and blood. I will protect you, and I will protect Sophia, as long as I live. Okay?”  
  
Biting down on her bottom lip to rein in her smile, Mika nodded.  
  
“Alright,” he muttered. With a gesture of his head, he indicated for her to head back to bed. “Alright, now; go get some sleep.”  
  
“Okay,” she complied, getting up, but only to kneel. Leaning forward, she rested her head down on Rick’s chest and wrapped her arms around his waist. With as big of a squeeze as she could muster, Mika hugged him. “Goodnight…dad.”  
  
As soon as she lifted herself up away from him, she finally got to her feet and pranced away before Rick could register the entire interaction with the girl that had just occurred. Looking to his left, he found Jo smirking back at him. A few feet away, Tyreese had been looking on and gave Rick a smile as well.  
  
“We are family…I got all my sisters with me…” Tara began to teasingly sing, partly to herself, from where she lay on her couch.  
  
Obviously, Mika and Rick’s conversation hadn’t been quiet enough. It would seem everyone had heard the words that had been exchanged, and it seemed everyone found comfort in it.  
  
“Shut up, fruitcake,” Merle remarked, tossing a throw pillow from his couch at the young woman. Her muffled ‘oof’ brought a chuckle to the older Dixon’s lips as he turned over and tried to get comfortable again.  
  
Lying back down upon the mattress, Jo rolled back up against him, resting her head upon his chest.  
  
“I gotta admit,” he whispered for her ears only, “it’s awfully nice to have someone call me ‘dad’ again.”  
  
“I bet,” Jo replied. “Maybe in a year or two you’ll hear it more frequently.”  
  
“How do you mean?”  
  
“If we find Hope, if she’s alive, she’ll be starting to talk, and she’ll learn how to say ‘dada’ and ‘mama’ and ‘baba’ and, with Daryl and Merle around, I’m sure she’ll pick up a more interesting vocabulary early on.”  
  
“Don’t say ‘ _if_ we find Hope.’ I thought we agreed you were the optimist and I was the pessimist?”  
  
Jo buried her face a bit more into his chest, listening to the sound of his heart beating and letting the gentle rise and fall from his breathing lull her. “I think I’ve decided it’s best to be a realist,” she answered. Neither said anything for a moment, until she finally added, “I just wish I knew what happened—who has her. I miss her so much.”  
  
“I miss her, too.” Rick lifted his head and lowered it, chin to chest, so that he could press his lips to the top of her head. “Being a realist helps survive in this world, but sometimes we gotta cling to some optimism.”  
  
“I suppose.”  
  
After a moment, Rick kissed the top of her head again. “We should get some sleep now.”  
  
“Yeah,” she agreed. “Goodnight, Daddy Grimes.”  
  
Rick smirked. “Goodnight, Mama Grimes.”

 

* * *

  
The next morning, Team Family had packed away everything they’d gathered up the day before or already had with them and moved onward.  
  
Leaving behind the consignment shop and the small town altogether, all thirteen of them walked along the Main Street until it became just another country road. They didn’t get too far beyond the town limits before something up ahead caught the eye of Milton, of all people, who had been walking toward the back of the group. Quickening his pace, he walked up behind Rick and tapped him on the shoulder. Turning around, Rick gave the smaller man an inquisitive look before stopping, and when Rick stopped, everyone else seemed to do the same.  
  
“What?” Rick asked.  
  
Adjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose, due to sweat forcing them to slide down on him a bit, Milton pointed just up the road a few yards. “I doubt that’s a coincidence,” he muttered. “I’m pretty sure you’re the only Rick Grimes.”  
  
Turning to look where Milton was pointing, Rick and the others spotted a large billboard up ahead that was so faded, it was hard to tell what had originally been advertised. But that wasn’t what was so interesting about the large sign that stood only five or six feet up off the ground.  
  
It was the message that was spray-painted across it in large black letters.  
  
Rick’s heart jumped into his throat and he instinctively reached out and grabbed Jo’s hand. When he looked at her, he saw tears of joy forming in her eyes and he looked back at the sign, once more, as if needing to make sure the words he’d read were actually there and not some mirage.

  
**RICK GRIMES—**  
**GO TO D.C.**  
**WE HAVE HOPE**  
**—SHANE**

 

Neither Rick nor Jo could seem to find the words to express what they were feeling.

Merle was the one who cut into the stunned silence.  
  
“Well,” he spoke, “Looks like we’re headed to Washington.”


	32. Travel

_"We travel, some of us forever, to seek other states, other lives, other souls." —_ Anais Nin

* * *

  
Approximately twenty to twenty-five walkers stood dormant throughout the paved lot of a Ford dealership in Fayetteville. Most had chunks missing out of their arms and necks where they’d been bitten while they were still alive, and now they were in such a state of decay it was hard to tell if some of them had been men or women, or what race they had been. Death was the greatest unifier, after all.  
  
The approaching sound of footsteps traveled through the air and made its way toward the ears of the shambling corpses, causing them to turn toward the direction the noise was coming from. One of the walkers in the lot closest to the road turned around in time to have a machete lodged into its skull. As the walker in question dropped completely lifeless to the ground, Rick Grimes took a step back and withdrew his blade and moved on to the next walker in his path as the others flanked around him to take out as many of the other walkers as they could manage.  
  
With her own machete, Jo charged forward and swung the blade sideways across the face of a walker whose jaw was missing. The top half of its head slid off and fell to the ground moments before the body dropped with it, but Jo didn’t wait to watch that happen. She was on the next while keeping a keen eye out for Sophia and Mika who were being safeguarded primarily by Tyreese and Karen. Merle seemed in his element; shoving the blade of his bayoneted prosthetic up through the base of a few undead skulls and even going as far as to chuckle as he did so. Daryl, on the other hand, wasn’t quite in his element; it was obvious he wasn’t at his best without his crossbow and using the carving knife he’d taken from Terminus as his primary weapon was considerably foreign to him. Not that he wasn’t perfectly capable, though. He just wasn’t in top form. Morgan had found pool cue he’d taken to and enjoyed twirling it around like a baton in their down time, and was now using it to spear a few walkers with.  
  
Everyone had a part to play and there was little room for error. They had to clear the area as much as possible so they could assess which vehicles they could use to take with them north to Washington DC. As soon as they had spotted the dealership, it was Milton’s idea to see what cars or trucks would be viable as most would be sitting on the lot with full tanks of gas. They just weren’t sure how many people before them would’ve had the same idea and if the vehicles left in the lot hadn’t been abandoned because of lack of fuel.  
  
As Jo turned to pierce her machete through the half-decayed skull of middle-aged, female walker in a kitten sweater, she hadn’t noticed the tall, emaciated male walker ambling up behind her, reaching out to grab at her hair. Without warning, Rick grabbed Jo by the front of her shirt and pulled her right up against him with his left hand while he shoved his right hand forward, inserting his machete deep into the underside of the male walker’s head. Removing the blade in one, swift gesture, Rick turned his head and looked Jo directly in the eye as the walker collapsed lifelessly to the ground beside them.  
  
“Gotcha,” Rick muttered with a wink of an eye.  
  
Jo grinned. “My hero,” she quipped, leaning in and meeting Rick’s lips in a kiss that was short but sweet before they each pulled back from one another to continue their slaughter of the undead.  
  
Within the next fifteen minutes the group had cleared the immediate area and Daryl was the first to head toward the building where the keys to all vehicles left on the lot were stored. Merle followed, to watch his little brother’s back, while the others hung back and gathered together just outside the building, keeping an eye out for any stragglers. While they waited, they took a moment to pull bottles of water out of their bags and take sips to satiate their palates.  
  
Not five minutes later, the Dixon brothers emerged with handfuls of keys, looking around to determine which key went to what car or truck without using the panic buttons.  
  
“Just keep pointing the fob at different cars while hitting the unlock button. When you find the right one, the headlights will flash,” Jo remarked, taking one of the key fobs from Daryl’s hands to demonstrate. She began aiming it at the vehicles to her right and hit the unlock button, continuously, as she panned along. When none of those vehicles seemed to be the right one, she turned and aimed the key fob to the group of cars parked on her left. Only after she stepped a little closer and lifted her hand again to try and aim toward the row of cars just behind the front row, a pair of headlights flashed. “Aha. Success.”  
  
Rick walked up with her to inspect exactly what kind of vehicle it was, how much room it had and if it, for certain, had enough gas in its tank, which they wouldn’t really know until they started the car up; if it started up at all. Moving between two cars in the front row, Jo stepped up to the driver’s side door of a black, Ford Focus sedan. As she pulled the unlocked door open, Rick held onto it as she then slid into the driver’s seat and shoved the key into the ignition. Turning it away from her, the car came to life and she leaned forward to inspect the fuel gauge for the gas level.  
  
Leaning back with a satisfied smile, she looked up at Rick who was glancing down at her expectantly. “We have our first car for the roadtrip.”  
  
With a satisfied nod, Rick tapped the roof of the car and then gave a thumbs up toward their group to continue looking for other vehicles.  
  
They needed enough to fit all thirteen of them comfortably.  
  
In the end they had four vehicles total, and each with full tanks of gas. Rick and Jo would take their girls in the Ford Focus sedan, while the Dixon brothers claimed a black, Ford F-150 with an extended cab that Tara would be occupying. Tyreese, who was a larger man, felt more comfortable in a truck as well and chose the same style of truck as the Dixons, just in navy blue instead of black. Karen, obviously, would travel with him, and that left Morgan, Sam, Ana and Milton who decided to group together and travel in a silver Ford Escape.  
  
With the travel arrangements decided upon, the group began packing up their respective vehicles as quickly as possible; not only because they were trying to make the most of the daylight hours, but because there were more walkers that were beginning to appear and they all just wanted to get away without having to fight any more of the dead.  
  
From all the walking they’d done in the two days since they’d discovered that billboard with Shane’s message on it, they were tired; and the least amount of energy they had to exert, the better.  
  
“I remember coming through this way before a couple of years ago with my wife and boy,” Morgan commented, pointing just up the road. “My sister-in-law lived about five minutes away, just off the 85. We had to make a stop at a Walmart at this pavilion of shops up the road from here. If I remember correctly, there’s a Publix and a Dick’s Sporting Goods store.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Alright, we’ll make a stop there; see what we can scrounge up,” he said, looking at Morgan and then upon each of the others as a few walkers got closer. “Hopefully we can find some walkie-talkies too which will make communicating easier during the long drives.”  
  
“We can figure those details out later,” Daryl muttered, gesturing to the walkers. “We got company.”  
  
Without saying anything else to each other, everyone scattered to their respective vehicles. Rick climbed into the driver’s seat, having taken the keys from Jo, who slid into the passenger seat beside him while Sophia and Mika took to the backseat.  
  
“Buckle up, girls,” Jo spoke, eyeing them both in the rearview mirror.  
  
She almost chuckled at the sight of Mika buckling in her two Barbie dolls into the seat between her and Sophia. Then, looking over at Rick, she reached her left hand out and placed it down upon his right leg, giving it a gentle squeeze while staring out at the lot. None of the others were leaving just yet.  
  
“I think everyone’s waiting for you to lead the way,” she surmised.  
  
Glancing at Jo’s profile for a brief moment, Rick smiled to himself and then nodded. Putting the car into gear, he pulled the car away from its parking spot and began to drive off the lot. And, sure enough, the others vehicles came to life and began to follow after, one by one, in single file.  
  
“Hi-yo, Silver! Away!” Mika exclaimed, bringing smiles to the occupants of the Ford Focus.

 

* * *

  
Getting to Dick’s Sporting Goods hadn’t been easy. It seemed plenty of other people had the same idea, judging by the amount of cars parked and abandoned any which way outside the store’s entrance. The group parked their vehicles just outside the mass of other vehicles and made the decision that half would stay behind with their vehicles and supplies while the other half made the wary trek into the store.  
  
Because of how large the store was and not knowing how many walkers would be lurking inside, Ana’s limp put her at a disadvantage and was asked to stay behind with Sophia and Mika. Because they weren’t sure how well Milton was in a tricky situation like this, he was asked to stay behind as well. They needed someone stronger and skilled with a weapon on watch, which Morgan offered. Sam was hesitant to go with the larger group inside, hating to leave Ana behind in case something happened and they got separated, or worse. Jo noticed as much and cut through the anxiousness she knew Sam was feeling and asked if he wouldn’t mind helping Morgan keep watch.  
  
“Try not to use your guns when we get inside,” Rick advised, checking the rounds he had in his Colt before holstering it. He removed his machete instead and looked at the others who would be heading inside. Gesturing between Tara and Sam, he then nodded at her rifle. “Sam, why don’t you take Tara’s rifle and climb up into the bed of one of the trucks to keep watch? Morgan, you do the same in the other. It’ll give you a better line if anything approaches.” Next, he turned to Ana and Milton. “Stay near the car with the girls.” Ana and Milton both nodded while Rick brought his attention back to the man who helped him in the very beginning of all this after he’d woke from his coma. “If something happens that you can’t handle, if a horde of walkers or any other unfriendly types come by, fire two shots into the air with one of the shotguns. We’ll hear it and we’ll come out. If worse comes to worse, you get the girls out of here and you go somewhere safe.”  
  
“I think we’ll be alright, Rick,” Morgan insisted, climbing up into the bed of Merle and Daryl’s truck.  
  
Rick wasn’t convinced. Walking up to the bed of the truck, he gripped the top of the side panel with his free hand and stared up at the other man. “We can hope for the best all we want, but we also gotta prepare for the worst,” he replied. “If it gets bad, for whatever reason, and you can’t wait for us to get back outside to you, you get the girls away from here and go somewhere safe.”  
  
“How would you find us?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “Head up the 85. The first church you come upon, wait there. We’ll find you.”  
  
Morgan shook his head. “Okay, but I think we’ll be alright,” he reiterated.  
  
“Yeah, well, if you wanna make God laugh, tell him your plans.”  
  
Stepping away from the truck, Rick nodded back to the others who were heading into the store. Merle, Daryl, Tyreese, Karen, Tara and Jo were all armed with their melee weapons; Merle literally so. Leading the way, Rick stepped quietly in between several of the abandoned cars, peering briefly inside the one or two that might have supplies they could salvage from later. Approaching the automatic doors that were closed tight from the absence of electricity, Rick turned and gestured to Tyreese who walked up with a crowbar in his hands.  
  
After a minute of jimmying, victory was to be had. Tyreese forced the door further open and as they stepped cautiously inside, they realized their victory was short-lived upon seeing the second set of closed electronic doors. Before Tyreese could force the inner set open, though, Rick held up a hand to signal him to wait. He took his machete and banged the hilt of it on the glass of the door and waited.  
  
“Let’s see how many of ‘em we gotta deal with.”  
  
It didn’t take too long for a few corpses to make their way toward the door. There was also no telling how long they’d been trapped inside and how dormant they’d been but, like a light switch going on, they were suddenly very alert; snapping their decayed jaws in the direction of the banging noise.  
  
Rick gave a nod of his head. “Alright, now try the door.”  
  
Shoving the crowbar between the electronic doors, Tyreese bought enough space to get his hand in between and pulled one of the doors over while Rick grabbed the other and did the same. Just as they focused on that task, three walkers came ambling forward and Merle shoved his right arm forward, impaling his arm blade straight into eye socket of one of the walkers.  
  
Rick was through the opened doors in no time and unleashed hell on the approaching walkers without wasting any time. He hacked and slashed at anything in his way, doing his best to clear a path for the others. Daryl was right at his side, soon enough, taking a batch coming from the opposite direction.  
  
“Holy shit, there’s a lot of ‘em,” the archer muttered.  
  
Rick gestured toward a row of standalone shelving. “We can move those and cut some of them off; give ourselves a barrier for taking them out. We’ll let them come to us.”  
  
Everyone followed Rick and Daryl toward the shelves and blocked themselves in. Standing shoulder to shoulder in a half circle, the seven of them waited, but not for long. As the first batch of walkers began to clamber for them, the group shoved their respective blades forward into foul-smelling faces staring lifelessly back at them. This particular task went on for about five to ten minutes, with the amount of dead bodies literally piling up on the other side of the shelving. Once the herd had thinned considerably, Rick gave the go-ahead nod to push the shelves aside and for each of them to push forward. Armed with their melee weapons and a few flashlights to help with the darkness of the store, the group walked slowly, trying to determine which way they were headed.  
  
“I think the Outdoors Department is in the back over there,” Tara informed, pointing to their far right.  
  
Rick looked over his shoulder at her and nodded. “Then that’s where we go, but keep an eye out. We could have lurkers hiding behind racks and other equipment.”  
  
“Keep an eye out for the floor, too,” Jo suggested. “We might find some creepy-crawlies without legs but still with the capability to bite our ankles.”  
  
Hanging back a bit, Rick waited for Jo to catch up to his side, and then gave her a wink. “Having fun yet?” he teased.  
  
Shoving her arm gently against his, Jo rolled her eyes. “The time of my life,” she retorted sarcastically; a smile dangling off her lips.  
  
Side by side they walked carefully through the store, around toppled racks of sporting equipment and a few dead bodies of people who had been killed before turning into walkers. The stench inside the building was absolutely sickening from the dead bodies having been sealed up inside for so long, yet, at the same time, the group was sadly used to it.  
  
The sound of someone throwing up moments later cut into the otherwise silent traipsing.  
  
Alright, so the group wasn’t _completely_ used to the smell.  
  
Rick raised his flashlight toward the direction the sound came from and the light fell upon Karen’s hunched form. Tyreese was standing beside her, rubbing her back soothingly.  
  
“Y’alright?” he asked.  
  
Standing up straight, Karen wiped her mouth and nodded, avoiding eye contact with Rick simply because the light shining on her was too bright to stare directly at. “Yeah, it’s just a bit much in here.”  
  
“What’d you expect; a walk in the park?” Merle inquired rhetorically. He shook his head and continued along, shoving over a mannequin wearing an Atlanta Falcons jersey. The noise it made when it toppled to the ground caused everyone to jump and spin toward him with their melee weapons raised, and then rolled their eyes when they saw it was only him. Noticing their glares that followed, Merle shrugged. “It was in my way.  
  
As soon as they’d made their way toward the hunting section of the Outdoors Department, which was pretty damned cleared out, Daryl was the first over with a skip in his step. As Jo had thought and relayed as much to Rick a few nights before, there were a few crossbows still available as well as a supply of bolts for the taking.  
  
“Fucking jackpot,” the younger Dixon exclaimed.  
  
While he gathered up his new toys, so to speak, the others began casing what was left of ammo and other accessories they could use, like ammo holders and gun cleaning kits; things people might not have considered grabbing when the place got looted. Karen found two flashlights, but they would need to find batteries for them at some point, while Tara had found some matches and butane lighter. Merle had wandered off a bit, but then doubled back when he found a knife sharpening kit he took to use for the blade on his arm.  
  
As Tyreese made his way around, two walkers popped out of seemingly nowhere and just as he bludgeoned one in the head with crowbar, a bolt shot straight into the head of the second, dropping it immediately. Turning around, Tyreese looked to see Daryl standing a few yards away with his new crossbow in his hands. Daryl lowered it and smirked as the larger man nodded his silent thanks and was answered with a silent nod of welcome.  
  
Over by the camping supplies, Jo had migrated; perusing what little equipment was left and stopping when she saw something that interested in her. Standing on tiptoe, Jo reached her free hand up, the one not holding her machete, and tried to pull the box in question forward.  
  
“What’s that?” Rick questioned, stepping up behind her and making her nearly jump out of her skin.  
  
“Shit,” she muttered. “Don’t sneak up on me.”  
  
He chucked slightly and leaned in to whisper, “Sorry.” Sheathing his own machete and setting his flashlight down on a bare shelf, Rick then reached his free arms out and helped her pull the box down. Holding it in his hands he gave it brief onceover. “Volcano Stove Collapsible Grill,” he read the name off the box.  
  
“It says it can cook with wood, which is helpful because we don’t exactly have any propane or charcoal lying around, y’know?” Jo shrugged. “I just thought it might be easier for cooking than trying to roast up whatever rodent Daryl’s killed with sticks over a fire pit.”  
  
Rick considered and shrugged. “Sounds nice.” He turned and looked at her profile as she continued to examine the box. He then gave it to her to hold. “You want it, you carry it.”  
  
Jo narrowed her eyes at him as he simply smirked back at her. Trying to grip the box one-handed, she crouched down and used her machete to pop open the top of the box. Rick watched her and kept an eye out for any lurkers as she went about doing whatever the hell it was she was doing.  
  
“You planning on testing it out right here?”  
  
“No,” Jo rolled her eyes, pointing to the box. “It shows it comes with a carrying case. We don’t need the propane attachment, so I can just put the grill itself into the case. It’ll be easier for transporting it out of here.”  
  
Rick briefly touched his fingertips to the top of her head. “And that’s why you’re the smart one of the two of us.”  
  
Jo snickered. “Give yourself some credit,” she replied with a grin, pulling the carrying case out and unzipping it. “I didn’t marry you for your looks alone.”  
  
“It was for my money, wasn’t it?” he joked, causing Jo to chuckle in a rather bubbly manner.  
  
“Oh, yeah.” Placing the collapsed grill into its carrying case with its grilling accessories, she then looked up at Rick with a more amused smile on her lips. “Daddy Warbucks, right?”  
  
Standing back up as she zipped the case, Jo unsheathed her machete and stepped up to Rick. As she leaned her face up toward him, he leaned his down as their noses brushed just before their lips touched.  
  
“Ya’ll wanna suck face later, so we can get the rest of whatever else we can find and get the hell out of here?” Daryl questioned. “It fucking smells like shit in here.”  
  
The Grimeses pulled away from each other to look over toward where Daryl was, but they could tell from the look on his face and the lighter tone in his voice that he was teasing them than actually irritated.  
  
“Aye, aye, Cap'n,” Jo mock saluted him.  
  
With a roll of his eyes, Daryl took his crossbow and his bolts and began to walk off without hesitation. “Alright then; let’s wrap this shit up. We’re taking too long as it us and I think Karen’s about to lose her lunch again.”  
  
“Shut up, Dixon,” Karen retorted.  
  
But then, as if on cue, Karen must’ve gotten another — _stronger_ — whiff of stale decay and hunched forward to vomit, as if on cue.  
  
“Called it,” Daryl shot back with a laugh.  
  
As the seven began to make their way toward the front of the store, Rick tripped over a random, severed leg and knocked over a rack of Atlanta Braves T-shirts. As Jo and Rick both chuckled at his foolish misstep, they didn’t see the rest of the walker the leg belonged to sliding along the floor until it grabbed at Jo’s ankle.  
  
Shouting out in surprise, the others turned around and Rick was thankfully quick enough to get his footing back so he could bring his machete down on the walker’s hand, severing it at the wrist. It didn’t stop the walker from reaching out with its other hand or stopping altogether, so Rick thrust the blade down into the top of the walker’s head, stopping it for good.  
  
“You two okay?” Tara asked with concern.  
  
Rick looked over his shoulder at the young brunette and nodded. “Yeah.” Looking back at Jo, he placed his free hand on her shoulder and eyed her. “It didn’t get to scratch you or anything, did it?”  
  
“No,” she shook her head. “Those dead fingers can't get through these boots.” Holding out her foot, she gave it a shake as if to prove a point, but then looked off toward another section of the back of the store where a few more lurkers had been riled up by the sudden cacophony of noise. “We really should get going.”  
  
“Yeah,” he agreed, moving his hand down from her shoulder to her elbow.

 

* * *

  
After leaving the store and shoving their new finds into their respective vehicles, prepared to move on out and hit the road once again. However, there were other stores at the Fayette Pavilion that the group deemed worth checking out while they were there; although, it was also agreed upon to stay away from any of the larger stores as Dick’s Sporting Goods had been exhausting. They tried next a Radio Shack, where there were some batteries left, scattered on the floor, as well as one set of walkie-talkies, and then a shoe store. Karen needed a new pair after throwing up on her boots and not wanting to have to clean them off or just deal with the lingering stench. The others that didn’t bother checking out any of the other stores remained in or around the vehicles, except for Jo who had decided to cross the parking lot alone and make her way to one of the smaller stores.  
  
Rick had been in discussion with Morgan and Merle at the time, determining their route north on a map, wondering if they should go around the city or if it might be easier to drive through it, so Rick had not realized where Jo had gone. She had given the heads up to Daryl to pass it along to Rick, and then asked Sophia to come with her. When the group’s ringleader stepped back over to his Ford Focus, folding the map up and tossing it onto the dashboard through the rolled down driver’s side window, that was when he began looking around for Jo. Mika was sitting inside the car, playing with her Barbie dolls and sipping from one of the juice boxes the group had scavenged from an abandoned car, so Rick knew she was fine when he walked up to Daryl who finally relayed the message.  
  
Frustrated that Jo would go off, semi-alone, without him knowing, Rick took out both his Colt and his machete and hurried across the parking lot, trying to figure out exactly which of the stores Jo and Sophia might’ve gone into.  
  
First, he walked up to a Rue21 and put his hand up to the glass window, peering inside. It was dim, so it was hard to see into the very back of the store, and he was a bit startled when a walker came slamming up against the window right in front of him. It was banging its greyish-tinted hands against the glass and chomping at air, leaving a slimy streak of decayed bodily fluids behind as its jaw brushed up against the window. Rick made a face and backed up, and then looked to his left, realizing the door, two stores down, was propped open with a small box of some sort.  
  
Stalking over, Rick raised his gun just in case, walking by another clothing store he didn’t pay attention to the name of and then stopped at the opened door.  
  
“Jo?” he called out in a loud whisper.  
  
“Yeah, in here,” she replied, much to his relief.  
  
“Everything okay in there?”  
  
“Yeah. The place was clear.”  
  
Letting out a sigh, Rick opened the door a bit wider to allow himself entrance and then walked inside as he holstered his gun and sheathed his machete. Looking around from side to side, he noted the place seemed pretty intact, for the most part. There was a wall of perfumes that had been encased in glass that had been shattered at some point when it was more than likely looted in the very beginning of everything, but the store in general wasn’t the type of store that housed necessities for survival and clearly went overlooked as the population began to die out.  
  
“A make-up store?” Rick questioned with a raised eyebrow when he finally spotted Jo and Sophia near some hairbrushes.  
  
Jo brought her gaze up to his face. “It’s a beauty supply store,” she corrected. “We don’t have brushes or combs and I thought maybe there’d be some shampoos to use.”  
  
“Are there?”  
  
“Some.”  
  
Rick walked up to Jo just as she moved away and wandered over to another section, letting her hands graze the products before her. He checked to make sure Sophia was okay before following his wife. Coming up behind her, he placed his hands on her upper arms and rested his thickening bearded chin down upon her shoulder; his gaze falling on what she was holding between her fingers.  
  
“Mascara?”  
  
Jo shrugged, causing Rick’s head to bob slightly. “I miss wearing this shit. Is that sad?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“It’s not sad that I want to take some of it and use it, even now, when it’s pointless?”  
  
Rick lifted his head from her shoulder and pressed his lips against her ear. “You don’t need it ‘cause you’re beautiful as you are, but if it’s something you want and it’s available, then take it. I don’t see the harm if it makes you happy.”  
  
Jo smiled and removed the package of mascara from the display hook. “Maybe Karen and Tara would like something, too.”  
  
Rick stepped back and nodded. “Yeah, maybe.”  
  
“Something practical,” Jo continued. “Foundation or cover-up is pointless. Our faces will just get dirty and it’ll make our faces oily and greasy.” She bit her bottom lip, examining the selection around them. She then returned the mascara to the display hook and frowned. “Mascara runs. Even the shit that says it’s waterproof. Eyeliner, lip gloss with a hint of color to it…little things to make us feel like the women we were before.”  
  
“Want me to find you a bag?”  
  
Jo pulled her gaze away from the makeup and instead to Rick’s face. With a loving smile, she lifted her right arm and touched the palm of her hand against the left side of his beard that was getting increasingly bushy. “Yeah, sure,” she replied, giving the course mass of short, curling whispers a gentle tug.  
  
Rick smirked and, as she dropped her hand to his chest, he took a step back and made his way toward the front of the store where the cash registers were. He ducked a little to look under the counter and found a few small, peach-colored plastic bags with the store name of Ulta written on them with white letters. He grabbed one larger bag nearby instead and returned to where Jo was. However, she was no longer where he’d left her. She had migrated over to the other side of the store where the wall of perfumes and colognes were.  
  
The giveaway to her whereabouts was the sound of shattered glass crunching under her boots from the broken display cases.  
  
Walking up behind her, he tapped her shoulder and handed her the bag. When she turned around to take it, she muttered a quick “thank you” and then dropped in the small packages of eyeliner and lip glosses she had swiped. She then brought her eyes over to the wall of perfumes and colognes.  
  
“What kind of cologne did you used to wear in the world before?”  
  
Rick snickered. “None of these. These were too pricey for my blood,” he replied. “On my wages, and being the sole breadwinner, with a child, a mortgage, a car payment and other typical expenses, the only thing I really ever bothered treating myself to was a six-pack of Budweiser and a few Slim Jims. Anything I wore came from the Avon catalogs Lori ordered from.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Night Magic.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Night Magic,” she repeated. “It was an Avon perfume I wore in high school. I had my aunt order it for me once and every year at Christmas that was one of the gifts she always seemed to give me. Trouble was, I never wore it enough and ended up with, like, four bottles of it; three of which were completely full and unused so I started giving them away to my friends.”  
  
“What scent did _you_ used to wear?”  
  
“Well, _I_ used to splurge, but it was like a once a year purchase, where I would buy myself a new perfume. My favorite was Poppy by Coach. It was the one I wore the most or always ended up going back to.”  
  
Rick scanned the selection in the standalone cases to his left and smirked as he pointed to one of several intact bottles of perfume. “What about this one? Sensuous Nude by Estée Lauder.” He picked up the round, pink tester bottle and removed the cap. Spraying a fine mist from its nozzle, he moved his nose close to it and inhaled the scent, but made a face. “Nope.”  
  
Jo chuckled and then eyed Sophia walking up with a handful of shampoos, brushes and a few bottles of nail polish. She was biting her lips together nervously, as if she thought her two adoptive parents might shoot down the items she had chosen to take as unnecessary. That was until she saw Jo had a bagful of goodies already and was checking out perfumes with Rick.  
  
“Can _I_ pick out a perfume?” the teen asked curiously.  
  
Jo nodded. “Go ahead,” she replied, holding the bag open. “Here, put the stuff in here.”  
  
“I should’ve seen if there was an even bigger bag under the counter,” Rick teased, winking at his bride.  
  
“Why don’t you pick out a bottle of cologne?” Jo suggested. “This might be the only chance you’ll ever have to wear something that wasn’t ordered from an Avon catalog.” She gestured to one of the bottles on the wall. “Try one of the big, fancy names, like Calvin Klein or Giorgio Armani.”  
  
“Fancy, indeed, but I don’t need it.”  
  
Jo mirrored how he usually cocked a head to one side and made a face at him. “We could _all_ use some fragrance these days,” she remarked. “We haven’t had the luxury of a shower in a couple weeks. Sponge bathing only does so much, my love.”  
  
Staring at Jo and watching how she looked pointedly at him, and trying not to notice the amused grin toying at Sophia’s mouth, Rick shrugged. “I suppose it won’t hurt.”  
  
“It definitely won’t,” Jo agreed.  
  
Stepping around her, Rick walked up to the wall and took in the sight of the bottles that remained and weren’t broken. Narrowing his gaze, he tilted his head to the left and apprehensively reached out toward a clear, tester bottle with a yellow liquid inside and a small, dark blue cap. It seemed simple and unassuming and that, alone, appealed to him. Removing the cap, he sprayed a fine mist out in front of him and gave it a slight sniff. Making a face that suggested he didn’t mind it, Rick nodded.  
  
“Which one is that?” Jo asked.  
  
Reading the words across the bottle, he replied, “Dolce  & Gabbana Pour Homme.”  
  
Jo grinned and placed her hand just above the top of his jean-clad ass. “Let me smell.” As Rick sprayed again in front of both of them, she leaned in and took in the scent with an introspective expression and “hmm-ed”.  
  
“You like it?” he wondered. He wasn’t gonna take anything that she didn’t like. She would have to smell it on him, too, at a closer proximity than the others.  
  
“Yeah, I do. It’s nice.”  
  
Looking down at the bottle, Rick set it back down in its display case and reached for the unopened box of the same thing behind it. “What kind of cologne did Oscar wear?”  
  
Jo frowned. “It doesn’t matter what he wore. He’s not here anymore.”  
  
“I know, but if there’s a scent you like better…”  
  
“What kind of perfume did _Lori_ used to wear?” she retorted with a knowing look.  
  
“Honestly, I don’t know,” Rick admitted. “I think it was kind of vanilla, and a bit flowery.”  
  
“Would you want me to smell like her?”  
  
Rick understood what she was getting at. “No,” he answered. “I want you to smell like you.”  
  
“Well, there you go.” Jo smirked. “And I want _you_ to smell like _you_.”  
  
Nodding, Rick dropped the box of cologne into the bag and gazed back at her with a hint of bedroom eyes. “Alright.”  
  
Closing the bag up, Jo simply smiled up at him and turned around. She gave the shelves of the standalone cases another look and then rounded the corner to the other side where Sophia was testing a few of the scents when she let out small, excited exclamation.  
  
“What?” Rick asked, looking over the top of the shelf toward the two females.  
  
Holding up an orange box with white writing all over it, Jo stood on tiptoe and smiled back at him. “Coach Poppy.”  
  
“Congratulations are in order,” he teased.  
  
“Oh, shut up,” Jo snickered, bringing a giggle out of Sophia.  
  
“Hey, you girls done in here? We’re burning daylight.”  
  
The trio turned and found Daryl standing in the entrance to the store with his new crossbow slung over his shoulder as if it had been there all his life.  
  
“Yeah, we’re coming,” Rick insisted.  
  
“D’ya find some nice lipstick to wear, Rick?”  
  
Walking out, away from the perfumes and colognes, Rick grabbed a small box of eyeshadow off a display table and chucked it at the archer. “Catch.”  
  
Daryl reached for what was being thrown at him on instinct but missed. The box dropped and Daryl frowned. Smacking his lips, he shook his head and looked amusedly back at Rick and the two females. “Not my color palette,” he jested. “Those are too bright and I prefer a natural look.”  
  
Making a quick, final decision, Sophia grabbed a box of perfume and placed it in the bag with Jo’s and the rest of the items they’d taken and then joined her adoptive parents as they made their way for the door. As soon as they all stepped outside, the four of them, total, looked out toward the direction of all four of their vehicles where the others were waiting.  
  
“Alright, let’s get back on the road,” Rick stated.

 

* * *

  
Only fifteen minutes after getting back onto the 85, heading north toward Atlanta, Rick pulled out one of the walkie-talkies and radioed Morgan. Since there were only two walkie-talkies and there were four vehicles, they had decided whoever drove in the front and whoever brought up the rear of their caravan would carry them in case they got separated somehow. The two trucks in between could look ahead or look behind them to get a message from either car.  
  
“Hey, Morgan,” Rick communicated, talking into the device with his right hand while maintaining his left on the wheel. “I think we should find some place to stay for the night before we head into Atlanta. I don’t think traveling through the city after dark is such a good idea.”  
  
Taking his thumb off the button, he waited for a response.  
  
_“I was thinking the same thing, my friend.”_  
  
“Alright,” Rick replied. “Follow the leader.”  
  
Looking over at Jo, who sat beside him again in their Ford Focus, he gave her a nod of his head and she rolled her window down. Sticking her arm out, she twirled her hand in some sort of previously discussed signal to let Merle and Daryl, in the truck behind them, that they were diverting from their planned path and to keep close.  
  
Merle gave one tap of the truck’s horn and a moment later, Tyreese did the same thing; understanding a change to the route was being made. Morgan honked last, letting the others know he was on board and aware, too.  
  
Rolling her window back up, Jo looked over as Rick set the walkie-talkie down in the console between them and then she reached her left hand out to rest it upon his right leg just like earlier in the day when they’d first left the car lot. They both brought their eyes briefly to his leg, then to each other, and then back toward the road ahead as Rick, turned left at the next intersection they came upon. The other three vehicles maintained a close distance as Rick leaned forward and noticed a residential neighborhood appearing.  
  
Jo pointed at a brick, ranch style home painted grey on the first corner. “That looks good,” she informed. “Big enough front yard so that all our cars and trucks can back up onto the lawn and we can take off in a hurry if we need to.”  
  
Rick nodded at her insight and drove up to the house. Slowing the car down, he drove a little past the driveway, but only so he could reverse and back into it. It was long enough that another of the vehicles could fit in front of them. Merle chose to instead drive up onto the lawn, make a U-turn and then parked facing the street. Tyreese pulled in, facing the house and remained that way, while Morgan backed into the driveway in front of Rick and Jo’s car.  
  
As they all began to hop out of their respective vehicles, they all noticed several walkers scattered about, around the other houses up the street and in the parking lot of the fenced-in business across the road, which was technically on the main road they’d just come off of. The house’s location gave them a clear view across said parking lot to the main road, which was good for keeping an eye out if anything happened outside; like, say, a herd passing through or a caravan of other people who weren’t exactly friendly.  
  
“We’ll make sure this place is clear, and if it ain’t we’ll make it so that it is,” Rick informed. “I think we’ll be okay if we do the same for the house next door. There’s enough of us and we should take advantage of as many opportunities to sleep in actual beds while we can. We don’t know what the road ahead has in store for us.”  
  
Sam and Ana smiled, holding hands as they exited the back of Morgan’s car.  
  
“Sounds fine to us,” Sam remarked, nodding happily and giving Ana’s hand a tighter squeeze.  
  
“Ya’ll clean house,” Merle spoke, and then gestured to walkers ambling toward the group. “Lil’ brother and I will take care of these dickwads on the road here.”  
  
Rick nodded at the older Dixon and then signaled for everyone to gather their weapons. “Remember, only use your guns if absolutely necessary. Conserve ammo.” Looking at Sophia and Mika he pointed back at the car. “You two stay inside the car and bunker down. We’ll come out for you when we’ve cleared the houses, alright?”  
  
Off both girls’ nods, Rick led the way up to the front steps of the grey brick ranch and tried the door knob. It was open, fortunately, and as he pushed the door open, he paused in the entryway and then banged on the wall just inside to his right before letting out a three, short whistles.  
  
He only had to wait a few moments before a walker who had previously been an elderly woman came staggering out from around the corner from the living room. As it stretched its arms out and snarled hungrily at him, Rick stalked forward with his machete. Shoving her hands down and out of the way, Rick placed his left hand on her shoulder to keep her steady as he shoved his machete through the front of her skull with his right hand.  
  
Rick caught her before she dropped and let her down gently before dragging her over toward the wall where he propped her up. Tyreese and Karen entered inside next, followed by Jo and Milton. Morgan, Tara, Sam and Ana had decided to head to the house next door and make sure it was clear, or to clear it if it wasn’t. Tyreese stepped around the dead body of the old woman with his crowbar and turned left down the hall with Karen in tow as Rick turned directly into the kitchen, where he was easily able to assume the old woman had come from. Jo, meanwhile, hung back in the living room, sensing Milton standing awkwardly behind her.  
  
Gripping her machete tightly in her hands, she licked her bottom lip and let out a sigh, sensing the elephant in the room. Turning around, she found he was glancing shyly at her and tried to offer a kind smile as he held onto a metal baseball bat Merle had grabbed from Dick’s and passed along to him to use at some point in the last hour or so.  
  
“What?” Jo demanded, a little more harshly than she’d intended.  
  
“N-nothing. I was just…thinking.”  
  
“About what?”  
  
“My faults,” he replied, glancing at the worn mauve carpeting. “They are many.”  
  
“Yeah, no shit.”  
  
Snapping his eyes back up to her, he frowned and shifted his weight from one leg to the other. “I haven’t had the chance to say anything to you yet, and I figure now is as good a time as any, but I wanted to apologize for the part I played in what Philip did to you. I—I never approved of it. I hated it so much, in fact, but I’ve never been a particularly vocal man. I’ve never been one to stand up to bullies or any sort of dominant personality,” he admitted. “I knew what he was capable of, of the things he’d done and was doing, so I knew what he could do to me if I went against him. I was scared to go against him because I didn’t want to end up as one of those biters he chained up during those fights he held in the arena, or as one of the heads in those fish tanks of his. I know you saw them, and it wasn’t pretty.”  
  
Jo tensed at the memory of the severed heads she’d seen, floating in the lit fish tanks in The Governor’s private room off his bedroom, where he’d kept his daughter Penny locked up. She was mostly just remembering all those days, those months, where she was locked away in darkness, lying on mattress, awaiting what fate had in store for her. She was remembering the mornings when The Governor would sponge bathe her and how Milton would examine her, to the best of his knowledge, to see how her pregnancy with Hope was progressing.  
  
She had seen the regret in his eyes then, and how he tried to avoid looking at her. It didn’t change the fact that he had remained silent and obedient; a willing servant.  
  
“See, that’s where you and I differ,” Jo finally replied, her tone firm and tinged with a bit of residual anger and bitterness. “If I was you, and it was just myself I had to look out for, and I saw a woman who was pregnant, locked away as I was, and getting raped by the man who’d impregnated her, and planned to kill her after she gave birth, I would’ve risked my life to help her. What’s the point in life if you’re going to waste it? How do you live with yourself?” She saw Milton was trying to find some words to say, but she continued ahead of him. “That’s why I’d trust my life with Merle, who is self-proclaimed asshole and a racist. Sure, he’s clearly got a violent streak and issues up the wazoo, but he pushes back when things aren’t right. As soon as he saw the truth in what was being done to me, he made the decision to help me; putting himself at risk of receiving The Governor’s wrath. You, I don’t trust you as far as I can throw you. Not yet; because I know you’d be too scared to stick your neck out for anyone. You would choose yourself over another. You’re all about self-preservation and that doesn’t work when you have a group of people around you.”  
  
Jo stepped closer to Milton and, although they were more or less the same height, it felt as if she towered over him. He seemed to sink back into himself like a turtle retreating into its shell, and neither seemed aware of Rick standing a few feet away, listening to the pair converse.  
  
“These people we’re with are my family. They’re my husband, my daughters, my brothers and my sisters,” she continued, getting in his face and jabbing him gently in the gut with the tip of her machete. “I would die for them and I know they would die for me, because that’s what we do. We’re family. But you wouldn’t do the same, would you?”  
  
“I—I’d like to think I wou—”  
  
“You _think_ ,” Jo scoffed, cutting him off. “Therein lies another difference between us, Milton. See, you _think_ you would do the same, but I _know_ that I would. And you know what? If I could trust you completely, if I had no doubts about you, I would lay my life on the line for you, too. Unfortunately, right now, to me, you’re a parasite. You’re a reminder of the worst time of my life. I can’t look at you and not think of those months, chained up and locked away and abused like an animal.”  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
“Yeah, well, sorry doesn’t change the fact that it happened. But it’s okay. It’s alright,” she glared at him but forced a brave smile upon her lips. “I got away. Good people found me and took me in. I made friends, I gave birth to my beautiful daughter and I even fell in love. I suppose everything happens for a reason, because if what The Governor did never happened, I never would’ve had my little girl and I never would’ve met Rick, and I wouldn’t give either of them up for anything in the world. So, in that sense, I thank you for taking part in perpetuating my imprisonment. It made me stronger and it led me to where I am now as a person. But I don’t forgive you, and I doubt I ever will.”  
  
Milton managed to look away from her and finally noticed Rick, just over her shoulder, standing a few feet away. Feeling flustered, Milton licked his lips and shifted nervously. “I am sorry, either way,” he insisted. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll stay in the other house tonight.”  
  
Jo sniffed at him. “I don’t care what you do, as long as it doesn’t hurt or endanger the ones I love. Because if it does, I will not hesitate to kill you.”  
  
Glancing between Jo and over her shoulder to Rick, Milton nodded. “Fair enough.” Backing up slowly, he then turned and went back out the front door, presumably to head over to the house next door.  
  
Balling her left hand into a tight fist and tightening her grip on the handle of her machete with her right hand, Jo exhaled a steadying breath as she felt her nerve endings slowly calming down. She also finally sensed the presence behind her and turned around to find Rick standing there, staring back at her with a look that was somewhere between concerned and proud.  
  
Not knowing what to say, she shrugged and smiled slightly. “How long you been standing there?”  
  
“Long enough,” he answered, walking up to her. Tilting his head forward, he pressed it against hers, staring down her nose. “You feeling better after that verbal evisceration?”  
  
Jo emitted a small chuckle. “Yeah, a little bit.”  
  
“Good.” With a nod of his head, Rick leaned forward a bit more and claimed her mouth with his own. Muttering against her lips, he added, “The house is clean, by the way.”  
  
“That’s good.”  
  
Stepping back, Rick gestured over his shoulder with his thumb. “There was an old man, too, but it looks like he took his own life early on; going out the way your dad did. The old woman, I think, took a bunch of prescription pills. I found a suicide note on the kitchen table next to an empty pill bottle. Unfortunately, her way out didn’t keep her down like her husband.”  
  
“Or maybe the husband found her dead, read her note, and decided he couldn’t live without her, so he took his life to be with her,” Jo offered.  
  
“Possibly,” Rick nodded. “It’s sadder, but a bit more romantic in a _Romeo and Juliet_ sorta way.”  
  
Stepping out from the hallway to the left, Tyreese and Karen appeared, and it was obvious they must’ve heard the entire conversation between Jo and Milton and had chosen to keep their distance until now.  
  
“We should remove the bodies, take ‘em outside,” Tyreese suggested.  
  
“And open some windows to get rid of the stench,” Karen added. “And maybe change the sheets on the bed in the master bedroom. That’s where the husband’s body was and it’s a bit of a mess in there right now.”  
  
Rick and Jo both looked over at the other couple and nodded at the same time.  
  
“Sounds like a plan,” Rick agreed.

 

* * *

  
That night, everyone was gathered around in the living room of the grey brick ranch, or in the dining room or kitchen. Even Milton, although he kept to himself and sat at the kitchen table reading an old copy of Reader’s Digest he’d found. Merle was sitting in an E-Z-Boy recliner in the living room, like he was the man of the house, watching as Sam and Tara joined Sophia and Mika for a game of Monopoly, while occasionally leaning forward to offer the latter some tips in how to cheat. Ana wandered around the house, occasionally spraying air freshener in every room to help eliminate the stench, which Karen thanked her for, while Karen and Tyreese sat on the couch, curled up snugly together, watching the game of Monopoly as well. Morgan was outside with Daryl, keeping an eye out and occasionally their low voices drifted inside from the opened windows, indicating some small conversation the two men were having.  
  
Then there was Rick and Jo, sitting kitty-corner to each other at the dining room table. From where they sat, Jo had a clear line of sight into the living room and Rick had a line of sight into the kitchen where Milton was. In front of them, on the table, sat two water bottles they’d been drinking from and a small bowl of peanuts they’d been snacking on. In their hands were a few playing cards and in between them on the table was the remainder of the deck.  
  
Jo eyed Rick impishly as she smirked at him, as if they were locked into a battle of wits.  
  
“Been a while since we enjoyed a game of cards,” Rick muttered, taking a swig of water with his free hand. Setting the bottle back down, he grinned over the tops of his cards at her.  
  
“Yeah, it has.” Narrowing her gaze, she nodded at him. “It’s your turn, by the way.”  
  
“Oh, yeah.” Looking at his cards, he considered his hand and then looked back up at her. “Do you have any sevens?”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Nope. Go fish.”  
  
“Shit.” Begrudgingly, Rick picked up a new card from the deck and slid it among the hand he already held, which was considerably larger than the hand Jo held, meaning she was winning. “I think you’re cheating.”  
  
“I think you’re a sore loser,” she retorted with a raise of her eyebrow. “Do you have any Jacks?”  
  
Staring her dead in the eye, he didn’t respond right away. Then, after another moment of hesitation, he sighed and slipped the card he had just picked up out of his hand and passed it across to Jo. Taking it from him she paired it with one of the cards she was holding and set both down on the table, leaving her with only two cards left.  
  
“You know what?” Rick questioned, setting his cards down, facing up. “I forfeit. There’s no way I’m making it out of this with my dignity intact.”  
  
Jo laughed at him and set hers two cards down as well. “Aww, poor baby,” she mock pouted and then tutted at him. “Wanna turn in? We’re gonna have another long day ahead of us.”  
  
Gathering all the cards up and stacking them neatly together, Rick nodded. “Yeah, that sounds good. I _am_ beat.”  
  
“Not too beat I hope.”  
  
As he attempted to return the cards into their cardboard box, Rick cast a glance upon Jo’s face and took note of her expression she wore; an expression that was plenty suggestive and made Rick grin when he caught on to her line of thinking.  
  
“You’re incorrigible,” he joked.  
  
“Nah,” she shook her head, pushing her chair back and standing up. Leaning over the table, she blew out the candle that had been providing them with light and grabbed her bottle of water up with her. “I’m just in the honeymoon phase of this marriage. Sooner or later I’ll get sick and tired of your ass.”  
  
Flashing her an amused smile, Rick moved to standing closer in front of her, picking up his own water bottle but leaving the pack of cards on the table. “Oh yeah? Is that so?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Yeah.”  
  
“Well, what do I gotta do to keep you interested?”  
  
A wicked grin dangling from her lips, Jo leaned forward and whispered something in his ear; something that made him snap his head back and his eyes glaze over with intense lust.  
  
Giving a slight tilt of his head, Rick placed his right hand on the small of her back and pulled her closer to him. “You ain’t gotta ask _me_ twice,” he responded; his voice sounding as if it had suddenly dropped an octave lower.  
  
Turning toward the group in the living room, Rick let them know he and Jo were turning in for the night and a reminder that he wanted them to all roll out not long after daybreak, so for everyone to not stay up too much longer either. There were a few teasing responses of “yes, dad” thrown back at him, which Rick just shook his head at before turning his attention to Jo and leading her away, down the hall to one of the extra bedrooms.  
  
As soon as they had the door closed behind them, they looked upon the single twin bed against the wall and both seemed to smirk.  
  
There were three bedrooms in the grey brick ranch; the master had a queen-sized bed, this bedroom with the single twin and the other extra bedroom with two twin beds. Rick and Jo had offered Sam and Ana the master, and Sophia and Mika would take the room with the two twin beds. Daryl was taking the couch in the living room. The house next door also had three bedrooms, but the master had a king-sized bed which would more comfortably fit Tyreese and Karen. The two extra bedrooms had one twin bed each; Morgan was claiming one and Tara the other. Merle was fine with taking the couch. That left Milton with the option of sleeping on the floor in either house’s living room or on the couch in the finished basement next door. The latter, however, wasn’t much of an option.  
  
The family that had been living there had been found dead down there in some sort of suicide pact. There had been a mother, father, a teenage son and a preteen daughter. There had even been a dog. No one had known how long they had been down there, but the smell was potent enough that it didn’t even matter if it had only been a month or upwards of a year.  
  
Because of what Jo had expressed to him, Milton opted to take the living room floor in the house next door, and that decision sat even better with Jo because she knew Merle would be there to keep his eye on Milton.  
  
Twirling Jo around to face him, Rick lifted a hand and palmed her breast over her shirt, walking her back toward the bed as he claimed her lips with his. As she sank down to sit upon the bed, Jo pulled him down on top of her, welcoming the feel of his entire weight over her body, as they snuggled close for a moment, and only a moment.  
  
Their libidos quickly kicked into high gear and soon enough their hands and fingers were everywhere and their clothes we beginning to fall away from them like dying leaves from a tree in autumn.

 

* * *

  
After getting an unfortunate late start out the following morning, due to Morgan getting a wicked stomach ache that meant he had to spend some unavoidable time the bathroom, the group finally pulled away from the grey brick ranch just before ten in the morning. Because of how Morgan was feeling, he had switched places with Sam in his car; Sam now driving with Ana in the passenger seat while Morgan rested in the back with Milton. Other than that all the driving arrangements remained the same as the caravan of two cars and two trucks drove single file back up the 85 at no faster than 30 miles per hour.  
  
Any faster was just not feasible. There were too many abandoned cars scattered along the roadway they had to navigate around the closer they got to the city, although, most of those vehicles were headed away from the city instead of toward it.  
  
It reminded Rick of when he and the group from the Atlanta Camp had attempted to make their way to the CDC, when they were still naïve to the fact that everyone was infected; back when Lori was still his wife, and she, Carl, Glenn, Carol, Jackie and Dale were also alive, and Shane and Andrea were accounted for. It was before they had lost Sophia and before Hershel’s farm.  
  
It was crazy to think how much had changed and everything that had happened in the last year and a half. All those losses and gains boggled the mind sometimes and made Rick feel like he was looking in on someone else’s life, or he was watching a movie; that this couldn’t possibly be life now. Thoughts like those made him anxious, but all he had to do, like he was doing now, was look over at Jo, squeeze her hand and latch onto some optimism.  
  
They had each other, they had their friends — their _family_. They also knew Shane had Hope, or at least Shane had Hope when the message was left on that billboard, and they knew where they were headed.  
  
Nothing was going to keep them from going there. Nothing would stop them from their mission to get their daughter back. Nothing would stop them from making their bringing their family back together again.  
  
Soon, they were driving past Turner Field on their right, where the Atlanta Braves used to play and, the closer they got toward the center of the city, the surer of himself Rick felt about the decision to drive through the city instead of around it. It was, for a lack of a better word, dead. The traffic roads in where clearing up and there was little to nothing in their way. Hell, the sun was even shining above their heads to make it all feel picturesque.  
  
As they turned off the 85 to head more directly into the heart of the city, Rick lowered the car’s speed down to twenty miles an hour. Eventually he came to a stop under an underpass; trying to determine if the exact route they’d planned on taking really would be quicker and also wondering if it would have any obstacles for them to get around. Rick couldn’t help but think of coming into Atlanta on the back of horse and finding himself surrounded by a horde of walkers, and that wasn’t the kind of surprise he was looking forward to again any time soon.  
  
After a moment, he radioed Morgan to give him the heads up that they would be continuing forward as planned, and then he once more nodded over to Jo who rolled her window down and twirled her hand to let Merle know they were continuing on. As soon as he took his foot off the break and moved it to the gas pedal, the Ford Focus lurched forward.  
  
As Rick set the walkie-talkie down in the console between him and Jo, he reached out and took her hand in his. The two of them smiled at each other and, at the exact moment they looked over their shoulders to check on how Sophia and Mika were doing, it was too late to react to the large white van that came speeding up the on ramp and side-swiped their car.  
  
The sudden impact caused Rick to lose immediate control of the steering wheel as the entire car was spun around a few times before coming to a complete stop when it slammed into the median on Jo and Sophia’s side. Rick and Mika’s was intact, but they had all been lurched around so badly they were all dazed.  
  
Jo tried lifting her head toward the direction of Rick’s voice as he called out to her to check that she was okay. She tried to reply that she was, not registering the warm liquid rolling down the side of her face from her scalp from when her head hit the window beside her.  
  
“Sophia, Mika! You girls okay?” Rick’s voice rang out as he nervously tried to turn around in his seat.  
  
“Yeah,” Sophia’s weak response was. “My neck feels sore, though.”  
  
“I’m okay,” Mika answered, in a smaller voice that seemed quite shaken.  
  
Jo attempted to focus more on Rick as she looked in his direction, but her eyesight and the throbbing in her head was starting to grow.

The last thing she saw before she blacked out was two men in full, black tactical gear approaching their car with automatic weapons pointed at them while Rick began to reach for her.


	33. Reunited

_“Things aren’t the way they were before_  
_You wouldn’t even recognize me anymore_  
_Not that you knew me back then_  
_But it all comes back to me_  
_In the end.”_  
— Linkin Park

* * *

  
Jo could feel her body getting jostled around but the entire experience seemed secondhand; as if it was happening to someone else or that it wasn’t happening at all and she was merely dreaming. Everything was dark and quiet for a while, and there was nothing to think or worry about. It was kind of nice. But then sounds came back to her; muffled voices, feet crunching over what could be gravel or broken glass. She was too out of it to determine which. The voices, as they got louder, they also seemed angrier, and one in particular felt familiar. She knew she should know the voice, but who it belonged to was lost on her for the moment. Her mind was too busy fighting off consciousness. She just wanted to stay in the quiet darkness a little while longer where she felt safe and calm.  
  
_“Jo, come on; come back.”_  
  
Those words pierced into said consciousness and began to bring her back to reality as she tried to respond. All that came out at first was a simple “hmm” and she could feel her fingers moving.  
  
_“Baby, come on.”_  
  
There was that voice again. So soothing; like a warm, but rough, melody.  
  
Her mouth felt dry as her lips parted, and a considerable amount of light suddenly offended her sight as her eyelids were forced open.  
  
“Ungh,” Jo grunted, wincing. “…the fuck?”  
  
She heard a slightly relieved chuckle. “That’s my girl. It’s alright, babe. You’re gonna be alright.”  
  
Blinking, a blurred figure at her left began to take shape and she began to remember what happened, and that she was somewhere very different from where she had been. “What…where am I? Where…where’s Rick?”  
  
“I’m right here.” It was the voice that had been talking to her.  
  
Turning her head to her left, she winced in pain from the throbbing sensation that was starting to make its presence known. Both the ride side of her head and her right arm and shoulder felt so incredibly sore as she focused on Rick and began to smile through the pain when his face became clear to her.  
  
“Oh. Hey,” she muttered.  
  
“Hey,” he smiled back.  
  
“There you are.” Lifting her left hand up, she reached for his face but he just took it in his own hand, holding it against his chest as he cupped the left side of her face with his other hand.  
  
“You scared me. I almost thought I lost you.”  
  
“Where did I go?” Jo wondered. “Why do I—why am I hurting so bad?”  
  
“A van hit us, right into your side, spun us around and we slammed into the concrete barrier on the other side of the road. You passed out,” he informed.  
  
“How long was I out?” she asked, trying to sit up, but he urged her to stay down.  
  
“Two hours, tops. I’m not sure.”  
  
“Where are we?”  
  
“They call it The Commune,” Rick replied. “I don’t know what to make of it or them just yet.”  
  
Jo scanned her eyes around the room she was in. It was simple with a few pieces of furniture. She was lying in the middle of a king-sized bed. On the opposite wall was simple desk with a green chair and a flatscreen TV mounted on the wall above it. Immediately to the right of the desk was a window, as well as another window on the wall to her immediate left, behind Rick, where there was also a counter with a microwave and a mini fridge. On her immediate right, along the wall, was a tall dresser, a sink with a mirror above it, and a small enclosed room that was either a walk-in closet or a really small bathroom.  
  
“Is this a hotel room?”  
  
“Technically, yes.” Rick shifted, sitting on the edge of the bed she was lying in. “The people here, they took it a short time after the city was bombed. They’ve taken people in over the last year and a half, built a community here. There’s a courtyard in the middle of the building, which is protected. It’s really a good idea, a place like this. They’re the ones that crashed into us.”  
  
“Who?” Jo was still a bit disoriented.  
  
“The people here,” he clarified. “It was a few of them that had been out on supply run and they didn’t think anyone would be on the road when we were. They were speeding up the on ramp and, well, they hit us doing about sixty. The girls are fine, though Sophia might have whiplash. You might have a concussion. There’s a doctor here who checked on you, but he couldn’t determine much until you woke up.”  
  
“What—what about everyone else?” she asked.  
  
“Daryl’s outside the room, but everyone else is downstairs in the lobby. Waiting.”  
  
“For what?”  
  
“To find out if you’re okay.”  
  
Jo forced herself to sit up, swatting Rick’s further attempts to prevent her from doing so. “I’m not an invalid,” she insisted.  
  
“I just want you to take it easy.”  
  
Frowning, she looked down at her legs and then up at Rick again. “I felt like I was being moved around not long ago; like I was floating.”  
  
“Probably when we were carrying you in here.”  
  
“It felt like it just happened.”  
  
Rick smirked. He lifted a hand and brushed some hair off her face. “Yeah, shit like that happens when you’re unconscious. You lose all sense of time.” Scooting closer to her on the bed, Rick pulled his legs up and stretched them out in front of him, leaning his back up against the headboard and then taking her left hand in his right and resting it in his lap. Thumbing her wedding ring, he tilted his head back and stared over at the window next to the desk which revealed nothing of outside because the curtains were closed. “That happened to me in my coma.”  
  
“It did?”  
  
“I remembered Shane leaning over me, holding flowers in his hand, saying something. I forget what about now, but it made me laugh and I answered him. But when I looked to my right, the flowers he brought were there in a vase on the bedside table, and they were dead. They’d been dead for probably a week. Petals were fallen and Shane was nowhere to be seen. I must’ve come out of my coma a bit when he’d visited me, but was catatonic or something where I couldn’t respond right then and there. It was like I had some sort of delayed reaction and didn’t realize any time at all had passed. I didn’t even know where I was. I’d forgotten I’d been shot, although the soreness and the old bandage on my abdomen were telltale signs.”  
  
“I remember you telling me that part, about waking up.” Jo sighed, lifting her aching right arm up to press her hand gently upon her head where she was remembering the sensation of warm liquid rolling down the side of her face. It had clearly been blood from hitting her head on the window, but there was no blood there now. There were, however, a few stitches along the hairline of her scalp. “I can’t imagine how scary that must’ve been; basically going to sleep with the world as it was and then waking up to what it is now.”  
  
“It was. I had basically woken from a dream to find my life had become a nightmare.”  
  
They both fell silent for a while, with Rick turning his head and pressing his lips against her left temple. Jo leaned into the gesture and sighed with contentment. She was just happy to have him there with her and glad everyone was okay, especially the girls.  
  
After a few moments, there was a knock on the door and it opened without whoever it was waiting for permission to enter. Stepping inside, was a man in his late thirties or early forties with thinning, sandy blonde hair on his head and somewhat of a goatee growing in. He was wearing a plaid shirt and clean, khaki pants and looked rather unassuming as he turned and looked upon both Jo and Rick with a clipboard in his hands.  
  
The man smiled at them both. “Ahh, the patient awakes.”  
  
Jo made a face of immediate distrust of this new person literally and figuratively entering her life. Her reaction must’ve been noticed by Rick as he gestured up toward the man in question.  
  
“Jo, this is Dr. Trevitt. He’s the one that was looking in on you and stitched your head.”  
  
Dr. Trevitt smiled again and gave a small wave of his hand at Jo. “You can just call me Gavin. No point in formalities anymore.”  
  
“What kind of doctor were you before?” Jo wondered.  
  
“I was an oncologist as St. Ignatius.”  
  
“A cancer doctor.”  
  
“In layman’s terms, yes.” Sitting down on the other side of the bed from Rick and setting the clipboard down as well, he reached out a hand and held Jo’s chin between his thumb and index finger. Moving her head gently from side to side, he asked, “How are you feeling? Sore, I bet.”  
  
“My head’s pounding. My right shoulder and arm hurt.”  
  
She didn’t much care for him touching her, but she understood he was trying to help.  
  
“Well, nothing’s broken. I can tell you that for certain. Lift your arm and hold it out straight.”  
  
Jo did as asked, but keeping it elevated for too long was making her feel achier and she had to drop it back down.  
  
“On a scale of one to ten, how bad is the pain in your shoulder?”  
  
“An eight?”  
  
“And in your arm?”  
  
“Uh, a five or six, I guess.”  
  
Leaning forward, Gavin pushed her hair off her shoulder and back and peered behind her. “Rick, would you mind helping me lift her shirt up?”  
  
Rick hesitated but, when he made eye contact with the doctor, he nodded. He figured that if this helped the man determine if Jo was okay or not, he’d do what was needed. Grabbing the hem of her shirt on the left, he raised the material up with Gavin who grabbed from the right, and then watched as Gavin inspected Jo’s right shoulder blade and touched gently upon it. Even the slightest touch made her hiss in pain. Rick leaned back to get a look at the area as well and noticed the dark purple bruising that had begun to form.  
  
With concern suddenly plastered over his face, Rick brought his attention back up to the other man. “Is that bad?” he inquired, catching the nervous look from Jo’s eyes.  
  
Gavin leaned back, dropping her shirt down, and glanced between the pair but focused solely on Jo. “Your shoulder’s dislocated.”  
  
“Oh,” muttered Jo, as if she had just been told it was drizzling after expecting news of a hurricane.  
  
Nodding, Gavin turned his sight upon Rick. “I can take care of this now if you hold her body steady.”  
  
“Oh—okay.” Wrapping his arms around Jo’s waist, he pulled her more into to keep her torso stationary.  
  
He and Jo both watched as Gavin raised her arm up with his right hand, bracing it just under her elbow and then placing his left hand upon her shoulder and feeling around for the right spot to grip.  
  
“Take in a deep breath,” Gavin ordered. As soon as Jo did as instructed, he then added, “Now exhale just as deeply.”  
  
As soon as the breath left her body, Gavin jerked her arm forward very roughly and she let out a yelp of mild pain. It was followed by a popping sound in her shoulder, signifying that her arm had been returned properly into its socket. The pain she had been feeling immediately decreased, though it was still present. It just wasn’t as sore anymore.  
  
“Damn,” she mumbled and then let out a small chuckle. “Thank you.”  
  
Gavin nodded. “You’re welcome.” Looking over at the clipboard he briefly perused what had been written down on it in some sort of chicken scratch handwriting and then smirked. “Well, I think you’re out of the woods. The pain in your arm was coming from the shoulder. And your head will be fine. I doubt you’re concussed. You just hit your head pretty good and cut it open. I stitched you up and you’ll have a goose egg and some bruising for a few days to go along with that headache. I’ll give you some Tylenol and you should be fine.”  
  
“Should?” Rick questioned, not content with the slightest hint of doubt.  
  
“Yeah. I mean, I’m just a former oncologist working out of a former Red Roof Inn. I don’t exactly have medical equipment anymore to run extensive tests. St. Ignatius fell fast and was hit bad when the bombs were dropped on the city. I mean, there’s still a hospital that’s running, more or less nearby, but we try to avoid that place.”  
  
“It’s alright,” Jo insisted. “We’re used to making do with less.”  
  
“What’s wrong with the other hospital?” Rick wondered, his curiosity getting the better of him. “Is it overrun?”  
  
“It’s overrun by a bunch of _cops_. They run the place now. I don’t know if there are any doctors or nurses left in there, but we’ve seen movement; cops coming and going, bringing injured people in they find on the streets.”  
  
“That doesn’t sound so bad.”  
  
Gavin shrugged. “We never see those people leave. So, either every person taken in has died or, well, we don’t know.”  
  
Rick narrowed his gaze, trying to read the other man. There was clearly more to it on Gavin’s end. “You seem to take it personal,” he deduced.  
  
“One of our runners here was out scouting an abandoned strip mall for supplies with a few of the others. She got separated from the group at some point when a bunch of rotters came spilling out of the building. The others think she might’ve gotten injured or something. They heard her calling out to them, followed by some gunshots, and when they made their way back to her, a car with a white cross on the back window was driving away. The rotters were all dead and Joan was gone.”  
  
“Joan was the runner?” Jo clarified, trying to keep track of his recollection.  
  
Gavin nodded. “Her and I were—I cared about her. She was nice, funny. She could make a mean cup of noodles,” he joked, reminiscing. “It took a couple of days for the other runners to determine where she’d been taken, to Grady Memorial. They tried getting in but the cops there threatened to shoot anyone in the head that got any closer. Our people asked if Joan was there, and one of the cops said she was fine — she was healing from a sprained ankle. They claimed they had a doctor helping her and they were protecting her.”  
  
“You don’t think they really were?” Rick shifted on the bed, watching as Gavin stood up with his clipboard.  
  
“I don’t know. The others never went back. They didn’t have much of a choice to contest what the cops told them,” Gavin answered, looking briefly down toward the floor. “The cops had on full riot gear with imposing automatic weapons. Our runners typically carry a few handguns, but mostly large knives. Ammo is in short supply these days, you know?”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
Letting out a sigh, Gavin turned his frown upside down and forced a change in subject. “Anyway, you should be better soon enough. I’ll go get you that Tylenol and if you want you can head down to the lobby to rejoin your friends. I’m sure Harry will want to talk to you.”  
  
As he made his way toward the door, Gavin was stopped in his tracks when Rick stood up and moved to walked over toward him.  
  
“Who’s Harry?”  
  
Gavin turned around and smirked. “Our fearless leader.”

 

* * *

  
Slowly walking down the hall, Rick and Jo passed the defunct elevator, while Daryl followed at a few paces behind them and Gavin at a few paces in front of them. As they reached the end of the hall, the latter pushed open the door to the stairwell and gestured for Rick, Jo and Daryl to go first, but neither moved. The trio just stood and stared at the doctor, waiting for him to continue in front of them.  
  
Conceding to their clear insistence, Gavin gave a small smile and walked forward, holding the door open so it didn’t swing back in their faces once he was through. Rick reached out and took it, allowing Jo to go before him and then Daryl took it. The archer gave his bearded friend a nod to let him know he could go ahead, and that he would take the rear still; just another silent conversation to add to their repertoire.  
  
Both Rick and Daryl looked both up and down the center of the stairwell, keeping a keen eye out for any discrepancies. Daryl was still lugging his crossbow around and wouldn’t allow anyone to take it off him without a fight; not after just getting it the day before. Rick had been the same, holding onto his Colt and his machete; both of which were still secured on either side of his gun belt in their respective holsters. If something were to go down in the stairwell, they were armed. And they could be dangerous.  
  
After only two flights of stairs, they reached the bottom and Gavin pulled the door open, ducking out into yet another hallway. Sidling up to her left, Rick took Jo’s hand in his and gave it a gentle squeeze as they continued to follow the doctor. At the end of the hall, it opened up to the lobby where the rest of Team Family could be found, lounging around with plenty of unknown faces.  
  
Karen looked up from the couch she was sitting on and immediately jumped to her feet to walk up to Jo and Rick. “Oh, thank God you’re okay,” she vented. “We were so worried.” When she took Jo’s available hand and gave it a squeeze, Jo winced. “I’m sorry. You’ve gotta be pretty sore still.”  
  
“I am,” Jo admitted. “But I’ll live.”  
  
Morgan walked up next with Tyreese in tow, and both men eyed Rick carefully as Gavin took the hint and wandered off toward the unknowns.  
  
“Have you gotten a feel for these people?” Rick inquired in a low voice. “Do you think we can trust ‘em?”  
  
“Most of them, yes, I think we can,” Morgan relayed. “There are a few families here, Rick, along with a few nomadic types; those who lost everyone and everything they held dear.”  
  
Rick nodded, taking this in as he directed his gaze more toward Tyreese. “What about you? What do you think? Did you get to check the perimeter at all?”  
  
“I think these people are genuine. They’ve offered us food and water while we’ve been waiting,” came Tyreese’s reply.  
  
“Yeah, well, those monsters at Terminus offered us food, too,” Jo quipped; however her tone was void of emotion as she warily looked upon the faces of the people she didn’t know.  
  
“Chocolate chip cookies,” Tyreese clarified. “Keebler.”  
  
“We have our own food and water,” Rick remarked. “Let’s not become beholden to these people just yet.”  
  
“They just had their doctor take care of Jo,” Daryl commented, picking at his thumbnail with his teeth. “I’d say we’re a little bit beholden already.”  
  
“No,” Rick shook his head. “They crashed into _us._ They _owed_ us that.”  
  
“Your name’s Rick, right?” a voice called out.  
  
Rick looked around Tyreese, Karen and Morgan toward the small group of people standing at or leaning against the check-in counter of the hotel lobby. Seated on top was menacing sort of fellow in his early to mid-30s, with thin brown hair that had a section missing toward the front, as if he had started to shave his head and then gave up. He looked a bit dirty, wearing a ratty army green tank top, dog tags and patchy facial hair.  
  
“I didn’t get your name earlier when you came busting in here with your lady friend being whisked upstairs like she was the fucking Queen of England,” the man continued. “I had to get your name from one of your friends.”  
  
Rick stepped past Tyreese and Morgan, taking up a defensive stance. “Yeah, my name’s Rick,” he confirmed. Walking forward a bit more, he directly eyed the other man as he tilted his head to the side; one of his tells that he was pissed, meant business, and/or shit was about to go down. “Are we gonna have a problem here?”  
  
The other man threw his hands up, level with his shoulders, as if surrendering. With a sly and toothy grin, he slid down from the counter and landed firmly on his feet. He couldn’t possibly weigh any more than a buck fifty and stood at least six foot three. “No problem here,” he assured, although the look he gave suggested he was nothing but trouble. “Just getting a feel for y’all; figuring out who the loose cannons are, y’know? I got keep my family safe and whatnot.”  
  
Rick narrowed his gaze, briefly looking around the lobby before settling back on tall, lean man. “You have a family here?”  
  
The man held his arms out at his side, maintaining his grin. “Everybody here is my family,” he replied, gesturing to the unknown faces in the lobby.  
  
Pursing his lips together, Rick nodded. He glanced over his shoulder at Jo, Daryl, Tyreese, Morgan and Karen, and then panned down toward Sophia and Mika who were huddled together on one of the lobby couches. Within the same area, sitting close together, was the rest of his group — Merle, Sam, Ana, Tara and Milton — watching the exchange between both men. Rick indicated them all with a simple, but possessive, glance. “And this is my family.” Taking a step back, he placed a hand gently onto Jo’s right shoulder and had her move to stand beside him before pointing to his chest to reintroduce himself. “I’m Rick Grimes, and this is my wife, Jo.” He pointed at toward the couches next. “Those two are our daughters, Sophia and Mika. The rest are my brothers and my sisters.” Flashing his own grin, Rick looked back at the other man with a look which was laced with a mixture of mischief and menace. “And who the hell are you?”  
  
The man took a step closer. “Raffy. It’s a nickname. It’s all you need to know.”  
  
“And what do you do here, _Raffy_?”  
  
“Guest relations.”  
  
There was a small eruption of laughter from the unknowns, causing Rick and his people to look around and tense up. Their last experience with new people had ended terribly, including the loss of their own, and they weren’t ready to let that happen again, so they were all going into this with their walls up high.  
  
“What about you, Rick Grimes?” Raffy questioned, clearly still amused with himself, while flashing the occasional — and slightly lecherous — glance over at Jo; all of which did nothing to calm Rick’s nerves. “What do _you_ do?”  
  
Keeping his cool as best he could, Rick stared back with a deadpan expression; keeping his voice steady and even. “Whatever I have to do.”  
  
As Raffy merely snickered, Mika got up from the couch and tugged on Jo’s hand, distracting her from the tension.  
  
“I need to use the bathroom,” the ten year old girl asked of her adoptive mother.  
  
Casting a brief glance over at Rick who was still staring Raffy down, and then a glance to the hall she had just come from, Jo noticed a bathroom sign outside a door which had been meant as a public restroom facility for women. “Alright, come on. I’ll take you.”  
  
Giving Morgan a nod of her head and a silent acknowledgement of where she was going, he nodded back in understanding along with a look that suggested he would let Rick know. With that exchange, Jo led Mika halfway down the hall and pushed the door open. As they headed inside, Jo pointed toward one of the stalls for Mika to go into while she turned and looked at her reflection in the mirror above the counter which held three separate sinks.  
  
She frowned when she saw herself. She noticed the stitches at her hairline right away, but also the purple bruising around the stitches and the fact that the skin there was considerably elevated from the goose egg Gavin had informed her she would have for a few days. There was dried blood matted into her hair so she turned on the faucet, thankful to discover there was running water. Cupping some water into her hand, she lowered her face and then splashed it up into her hair to try and clean some of the blood out.  
  
“Are we going to stay here?” Mika called out from her stall.  
  
“I don’t think so,” Jo replied. “We’re going to DC, remember? The sign from Shane said that’s where he went with Hope.”  
  
“If we don’t find Hope there, can we come back here?”  
  
Jo straightened up, turned off the faucet and turned around to face the closed door of the stall Mika was still in. “Why do you wanna be here?”  
  
“They have a pool.”  
  
Unable to contain her amusement at the simplistic answer, Jo let out a small chuckle. “Well, I don’t know how much damage our car received when we were hit. If it needs to be fixed, we might have to stay at least a day. I’m not sure. If we do, maybe we can see about you taking a swim. How’s that sound?”  
  
The toilet flushed and the lock on the stall door slid open just as Mika stepped out with a smile on her face. “I don’t have a bathing suit, but I would like to do that very much.”  
  
“Well, you can just go in your clothes. We have extras in the car that we got from that consignment shop.”  
  
Stepping aside and watching Mika walk up to the sink to rinse her hands, the sudden commotion of heightened, angry shouts echoed down the hall and found its way into the bathroom despite the door being closed.  
  
“What was that?” Mika wondered nervously, turning and looking up at Jo.  
  
Jo shook her head. “I dunno. Come on.”  
  
Holding open the door with her left hand, to avoid using her sore right arm, Jo let Mika out first and then looked up the hall toward the lobby once she was out of the bathroom, too. Her green eyes immediately focused on the sight of Rick and Raffy in each other’s face, growling at each other. About what exactly, Jo was unsure.  
  
Mika followed as Jo ran back to the lobby just as Daryl walked up to Rick and gripped his shoulder, reining him back in; telling him it wasn’t worth the fight. Taking a hesitant step backward, Rick looked to Daryl and nodded, before noticing Jo over his shoulder. As she approached him, she grabbed hold of his hand and gave it a squeeze.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
“This asshole doesn’t know when to shut up. That’s what happened,” Rick answered, loud enough for Raffy to hear him.  
  
“If your fuckwit husband here ain’t satisfying ya, baby, I’d more than gladly let you ride my face,” Raffy lewdly commented toward Jo, grabbing his dick through his pants as he spoke while chuckling at what he considered humor.  
  
That was the straw that broke the camel’s back, though, for Rick. Whipping his head toward the taller man, he stalked right up and slammed his fist square into Raffy’s nose without notice. Raffy went down like a sack of potatoes and Rick was on him like lightning. Sitting on his chest, Rick continued to punch Raffy in both the face and the chest, with Raffy getting a few minor swipes in. The Commune group began to rally behind their own while Tyreese and Daryl both tried pulling Rick back, but the adrenaline coursing through Rick’s veins was allowing him to easily shrug both his friends off as he maintained the upper hand in this fight.  
  
When a blonde woman in her mid to late fifties came hurrying through the front door and into the lobby, several heads turned.  
  
“Stop it! Both of you, right now!” she demanded. “I said stop!”  
  
As Rick looked up long enough to see who was yelling at him, Raffy got in an uppercut punch to Rick’s nose, causing Rick to drop over to the side on his hands and knees. The second Raffy slipped a knife out of his back pocket and attempted to attack Rick, Jo darted forward and slipped Rick’s Colt Python from his holster and aimed the gun directly at Raffy’s head.  
  
“Do it,” she dared, stepping forward more and pressing the end of the barrel against the tip of Raffy’s bloody nose. “Give me a reason to shoot you.”  
  
Despite her sore right arm, she was able to maintain a steady aim.  
  
“Jo, don’t,” the older blonde woman pleaded, holding her hands out and stepping between Raffy and Jo. She pushed the gun away and kicked Raffy with her boot while maintaining her gaze solely on Jo. “Put the gun down. This fight is over.”  
  
Lifting her gaze away from Raffy, Jo eyed the older woman with a scowl. “Who are _you_?”  
  
“I’m Harry.”  
  
“ _You’re_ Harry?”  
  
“I am.” Turning toward a few of the people from The Commune, Harry gestured to Raffy. “Take him to his room to cool down.”  
  
“Yes, ma’am,” a few of them obliged, helping Raffy to his feet and leading him off down the hall at the opposite side of the lobby.  
  
“And bring me his knife.”  
  
One of the Communers backtracked, holding Raffy’s knife out to Harry, who took the blade and tucked it into the gun belt at her waist. As she watched the others receding down the hall, she turned her attention back toward Jo, Rick and the rest of Team Family. “I’m terribly sorry about Raffy,” she apologized. “He’s a bit of a loose cannon sometimes and has next to no filter.”  
  
“Why keep him around?” Rick asked, sitting up on his knees as he tipped his head back slightly. Blood was dripping from his nose and running into his mouth. Spitting some of it away, he turned as he let Jo help him up to his feet while placing his gun back into its holster.  
  
“He’s fiercely loyal.”  
  
“So, you’re the leader?” he wondered further, wiping some of the blood away with his fingers and looking briefly at it.  
  
“I am.”  
  
“Some place you’re running here,” Merle piped up sarcastically, from the side of his group where he’d been leaning against one of the lobby’s square columns.  
  
“Well, you know what they say: when the cat’s away, the mice will play.”  
  
“Listen, we don’t care about your setup here. A few of your loyal subjects crashed into one of our cars on the road, injured Jo here,” Tyreese remarked. “We just want our car fixed so we can get back on our way.”  
  
“And if we can’t fix our car, you owe us a new one, complete with a full tank of gas,” Rick demanded as he wiped his hand on the side of his pants. He steeled his gaze as he looked upon the older blonde, clenching his jaw as well and ignoring the soreness from the one or two punches Raffy had managed to get in before Harry arrived. “We’ll give you until tomorrow at daybreak.”  
  
Harry smirked, looking back at Rick as she placed her hands on her hips. “Why the rush?”  
  
“We got somewhere we need to be,” he replied. “People we need to get to.”  
  
“You’d be much safer here than on the road.”  
  
“We can handle it,” Jo spoke back up.  
  
“Well, you’re welcome to stay here as long as you need to. We have plenty of rooms to choose from.” Harry gestured toward the courtyard. “We’ve been here almost a year and a half. We took this place a few months after Atlanta was bombed. We cleaned it up and secured it. We made it safe and we made it home. We even have a vegetable garden in the courtyard. We don’t have electricity but we have running water. We have food and shelter. Everyone here is like family and you could be part of this, too.”  
  
“We said we have someplace we need to be,” Jo insisted. Narrowing her gaze at Harry, she tilted her head slightly, a la Rick.  
  
“And the last time we were invited to stay somewhere with a self-sustaining group of people such as yourselves, the people there turned out to be the worst kind of people you can imagine and it cost us one of our own,” Rick remarked. “So you’ll have to excuse us if we don’t exactly trust this place or the people in it.”  
  
Harry smirked and held her hands up as if to surrender. “Oh, don’t worry. All of us here have witnessed some truly terrifying things out there,” she gestured over her shoulder toward the doors, “and I’m not just talking about the dead rising.  
  
“How’d you know my name?” Jo questioned suddenly.  
  
Harry caught her eye and looked confused for a moment. “Hmm?”  
  
“When you came in here, you called me by name,” Jo explained. “How do you know my name? Did someone radio it to you over a walkie-talkie or debrief you before you walked in?”  
  
Her face taking on an expression that was a mix of both amusement and sadness, Harry dropped her hands back to her hips. “You don’t remember me, do you?”  
  
“Uh…no? _Should_ I?”  
  
Just as Harry was about to respond, a young man in his early to mid-twenties, with dirty blonde hair came sauntering into the lobby from outside with a small group of people in tow. They each had large blades strapped to the belts they wore, as well as a few carrying small handguns. They were all mid-conversation, with a few chuckles being thrown around among them, when they stopped; noticing the gathering of bodies in the lobby of those faces that were familiar to them and those that weren’t.  
  
When the blonde man’s green eyes fell upon Jo, his entire face lit up like a kid on Christmas.  
  
“Jo!”  
  
In a heartbeat, he ran up to her and threw his arms around her waist, holding her as tightly as possible and burying his face into her shoulder. The members from Team Family tensed at the greeting; either sitting or standing where they were in confused silence.  
  
As soon as the young man pulled back and Jo was able to finally get a look at whom he was, her jaw practically dropped and happy tears almost immediately lined her eyes.  
  
“Oh my God, you’re alive!” she cried, her tears falling down her face as she pulled the young man back in for another embrace.  
  
“So are you!” he exclaimed, cupping her face in his hands as he emitted a chuckle of relief through his own tears. “Holy shit. I figured you were dead. I was able to make it to your house after a couple of weeks with some friends, but you were gone. I found Oscar, though. He bit one of my friends. I had to put him down. I’m sorry.”  
  
Jo shook her head, still a bit stunned by this reunion that confused the rest of her group. “No, it’s okay,” she assured. “He got sick in the beginning and I couldn’t bring myself to kill him, so I left him in the bedroom.” She frowned apologetically at him and added, “I’m sorry about your friend. If I’d put Oscar down myself your friend would still be alive.”  
  
The young man shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not,” he insisted. “That’s not your fault, though.”  
  
“It kinda is.”  
  
“No, it isn’t. This world sucks. These things just happen now.”  
  
As Jo just stared happily back at him, she soon began to realize there were curious gazes directed at the two of them. Emitting an embarrassed laugh, she turned and gestured to Rick; grabbing him by the wrist and pulling him over.  
  
“This is my husband, Rick Grimes,” Jo gestured to Rick who seemed a little apprehensive.  
  
“Your _husband_?” the young man repeated with a raise of his eyebrow and an impish smirk.  
  
Rolling her eyes, Jo smirked back and then looked from Jo to the young man. “Rick, this is my brother, Finn Autry.”  
  
Rick’s apprehension quickly dissipated. His shoulders drooped as he let go of the tension that had built up and even a smile began to appear on his lips. “It’s nice to meet you,” he commented, offering his hand to the younger man. “Jo’s mentioned you a few times. Kinda feel like I know you already.”  
  
Finn accepted the handshake and smiled back. “Wish I could say the same, but we’ve got the time to do that now, don’t we?” With his free hand, he gripped Rick’s shoulder. Then, teasingly, “I really liked the first husband, so you got some big shoes to fill.”  
  
“I’ll try my best.”  
  
Jo grinned from ear to ear to see the two most important men in her life meeting and already getting off to a great start with each other. She then got her brother’s attention and gestured to everyone else in her group, pointing to them one at a time. “Finn, that’s Sam and Ana; behind me is Tyreese, Karen, Morgan…Daryl, and his brother Merle with the homemade bayonet for a right hand. He’s kind of an asshole, but he’s our asshole.”  
  
“Hey,” Merle muttered, as if taking offense, but his tone was anything but offended. The slight mischievous look in his eyes said as much.  
  
“Said with love, Merle,” she replied. She then continued to make introductions. “That’s Tara, Milton, and last but not least, we have Sophia and Mika, our adoptive daughters.”  
  
Finn smiled upon each face and then chuckled upon hearing Jo had adoptive daughters. “So, I have two nieces, then.”  
  
“Three, actually,” Rick informed. “We have an eight-month-old, too. Her name’s Hope, and she’s with a friend, headed up to DC, which is where we were headed earlier when one of your guys slammed into our car.”  
  
Finn frowned and focused on Jo’s bruising and stitches along her hairline. “That my boys’ handiwork?”  
  
“My shoulder was dislocated, too,” Jo remarked.  
  
“God _dammit_ ,” Finn cussed, turning to look back at a few of his own group that had been in the lobby the entire time. “Which one of you fuckwits did this to my sister?”  
  
“I said I was sorry earlier,” remarked a man in his late twenties or earlier thirties with shaggy blonde hair and a full beard.  
  
“Did he say he was sorry?” Finn asked his sister.  
  
Jo shrugged. “I was unconscious for the last two hours.”  
  
“You were— _Milo_. You literally knocked my sister unconscious and she didn’t get to hear you apologize.”  
  
“Sorry, Finn’s sister.”  
  
“It’s Jo, and thank you,” she answered the man named Milo.  
  
Finn shook his head and chuckled, casting glances between Jo, Rick and the rest of her group. “There a lot more of us than there are of you, so I’ll just rattle off a few names to get you better acquainted for now.” He turned and began pointing at his people. “Well, now you know Milo. He’s the driver for our secondary group of runners because he’s a piss poor shot with a handgun and can cut himself on a knife just by looking at it.”  
  
“Fuck off, Finn,” Milo retorted with a snicker.  
  
Finn merely grinned. “The old man, here, is John,” he gestured to a man in his mid to late forties with floppy brown hair and wearing an army jacket. He was one of the few that had come into the lobby with Finn and seemed to be the only one from The Commune brandishing an assault rifle instead of just a handgun or melee weapon.  
  
“Not too old to beat your ass,” John quipped, waving politely at Team Family.  
  
Finn ignored the comment and rattled off a few more names, pointing to each person as he went along. “Then, there’s Lena, Patrick, Jamal, Nicole, Gordy, Piper, Hank, Joshua and that pretty thing hiding behind the check-in counter is my girl, Jen.”  
  
Waving over to Team Family with a shy smile was a young blonde in her early to mid-twenties like Finn. Among all the faces, the women stood out. Nicole was a thin redhead who looked as if she’d never had to get her hands dirty, Piper was a short brunette who couldn’t be any older than seventeen and Lena, another brunette, seemed shady. There was something about her gaze that was off-putting and made Jo want to keep her at a safe distance.  
  
“One more,” Harry piped up as another woman sauntered into the lobby, jangling car keys from her fingers.  
  
The woman in question had smooth, dark skin and wore her hair in dreadlocks with a scarf as a sort of headband. Strapped to her back was a scabbard containing a katana and as soon as she realized there were more people in the lobby than she was probably used to, her free hand immediately went to the hilt of her weapon and glared around at everyone with trepidation.  
  
“Took you long enough to park,” Finn teased.  
  
“There were walkers on the street. They came into the parking lot so I took care of them,” she replied, still keeping a wary eye on Team Family.  
  
“It’s alright. At ease, soldier,” Finn chuckled, gesturing to Jo. “This is my sister, Jo, and her husband, Rick, and the rest of their people. Milo hit their car apparently which, if you ask me, is kismet. I never would’ve known my sister was still alive.” He turned and eyed Jo, placing a hand on her arm and smiling warmly at her. Then, he gestured to the newly returned woman. “Jo, Rick, everyone else, this is our samurai queen, Michonne.”  
  
Michonne’s gaze softened as she rolled her eyes at Finn. “I told you not to call me that, because I’d do _what_ to you?”  
  
“Cut off my balls with your sword and feed them to the dead?”  
  
“Exactly,” Michonne smirked. Glancing between both Rick and Jo, she stepped up to them and offered her hand. “Hello. Sorry Milo hit you.” Her dark eyes wandered up to Jo’s goose egg and stitches. “That from the accident or something else?”  
  
“The accident.”  
  
Michonne shook her head. “He was probably listening to Metallica in the van again. When he has the music up, he forgets how fast he’s going.”  
  
“I said I was sorry,” Milo insisted, walking forward a bit as he shoved his hands into his back pockets. “And I wasn’t listening to Metallica.”  
  
Michonne, Finn, Rick and Jo all looked at him.  
  
Milo shrugged sheepishly. “It was Pantera.”  
  
Both groups fell silent, with the majority of introductions made, until Harry stepped up with a smile and clamped a hand over Finn’s back.  
  
“Why don’t we get Jo’s people something to eat and then we can all catch up,” she suggested.  
  
Jo folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her gaze at Harry. “You still never answered how you knew my name, and why would you think I would know who you are?”  
  
Finn looked between both women before settling his gaze on Jo. His expression became slightly serious. “Jo,” he began. “Harry’s our mom.”


	34. Amends

_“I think in most relationships that have problems, there's fault on both sides. And in order for it to work, there has to be some common ground that's shared. And it's not just one person making amends.”_ _—_ Steve Carell

* * *

  
Four pairs of eyes looked awkwardly between each other in what had been, once upon a time, the office of the former hotel’s manager. It was silent; no one was speaking, but that silence spoke volumes. Sitting there, glaring like a petulant child at the woman who was apparently her mother, Jo was not completely wrong in expressing herself in such a way. The woman in question _had_ abandoned her and her brother both and had no part to play in either of their lives except their conception, gestation and subsequent births; beyond that, they were motherless in Jo’s opinion. They had had their father and that had been enough.  
  
Or so Jo thought.  
  
“Is anyone going to say anything or are we just going to sit here like this for the rest of the night?” Finn wondered aloud, leaning against the wall to Rick and Jo’s immediate right.  
  
Rick looked at the young man who was technically his brother-in-law now and shrugged before glancing at Jo’s profile. He noted she was glaring daggers at her mother, who was sitting in the chair behind the desk across from them, but he wasn’t about to say anything. It wasn’t his place to offer his own two cents; he was simply there with her in support for this tense reunion.  
  
“Yes, let’s talk about why the hell you’re here with her,” Jo retorted, still not looking away from Harry, who was now feeling a bit anxious under Jo’s scrutinizing gaze. “She’s had no part to play in our lives beyond bringing us into this world. The best thing she ever did was leave us with dad. She doesn’t deserve to be a part of our lives in this world either.”  
  
“Well, I don’t think that way,” Finn replied, folding his arms across his chest. “I believe, if anything, this is a time for second chances.”  
  
“No,” Jo insisted, finally bringing her gaze away from Harry and instead upon her brother. “There are no second chances.”  
  
“If it makes you feel any better, he didn’t seek me out. It was the other way around,” Harry offered.  
  
“No, it doesn’t.” And, like that, Jo’s eyes were back upon the older blonde. “You gave up the right to be in our lives. You can’t just come back into them.”  
  
“I get you're angry at me for leaving and staying away for so long, but you were better off without me then. I was not fit to be a mother. Leaving you both in your father’s care was the best thing, I agree. That’s why I made that decision. I knew he was a good man and would do for you what I couldn’t,” Harry began, leaning forward on the desk. “I was a terrible alcoholic who wasn’t able to deal with a lifetime of personal issues. Things happened to me when I was growing up and into my adulthood I couldn’t handle, so I turned to booze and even hard drugs when the moment seemed fit. When I was pregnant with the both of you,” she looked between both her children, “I forced myself to stay clean. I couldn’t bring myself to knowingly risk your health in the womb, but as soon as you were both born, I allowed those vices back into my life. It took me years to get my head straight. Therapy eventually helped me turn my life around. It helped me acknowledge the bad things done to me and the bad things I’d done as a result. I’m not saying my past excuses anything I did, but if I didn’t leave, if I’d been in your lives, you wouldn’t have grown up into the wonderful people I know you grew up into. That’s on your father. I know that. And I never stopped appreciating him for being that person.”  
  
Jo’s eyes narrowed. She had never seen a picture of her mother. If her father had one, he kept it hidden and to himself. Lord knows she snooped the house all over while growing up, wondering what her mother looked like and if she looked like her at all. Sometimes, she had fantasized about how her life might’ve been better if her mother reappeared and took her away whenever she got mad at her father, but then she remembered the truth of her mother purposely staying away.  
  
Now, here Harry was; Harriet Marie Bergdorf, to be exact. That was her name. Jo had known that much. It had been on her birth certificate, after all.  
  
It was difficult to stare at this woman in front of her, because their looks were so similar, down to the same face shape, blonde hair, green eyes, nose and lips. It was quite eerie, to be honest. For Jo, it was like getting a glimpse of what she’d look like in another twenty to twenty-five years. It made having a face to place her anger and resentment upon that much harder. She didn’t hate herself, so wanting to hate someone who looked like her felt awkward.  
  
“Why did you seek Finn out?”  
  
“To be honest, I was seeking _you_ out.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
Harry sighed, flexing her fingers anxiously. “Because I already knew where to find Finn,” she answered. “I’d been in contact with him for the last few years, and I couldn’t reach him anymore once the cell towers went down. I knew he would go to one of two places: your father’s house or yours. Your house was closer to get to, so I went there first.”  
  
“You were at my house?” Jo demanded.  
  
“No. I never made it there. There was a herd just east of Decatur, which is where I was coming from. So I went south and made my way toward the city.”  
  
“She literally ran into me,” Finn commented, a smirk playing at his lips. “She was running down the 20, near Panthersville, with a rifle in her hands looking like a hot mess with about twenty walkers on her trail. My friends and I had just gotten onto the 20 from Candler Road. Our plan was to keep going south toward Macon and beyond that who knows. And there she was, running down the road, flagging us down for help.”  
  
“It was kismet,” Harry smiled faintly, looking over her shoulder at her son.  
  
“Wait, you’ve been in contact with each other for a few _years_ now? What—have you just been pen pals or have you actually met up?”  
  
“It was after I graduated high school. I asked dad if he had her address or number. He did, so he gave it to me, asking if I was sure and to not get my hopes up. But I needed to meet her.”  
  
“Why didn’t you tell me about it?”  
  
“Because any time I broached the subject you went off on a rant about how she wasn’t worth our time, wherever she was. You hated her and I figured it would just make you angrier. So I said nothing.”  
  
“If you don’t mind me asking,” Rick piped up after remaining quiet, “didn’t you ever consider coming back into their lives, even if to just send a birthday card? I mean, I can understand you had your demons that would’ve been toxic for them to be around, but did you ever think about them or want to know what they were doing with their lives? I mean, speaking as a parent, I can’t imagine being completely detached from my children. Even after you sought help and got on a better path, you didn’t think to maybe pick up the phone and see if making amends was possible?”  
  
Harry glanced at Rick and then down at her fingers. The way she continued to flex them and pick anxiously at her fingernails was reminiscent of Daryl when he was craving a cigarette. Rick couldn’t help but wonder if that’s all that was — her craving for nicotine. Maybe the situation at hand was making her so tense that she was wishing for an alcohol fix or something harder to take the edge off. She was a self-proclaimed recovering addict, apparently.  
  
“I did check in, once in awhile, but with their father. I called him around their birthdays, or Christmas, asking how they were and if they were okay. He’d give me a brief update; like when they graduated high school or college, when Jo got married.”  
  
“Did dad give you my address?” Jo asked. “Is that how you knew where I lived.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Jo huffed and shook her head. “He could’ve told me.”  
  
“You would’ve just gotten angry,” Finn contested.  
  
“So? I still deserved the right to know that she was inquiring about me; about us both. I deserved to know you had this happy family reunion going with her, regardless if I got angry about it or not. That wasn’t your decision to make. How do you know that I didn’t want to meet her after all this time? I could’ve gotten all this off my chest a lot sooner and put it behind me for good or, hell, made amends. It was not your choice. It was not your decision to keep this from me.”  
  
“Well, I thought I was doing you a favor. Your life with Oscar and your job was going well. You seemed happy and well-adjusted enough in your life without her. I figured why ruin a good thing? You didn’t need her, you said so yourself.”  
  
“A daughter _always_ needs her mother!” Jo shouted, surprising herself a little by her outburst. Reeling herself in and trying to get her temper in check, she took a steadying breath and continued. “Do you not understand how hard it was for me growing up without one? All those things I needed from a woman’s perspective? I only really had Grandma Autry. Aunt Jemma and Aunt Joanie were busy with their own children and lives to be bothered with my issues. Don’t get me wrong; I loved grandma and she was the best, but it wasn’t the same.”  
  
“And I wish I could’ve been there. I wish I could’ve been the mother you deserved,” Harry looked between both Jo and Finn, “the mother you _both_ deserved.”  
  
“You’re here now,” Finn assured as he stepped forward and placed a hand his mother’s shoulder.  
  
Harry found solace in the gesture, reaching her own hand up and covering his with it. “You would’ve been worse off with me. You would’ve grown to hate me more than you do now,” she said to Jo, mostly. She shrugged. “I did what I had to do, and even though I regret being the person I was then, I do not regret the choices I made to leave you two behind with your father. I would do it again in a heartbeat if it meant you would grow up the same; healthy, well-rounded, strong and loving.”  
  
Jo was having a hard time finding any more faults in her mother. She had admitted to her wrongdoings and had justifiable excuses. What was worse was that Jo knew she had a good life growing up, even without her mother present. She knew, by what Harry told her, that having a mother who was an alcoholic and addicted to drugs constantly present in her life would’ve had a worse impact on her life. Hell, Jo might’ve grown up and turned to the same vices as her mother to deal _with_ her mother, thereby perpetuating the cycle.  
  
Leaning back in her chair, Jo looked over at Rick and Rick, sensing her gaze, looked back. He offered a supportive smile and squeezed her hand.  
  
“I’m not saying I forgive you,” Jo began. “However, I can understand why you left and stayed away, and…I’m glad you did…for our benefit.” She lifted her green eyes and glanced up at her brother.  
  
“Thank you,” Harry replied.  
  
There was a moment of awkward silence hanging in the air again until Finn cleared his throat.  
  
“Will you stay?” he asked of his sister. “I mean, will you stay here with us? We have more than enough room for your entire group.”  
  
Jo frowned and looked down at her lap. “I wish I could say yes, but I can’t. We need to find our daughter. She’s out there on the road with our friend, headed for DC. That’s our priority.”  
  
“No, I know, I was just…we just found you.”  
  
Rick leaned forward. “Why don’t you come with us?” He gestured between Jo and himself.  
  
“Yeah,” Jo agreed. “We should stick together from here on out. You should come with us.”  
  
Finn sighed deeply. “We can’t leave the others behind here. We made this place. The people here, we rely on each other. And Jen…I can’t leave her and I don’t want to risk her life by taking her on the road. We’re safe here. We have shelter, food, protection. Out there is like Russian roulette. You can get killed at any moment.”  
  
Jo smiled sadly. “Then we’re at an impasse; we can’t stay and you won’t leave.”  
  
“If you find your daughter — _when_ you find your daughter — come back here,” Harry suggested. “Bring your daughter and your friend back here, if you can. Your daughter should grow up in a home, some place safe, and you can have that here.”  
  
Rick and Jo looked at each other.  
  
“When we find her, if she’s alive or not, we’ll do what we can to return. Whatever the outcome is when we get to DC. If we find her and she’s alive and well, or if we learn she didn’t make it, we’ll be back.” Jo gripped Rick’s hand tight.  
  
“I hope you find her,” Finn added. “I’d really like to meet my niece. You know…the one you actually gave birth to and didn’t just adopt.” Then with a distant look in his eyes, he let out a small laugh. “Dad would’ve spoiled all of them regardless of blood.”  
  
Jo couldn’t help herself. She smiled chuckled to and then gestured toward her brother with a bob of her head. “Yeah, he liked taking in strays; animals and people alike.”  
  
“How’s your arm feeling?” Harry asked, changing the subject, but not necessarily on purpose.  
  
“I’ve dealt with worse physical pain, but I wouldn’t say no to some Ibuprofen right about now,” she responded. “Gavin was supposed to get me some, but then Raffy happened and you two walked in and one thing led to another and here we are, so I never got to take anything.”  
  
Harry pushed her chair back and stood up. “I’ll have him bring you something a little better than Ibuprofen.”  
  
“Nothing too strong, if you don’t mind,” she recommended. “I don’t mind a little ache. I just don’t want to feel loopy.”  
  
Harry nodded and took her leave from the other three in the office. As soon as she was gone, Jo and Finn immediately looked right at each other and, for a moment, Rick thought they had some sort of telepathic sibling connection going on. He wasn’t too far off, though. They were both thinking the same thing, more or less.  
  
“See? She’s not that bad, is she?”  
  
“No, I guess not. But you know how I am with grudges,” Jo replied without missing a beat.  
  
“You hold them forever,” Finn jested. “I still remember that girl you were friends with when you were in high school; Kimmy, right? The two of you agreed to go stag to a homecoming dance together and she was supposed to pick you up, but instead she bailed on you at the last minute and went to the dance with your ex-boyfriend, Dan.”  
  
Jo recalled the memory and nodded. “You know, that was, like, eighteen years ago and even now that still pisses me off.”  
  
“Like you said,” he snickered, “you hold grudges.” Casting an eye over to Rick, he asked in a teasing tone, “You know what you signed up for when you married my sister?”  
  
Rick looked from Finn and then to Jo, who caught his eye. The pair of them smirked at each other as he gave her hand another squeeze. “Oh, yeah. Been through too much now to turn back.”  
  
“We’ve seen each other at our worst and at our best. We’ve been through it all together and it hasn’t even been a year yet.” Jo kept holding Rick’s eye, maintaining a knowing smile with him.  
  
“How long _have_ you two been together? How did you meet?”  
  
“It was about nine, nine and a half months ago?” Rick questioned rhetorically. Even though he wasn’t exactly sure on the overall timeframe anymore, he wasn’t looking for her to actually respond. “The group I was with then was quite different. I mean, there were different people with me. Daryl’s the only original one. Everyone else is either dead or missing. Mostly just dead. It was a couple months after winter and we’d come upon this old house and while we were clearing it out of walkers and checking to make sure it was some place we could stay for a while, we found your sister and Sophia in an upstairs bedroom. Sophia was originally part of my original group, but got separated from us on a highway when walkers started chasing after her. I led the walkers away, but lost her. Unbeknownst to me then, Jo had found her. We were like ships in the night.”  
  
“Sophia and I tried to make our way back to the highway but other walkers blocked our path and we got lost and we took shelter in a house. It was about two days later by the time we made it to the road and by then Rick’s group had already gone, so Sophia stayed with me, in the beginning anyway.”  
  
“So you got separated from her, too? But then how did you end up in the same house together?”  
  
“Merle,” Jo replied. “The man with the knife hand. Sophia and I crossed paths with this man, who brought us to a town he basically ran. It was fortified, safe, self-sustaining. It was ideal…initially. And that man was charming. I can never begrudge him that. But the charm was a front. He was a monster. I don’t feel like going into details, but let’s say Hope was the result. That man is her father by blood alone. When I realized I was pregnant, I wanted to leave and I tried to. He and I ended up fighting and he would’ve killed me, too, but then he realized I was pregnant. Instead, he opted to lock me up and throw away the key until the baby was born, and then he was going to kill me. Merle, however, eventually came to my rescue. I was about seven months pregnant by then. He got me out, and then went and got Sophia who’d been staying with this old woman. Sophia and I made a run for it in the dead of night. After a couple of days on the road, we found that old house. We were tired, hungry and I was especially drained simply from being pregnant. I could barely hold my head up or keep my eyes open. Somehow Sophia got me upstairs into that bedroom.”  
  
Rick moved his hand from Jo’s and trailed it up to the back of her neck where he rested it soothingly. “She looked like she was close to knocking on death’s door,” he continued, taking over the conversation. “She passed out shortly after that, Sophia got reunited with her mother and we all found a prison to stay at. We cleared it out, made it safe. It became home. Jo had Hope there; a month early, too.”  
  
“Rick delivered her,” Jo added. “We were stuck inside the infirmary. An alarm was set off using a back-up generator, riling up the walkers; several of which were just outside the infirmary doors so we couldn’t get out. And there was no way to reach the others anytime soon. There was no time; the baby was coming, so Rick had to do it. He brought Hope into the world. He’s been there for her since day one, loving her as his own.”  
  
“Until recently.”  
  
“What happened recently?” Finn asked.  
  
“The man I mentioned, Hope’s biological father. He called himself The Governor. Well, he said others gave him that nickname, but he sure as hell never insisted otherwise. He liked it, that power and authority. Fucking megalomaniac,” Jo grunted bitterly. “We went after him not long after Hope was born. Him and a few of his people had found us and killed three of our own, and threatened to do worse if Rick didn’t hand Hope and me over. Instead, we took the fight to him, but he got away. We spent the next six or so months in relative peace. It was nice. It was real nice.” Jo looked at the ground and began to smile. “It gave him and I time to properly fall in love. I mean, we were already there, but now we had time to just enjoy each other without constantly looking over our shoulders. We had each other, we had our daughter, and we had our friends and a growing community within that prison. Life was good.”  
  
“Sadly, all good things come to an end,” Rick muttered. “The Governor came back, with a battalion. He even had a tank. He’d kidnapped Jo and my ex-wife Lori. He was going to kill Jo, but Lori sacrificed herself. That bastard blew holes into the prison with that tank, slaughtered the mother of my dead son and let his people attack us. They tore down our fences, killed our people. He would’ve killed me, too, but your sister here drove her sword through his chest.”  
  
Jo tilted her head slightly and let a slight smirk toy at her mouth. Despite all the anger she would always hold for The Governor, she took joy in knowing he died at her hand. “And then I cut his head off.”  
  
“Fuck,” Finn muttered. “That’s fuckin’ hardcore.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I only did to him what he did to Lori. She’d become one of my best friends. He was going to do the same to me.”  
  
“No, I get it. I would’ve done the same, probably.” The younger man frowned and folded his arms across his chest once more. “Still…damn. I’m sorry the two of you had to go through all that.”  
  
“So are we,” Rick agreed.  
  
“During all that chaos is when we lost Hope. One of our friends said a woman got away with Hope, so we knew she had gotten safely away, we just didn’t know who exactly had her or if she survived after leaving the prison. We holed up in a house for a few days so Rick could heal and we could gather up some supplies. Daryl and Sophia got out together and they found us. And a few days after that we found the others at a place called Terminus; a falsely advertised sanctuary. The people there were just as bad as The Governor, but we got away, except for Carol, Sophia’s mother. She died making sure her daughter lived.”  
  
“About three days ago we found a sign. My friend Shane, who was at the prison, had survived somehow, and he’d found Hope. He left the sign for us, telling us as much, and to go to DC,” Rick added. “We found the transportation, gathered up more supplies and that brings us to now.”  
  
“When did the two of you get married?”  
  
Rick and Jo looked at each other, both mentally trying to do the math in their heads and count back the days.  
  
“It's been five days,” Jo replied. “Almost a week.”  
  
“Time flies,” Rick grinned, bringing his hand off her neck and pushing some of her hair off her face.  
  
“Was there cake?” Finn joked.  
  
“I wish.”  
  
“We did it on the side of the road. Only Daryl and Sophia were there as our witnesses. The entire ceremony, if you wanna call it that, lasted—what—one, two minutes tops?” Jo grinned. “Maybe we’ll renew those vows at some point in the future. Who knows?”  
  
“Well, congratulations.” Finn looked between his sister and his brother-in-law. “I’m glad you two have been able to find someone to love amidst the craziness of this world.”  
  
“Thank you,” Rick nodded.  
  
“You, too, apparently.” Jo eyed her brother with an impish grin. “That girlfriend of yours is rather pretty. Jen, right?”  
  
“Yeah, I think I’ll keep her around,” Finn jested.  
  
“You really like to surround yourself with blonde women,” Jo continued. “Me, Harry, now Jen.”  
  
“And she’s just as much of a ballbuster as you and mom.”  
  
Jo scrunched up her nose. “It’s so weird to hear you refer to her as mom so nonchalantly. But then I have to remember you’ve been hanging out with her behind my back for about seven damned years.”  
  
Finn frowned guiltily and shrugged. “Sorry, sis.”  
  
She shook her head. “Whatever. Water under the bridge, right?”  
  
“I dunno.” He looked at Rick but pointed at Jo. “You were listening to the part where this one holds grudges, right?”  
  
Rick chuckled. “Yeah, but I think I’m safe so long as I stay in her good graces.”

 

* * *

  
A short time later, Harry had returned with two Vicodin pills but Jo waived them off. She had taken Vicodin years before when she’d had her wisdom teeth removed and remembered it making her feel lightheaded and nauseous, and she refused to take something like that again. Instead, despite Rick’s insistence she at least take some Tylenol or Aleve, Jo opted to go without any pain medication whatsoever. What she was feeling was manageable. And, like she said, she’d experienced far worse pain.  
  
Not too long after, Rick and Jo and rejoined their group back out in the lobby. Most of the Communers had gone off to their rooms for the rest of the evening or to other parts unknown within the hotel. Rick took lead in the conversation explaining how they would stay the night in the hotel, but get back on the road first thing in the morning.  
  
An offer was also put on the metaphoric table.  
  
If anyone decided they wanted to stay on at The Commune and not make the trek north to Washington DC, it would be understood. There would be no ill will in parting ways. Jo did also clarify that once they got to DC and, if and when they found Hope and Shane, the plan was to try and make the trek back to Atlanta in order to return to The Commune. If Hope and Shane were alive, they would return with them. But if anyone wanted to stay behind and wait for them to come back, that was fine. They knew the dangers that awaited them out there on the open road, especially with not knowing what roadblocks and obstacles, both literal and theoretical they might face. Not everyone might be down with that after everything they’d been through in the last three weeks; from the illness at the prison, to The Governor’s attack on the prison, and everything that went down at Terminus. It was a lot to handle in such a short timeframe for anyone.  
  
Insisting that no one make a decision right away, but to sleep on it, Rick insisted everyone get some sleep for the night.  
  
Finn did the honors of showing everyone to their rooms; making sure to keep Rick’s group as nearby each other as possible and on the same floor. Jo had seen to getting Sophia and Mika settled into a hotel room with two queen beds and looked on with amusement with how happily Mika jumped on her bed. After asking them to not stay up too late jumping on their beds or talking, Jo kissed both girls on the head and bid them goodnight before retreating to the hotel room she had woken up in earlier with Rick by her side.  
  
Closing the door behind her, she looked around through the darkness of the room, wondering where Rick had gotten off to. Walking over toward the window nearest the sink, she pulled the curtains open to let in a bit of evening light, and then stepped over to the sink, where she then lifted her shirt off and winced at the dull pain in her shoulder. Upon setting her shirt down on the small counter, she took in the sight of the bruising on her right shoulder that was taking on a greener hue; a departure from the redder hue from earlier in the afternoon when Gavin had fixed her dislocated shoulder. It made her think about Oscar for a moment, back to their honeymoon when he’d suffered the same thing, and then how she’d been able to fix Sam’s shoulder for him a few weeks ago in that house in the cul de sac; all because of witnessing the Mexican paramedics fixing her late husband’s shoulder. Now, it had been her turn and she could only hope that would be the worst injury she had to face for however long she had of life.  
  
_If wishes were horses, beggars would ride._  
  
Jo smirked; her grandma’s voice in her head again. That old woman always had something to say — some old adage — that seemed to fit any circumstance.  
  
The hotel room door clicking open caught Jo’s attention as she turned her head to the right and took in the visage of Rick sauntering into the room. He stopped for a second to note her standing there and smiled over at her before shutting the door behind him.  
  
“The girls settled in for the night?” he asked, walking up toward her.  
  
“Yeah,” Jo answered, as she looked at both their reflections in the mirror. “Mika was rather enjoying having a big bed to herself.”  
  
“I bet.” Bringing a hand to her shoulder and touching his fingers gently upon it, Rick frowned. “That looks really painful. I wish you would’ve taken something. I can go find Gavin.”  
  
“I’m fine,” she insisted, turning and looking him in the eye. “This is the least of my worries.” Raising her left hand, she pushed a few of his errant curls off his forehead and smiled up at him. “You’re so handsome.”  
  
Rick rolled his eyes, but smiled back. “I suppose, in a certain light.”  
  
“In all light, or dark, all the time,” she insisted. Standing slightly on tip toe, Jo pressed her lips upon his and continued to smile as she felt him reciprocate without hesitation.  
  
“You know, your mother said there’s running water here. It might be cold water, but it’s better than nothing,” he commented. “We can fill the tub in the bathroom, let it sit for a while so it gets to room temperature and take a bath. We kinda need it.”  
  
Jo chuckled and nodded. “Yeah we do,” she agreed. “Sponge bathing only goes so far.”  
  
Leaning in, Rick kissed her lips and smiled again. “You take the rest of those clothes off and I’ll start running the water.”  
  
With a playful slap to her ass, Rick opened the bathroom door and left it open. With no electricity, there was no light to see what he was doing and what little light was spilling into the hotel room was all he had to work with. Jo shook her head and grinned from ear to ear as she turned away from the bathroom and began to peel off the rest of her clothes, letting each piece fall to the floor as she walked over to the desk where a few pillar candles sat with a box of matches. Scooping them all up in her hands, she carried them toward the bathroom, where the sound of running water entered her ears.  
  
It was almost silly how lovely the sound was to her.  
  
The amount of things they all took for granted before the world fell apart was astounding.  
  
“I got candles,” she announced, stepping into the small bathroom that housed only a tub with the toilet immediately beside it. There wasn’t much room to stand around for two people. As she stood in the doorway to the bathroom, she appreciated the view of Rick’s bare ass as he stood there naked before her. “It’s a full moon tonight.”  
  
Rick snickered and turned around. When he looked down at her, he frowned. “Why’d you leave your bra on?”  
  
“I can’t get the clasp in the back without it hurting more.”  
  
Rick sighed. “I told you to take something for it. You’re damned stubborn.”  
  
“Guilty as charged, officer.”  
  
As an impish grin took up residence on her face, she watched as Rick rolled his eyes again at her and then began to wrap his arms around her upper torso. She still held the candles and box of matches in her hands while his own fiddled with the back clasp of her bra for a moment until it came undone. Taking half a step back from her, Rick took the candles from her hands and set them down on top of the toilet tank and on the toilet’s closed lid; letting Jo shimmy out her bra as the straps slid off her shoulders.  
  
Once her breasts were free from their confines and she was just as naked as he was, she took out a match and struck it against the flint along the side of the box. Jo began to light the candles as quickly as possible so that the flame didn’t reach her fingers and burn her and so that she didn’t need to waste an extra match as there didn’t seem to be that many in the box to begin with.  
  
As the small room began to glow with orange light, Rick turned toward the tub and lifted a leg to step in.  
  
“Not gonna wait for it to get to room temperature?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “It’s not that bad.”  
  
Slowly he sat down with his back against the end of the tub opposite from the faucet. He kept his legs bent at the knees but spread enough so that there was room for Jo to sit down with him. Taking her cue, Jo lifted a leg and dipped her foot in, getting a slight shiver from the coolness of the water.  
  
“Not that bad my ass,” she retorted.  
  
Rick simply smiled up at her, enjoying the view of her bare ass as she stepped all the way into the tub and tepidly sank down into the water to sit between his legs, much like they had together in the woods the night after escaping Terminus and losing Carol. Snaking his arms around her abdomen, Rick pulled her back against his chest so that her head rest down upon an angle on his left clavicle. They sat there in silence for a few moments until the water got high enough for the two of them and Jo reached her foot up and turned the faucet off with her toes.  
  
The inset soap dish in the wall to their left had two small bottles and a tiny pad of soap, wrapped in plastic. The two bottles were shampoo and conditioner, respectively and Rick reached his left hand up to grab both bottles. Setting the conditioner on the edge of the tub to their right, he proceeded in twisting off the cap of the shampoo and squeezing a dollop into the palm of his hand while Jo watched, as his hands were out in front of her. Bringing his hand up to his head, he placed wiped the shampoo into his hair and quickly began to work it through his curls until his head was sudsy enough. Then, Rick repeated the process; squeezing another dollop of shampoo into the palm of his hand and placing his hand on top of Jo’s head where he began to work it into her strands. Since her hair was considerably longer than his, he needed to use a bit more shampoo for her.  
  
Jo groaned happily at the sensation of his longer, thicker fingers massaging her scalp as he cleaned her hair for her. After letting both their hair sit like that, full of suds, for a minute or two, Rick cup some water into his hands and began to rinse her hair clean before tackling his own.  
  
Even without bothering to use the conditioner or even the soap just yet, and even in the glow of candlelight, they could both tell that the water they were sitting in was turning a murky color from the grime coming off their bodies.  
  
Turning next to using conditioner on their hair, Rick repeated the same steps. Afterward, once both bottles had been recapped, he returned them to the soap dish and then grabbed the little pad of soap, removing its plastic wrapping, which he tossed to the floor outside the tub. He dipped the soap into the water and then began to lather their bodies up enough for them to rub their limbs and appendages clean and rinse themselves off.  
  
“This water is disgusting,” Jo grimaced.  
  
“Drain the tub,” he suggested. “As it’s draining turn the faucet back on and fill it with fresh water.”  
  
And that’s just what Jo did.  
  
As the dirty water disappeared down the drain, Jo ran the faucet, splashing the clean water around to remove some of the grimy residue away before plugging the drain back up and refilling the tub. She leaned back down against Rick’s chest and waited till the water reached the perfect level. However, the water wasn’t exactly warm and her teeth began to chatter, so Rick wrapped his arms around her chest and rubbed his hands up and down over her skin to warm her up until their bodies adjusted to the temperature.  
  
When the tub was filled enough, Jo once more turned the faucet off with her toes but then she sat up and turned slightly. Her torso faced the wall but her head was turned toward Rick, who she looked upon with a twinkle in her eye as he laid back against the tub with slicked back, brown curls and a wet beard. The candle glow made the moisture upon his bare chest glisten and her pulse quickened as she let her eyes linger down below the surface of the water.  
  
A mischievous smile appeared on her lips as she twisted her hips. The water sloshed around their bodies with her sudden movement as she began to stand up. “Put your legs down,” she advised, gesturing to how they were still bent at the knees to accommodate how she’d been sitting beforehand. As soon as he obeyed, she sank down into his lap and placed her hands upon his shoulders.  
  
Knowing what she was about, Rick held up a hand to halt her and reached over the side of the tub as best as he could so he could pick up his pants. Digging into one of the pockets, he proceeded in removing a solitary condom and holding it between his fingers. Bringing it to his mouth, he tore the tiny package at the corner with his teeth and began to remove the rubber contraceptive from its confines.  
  
“Where’d you find that?”  
  
“Daryl,” he replied.  
  
Jo raised an eyebrow at him. “Daryl? What’s Daryl doing with condoms?”  
  
“He found a box of them in the lobby earlier when we were talking with your mother and Finn. He handed a few out to Sam and Anna, and to Tyreese and Karen. Then pocketed a few more for us.”  
  
“Well, that was…thoughtful?” Jo snickered as she watched Rick rolled the condom down over his cock, which was trickier than expected when doing it in water.  
  
“His intentions were definitely noble,” Rick agreed with a slight chuckle. Looking up from his growing erection and up to Jo’s face, he moved his hands to her hips and lifted her up a bit.  
  
Jo followed his cue and positioned herself over him, biting her bottom lip as his tip pressed against her entrance. Gripping her hips even tighter, Rick pulled her down onto his length, easing himself in slowly until he was buried inside of her. The sound of her gasping upon being filled up by him was always music to his ears. As he sat up, moving his arms up around her back, Jo began to wrap her legs around his waist. Soon enough, Rick began thrusting in and out of her, building up his pace. Water continued to slosh around them with each movement and more fervently the faster he went. Their respective moans and groans echoed off the bathroom walls as they clung tightly to each other; their chest pressed together as they sought out each other’s lips.  
  
As water continued to slosh around them and up between their bodies, Rick leaned his head back from Jo for a moment to watch her face as she tipped her own head back. Her eyes were closed and her brow knitted together as she focused on the building of her orgasm. He loved how she bit her bottom lip in concentration and to hold back from crying out too loudly. Being able to just let loose and be loud with each other was an extremely rare thing for them. There were always people nearby they had to consider.  
  
Their first time together in that bungalow in Decatur had been freeing on many levels, and then there were those few, occasional times Rick took Jo on a run while they were still at the prison. The last time they let their hair, figuratively, down was just over a week ago at the house where Daryl and Sophia had caught up with them. When they’d gotten drunk off bourbon whiskey and fucked like bunnies all night long despite Rick’s recent injuries. The liquor had helped numb that pain and allowed him to focus on other things.  
  
Slipping his rough hands from around her back, he let them slide down the slick slope of her ass, grabbing firmly onto both cheeks and pulling her further down on him with each rocking thrust upward he made. Her entire body shook with the gesture and his blue eyes, which had darkened from his own arousal, wandered to gaze upon the way her breasts jiggled in front of his face. Her rosy buds were pebbled and just begging for his lips and teeth on them. Lowering his face just between her slight cleavage, Rick began to drag his tongue along the skin of her chest, wincing slightly at the taste of soap residue. It burned but he ignored it and got past it as he moved his mouth over to one breast, taking the nipple between his lips and sucking hard on it; eliciting a hearty moan from the depths of her throat that signaled her approval at the gesture.  
  
He enjoyed it just as much as she did. Rick just happened to love her breasts. They weren’t too small, they weren’t too big. They fit perfectly in his hands and were pleasant to rest his head against. Plus, there was just that inherent trigger in anyone attracted to women who found themselves pleasantly distracted by the jiggle of breasts. Rick was by no means exempt from the appreciating the jiggle.  
  
The moment he felt her nails beginning to dig into his back, he knew she was starting to come. Her inner walls clenched around him, which felt glorious and helped bring him quickly to his own peak soon after.  
  
When both their bodies were satiated, Rick leaned back down against the tub and let Jo fall gently upon his chest; wrapping his arms around her waist and just holding her there with him. He turned his face and pressed his lips to her forehead and smiled contentedly as he closed his eyes while reveling in having her there; their bodies still connected and their heartbeats returning to their normal pace.

 

* * *

  
Jo stirred awake sometime later, not realizing she had fallen asleep. Lifting her head, she noticed what she had perceived as a very hard but warm mattress was nothing more than Rick’s chest and that they were both still in the bathtub. The candles on the back of the toilet and on the closed lid were still burning, with wax dripping down the sides onto the porcelain surface.  
  
As she sat up, Rick’s eyes began to flutter open. He squinted at her initially as he raised a hand to his face and rubbed some of the sleep away. They moved in silence as they finally separated their bodies from one another, with a lazy smirk appearing on Rick’s lips as he watched Jo pull herself up to her feet and step out of the tub. Sitting up as she reached for a towel to wrap around her body, Rick looked down and removed the condom he was still wearing. He frowned at it and realized there was no garbage can in the bathroom to throw it out in. Draining the tub and standing up as well, lukewarm bath water rolled down his body as he stepped out of the tub and stalked out of the room, wet and naked, and noticed the garbage can under the sink in the hotel room. Tossing the condom away, Rick grabbed a towel for himself, wrapping it around his waist, and then walked up to the bed where he dropped down face first.  
  
Jo snickered at him as she rifled through a small bag on the green chair at the desk. Their group had brought just a little bit of their things inside the hotel just before being shown to their rooms so they could all have fresh clothes to change into the next morning before the journey north continued. Jo was opting to change into those clothes now instead of putting her dirty ones back on.  
  
Realizing what she was doing, Rick lifted his head and looked over his shoulder at her. “Why bother? We’re just gonna be in here the rest of the night sleeping or other things.”  
  
“I wanna take a walk first and maybe find something to eat,” she replied, trying not to smirk too much as she attempted to ignore the playful tone in his voice. “My stomach’s starting to growl.”  
  
“Alright,” Rick nodded, rolling onto his back and moving to sit up. “Give me a minute to throw some pants on and I’ll come with you.”  
  
“No, you stay here and rest. There’s gonna be doing a lot of driving tomorrow. Get as much sleep as you can. I’ll be fine.”  
  
Rick just stared over at her as she stood there with her back to him while stepping into a pair of jeans. “Okay. But take something with you for protection. Raffy’s around this hotel somewhere and I don’t trust him as far as I can throw him.”  
  
Pulling a handgun out of her bag, she removed the magazine and checked the amount of ammo before sliding it back into place and tucking the gun, with the safety on, into her back pocket. Taking a shirt from her bag, Jo turned around and winked at Rick before pulling the shirt down over her head and wincing slightly in the process. She knew the ache in her shoulder wouldn’t disappear overnight but little things like getting dressed would get real annoying really fast if the soreness continued for much longer. Foregoing her bra, which she’d left in the bathroom with the rest of their clothes they’d removed before their bath, Jo stepped over to the bed as Rick sat all the way up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.  
  
She looked down at him and he looked up at her, reaching his hands out and placing them on her hips.  
  
“Don’t be gone too long,” he advised. “The beast is waking up again.”  
  
As Jo narrowed her gaze, watching how he grinned mischievously at her, her eyes wandered down to his towel and noticed the slight bulge beneath the cotton material. Raising an eyebrow, she smirked back and shook her head. “You’re like a teenager.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “What can I say? I got a hot wife.”  
  
“Yeah, you do,” Jo replied with a giggle as she stepped away from his grip and over to the hotel room door. “I’d bring the candles in the bathroom in here so we can keep an eye on them. We don’t want to burn this place down before we leave tomorrow.”  
  
“Aye, aye,” he mocked saluted her as she slipped out of their room.  
  
Closing the door behind her, Jo shoved her hands into her front pockets and wandered off down the hall, stopping at the door of the room where Sophia and Mika were in. She leaned into the door and listened carefully to see if she heard them chatting but all was silent, indicating both girls were more than likely fast asleep already. Continuing on her way down the hall, she passed Tyreese and Karen’s room where she heard a few moans, and smiled to herself. It amused her that she and Rick weren’t the only ones making the best of any downtime they had.  
  
Rick said Daryl _had_ passed out condoms to the three couples in their group.  
  
It made Jo wonder if Sam and Ana were about the same thing right now, which brought a chuckle to her lips.  
  
As soon as she made it down to the ground floor, she meandered through to the lobby and found it empty. Turning toward the courtyard in the center of the hotel, she could see through the windows where a few of the Communers were sitting around a contained campfire, drinking what looked to be a few warm beers while wrapped in blankets and chatting among themselves. Two of the Communers in question were her brother Finn who sat in a chair with his girlfriend Jen in his lap; cocooning her with a ratty-looking plaid blanket.  
  
Jo smiled.  
  
He brother was happy and had a life here and it made her feel much better about leaving him behind in the morning. She was certain he would be okay here. She’d rather he stay behind where she knew he would be safe, with people he knew and cared about, than out on the road with her where, at any moment, a walker could come out of nowhere and bite him, thereby giving him his death sentence.  
  
Off the lobby, just down the opposite hallway she’d come from, was a conference room set up like a food pantry. Jo poked her head inside and found a large stockpile of canned goods and other non-perishable food items. Closing door behind her, she walked up to the shelves set up with food and even paper plates, napkins, Styrofoam cups. There was a little bit of everything it seemed. Perusing the selection, Jo smiled at the sight of peanut butter. It wasn’t the only one, so she didn’t feel bad taking it. She then grabbed a small box of crackers from a top shelf, along with a jar of pickles and a bottle of orange-flavored Gatorade.  
  
Everything suddenly looked delectable, but she could only carry so much.  
  
Satisfied with her pickings, she smiled to herself and turned to head for the door when she was stopped dead in her tracks to find Raffy standing in the doorway with a sly grin upon his face.  
  
“Well, well, well, what have we here? Stealing our food?”  
  
“My brother offered us something to eat. I’m taking him up on that offer,” she replied. “If you have a problem with that, take it up with him or Harry.”  
  
“There doesn’t have to be a problem.” He began to look her up and down in a very non-subtle way, going as far as to lick his lips like he’d just seen a delicious porterhouse steak.  
  
“No, there doesn’t,” she agreed. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to take this back upstairs and have something to eat with my husband.”  
  
“You enjoy eating with your husband?” Raffy inquired, his double meaning terribly obvious. He was standing directly in front of the door, blocking her way out on purpose. “Does he _eat_ with you really good? Do feel fully satisfied afterward?”  
  
Jo sighed and rolled her eyes as she set her food items down on the table in the center of the room. She wasn’t in the mood for his inappropriate sexual innuendos nor was she in the mood for playing these word games with him. “Rick keeps me perfectly satisfied. And if this,” she gestured to him, “is how you try to come on to women, especially married women, you seriously need to brush up on your skills, or lack thereof.”  
  
Raffy’s lewd smile changed abruptly to a sneer. Clearly, he didn’t like being called out on his shit. “You’re just like your mother,” he spat. “A _bitch_.”  
  
“Guess that proves that nature wins out over nurture.”  
  
“Shut the _fuck_ up.”  
  
Jo clamped her mouth shut. She wasn’t expecting him to sound so cruel. She was expecting him to continue being a whiny, perverted asshole. There was actually something pretty terrifying in his eyes, the way they glinted in the virtual darkness of the pantry.  
  
“Get out of my way,” Jo warned. She subtly moved her right hand behind her back, ready to reach for her gun. “Just turn around and walk out of this room.”  
  
“Or what?” he dared, taking a step closer to her. “You gonna throw that Gatorade bottle at me; fight me like a little girl?”  
  
“No,” she shook her head, clenching her jaw and stepping closer to him as well. “I’ll kill you like a woman.”  
  
“With what—your bare hands?” he taunted.  
  
Without missing a beat, Jo whipped her gun out of her back pocket and gripped it tight in her hand as she raised it, pressing the barrel against his forehead. “With my gun.” She removed the safety and took another step closer, forcing him to move backward while she kept the gun in place. “How many walkers have you killed?”  
  
Raising his hands in a sort of surrender, Raffy smirked. “Plenty.”  
  
“How many _people_ have you killed?” When he didn’t reply she pressed the gun harder against his forehead, which seemed to piss him off a bit. “I asked you a question.”  
  
“Two.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because they tried to kill me.” Glaring at her, he pointed at her with his right hand. “What about you, Mrs. Grimes? How many rotters have _you_ killed?”  
  
“A lot.”  
  
“And how many _people_ have you killed?”  
  
“More than you,” she replied, holding his gaze as if her life depended on it.  
  
“Why?”  
  
Jo’s nostrils flared slightly. “Because they deserved it.”  
  
Raffy’s sneer gave way to amused smile. “And do you think I deserve it?”  
  
“Maybe you do, maybe you don’t. It’s up to you what conclusion I come to.”  
  
He chuckled, looking over toward the wall and then narrowing his eyes as if something important had caught his attention. That simple gesture was the distraction he needed to turn the tables in his favor. Using his peripheral vision, the second he noticed her eyes shift toward the same direction he’d looked, he grabbed for her gun and twisted her arm away from him and then pulled her around and back up against his chest. He easily snaked the gun out of her grip and held it in his own hand while pressing the barrel up under her chin while pressing his lips against her ear.  
  
“Guns aren’t your forte, are they? Maybe you’re used to a little, pink switchblade with girly flowers on it. Or maybe the hubby is the one who really dispatches all the nasty people for you and you just like to lie about it to boost your ego.”  
  
“I had a sword, actually,” Jo clarified, gritting her teeth and struggling in his grip as his arm wrapped around her neck to hold her in place. “I was pretty damn good with it, too.”  
  
“Couldn’t be that good if you don’t have it anymore?”  
  
“It was either leave it or risk my daughter’s life. I made the right decision. I can get another sword.”  
  
“Which daughter’s that? The bouncy one with the dolls or the pretty thing with the scowl and nice, full lips just waiting for a man to—”  
  
Recalling the move Rick had made with the head Claimer the night before arriving to Terminus, Jo knocked her head back hard and fast into Raffy’s face, hitting him square in the nose. And, same as what happened with Claimer Joe and Rick, the gun went off beside Jo’s head and the instant ringing in her ear was practically deafening as they both stumbled away from each other in respective disorientation.  
  
Grabbing her hair, Raffy pulled her back with such a force, she fell down upon her ass at his feet and he took a moment to wipe the blood that was dripping from his nose. Stepping quickly around to stand in front of her, he crouched down with one leg planted on either side of hers so that their faces were more or less eye level with each other. Still holding the gun in one hand, he wiped his other, bloody hand across Jo’s face.  
  
“That was rude,” he barked, and then covered her face with his hand and shoved her backward. “Open your mouth.”  
  
“Fuck you.”  
  
“Open your damn potty mouth, bitch.”  
  
Jo grinned. “Fuck. You.”  
  
Raffy raised the gun to her face and pressed the barrel against her bottom lip. “Open wide or I’ll shoot you between the eyes right now.”  
  
“And risk raining hell down upon yourself? That gun just went off. Someone’s bound to have heard it and they’ll come looking to see what happened.”  
  
“I like taking risks.” He raised the gun slightly and tapped the barrel against her cheek. “Open your mouth or open them legs. Either way, I’m gonna see what your husband was so quick to defend. I wanna see if you’re worth it.”  
  
“I’ll die first.”  
  
“Fine. Then you die, and you’re no longer here to stop me from going to your daughter and—”  
  
Raising her leg, Jo kicked him in the crotch as hard as she could muster and watched with satisfaction as he toppled over in pain to his side. Clambering up to her knees, she grabbed for her gun back and climbed up over him and shoved the gun into his mouth as he opened it up to groan in agony.  
  
“You’re a waste life. You’re a loose cannon and a threat to everyone here,” she growled at him. “This world has changed all of us, and you’re one of the people that went bad, like rotten apple. If I let you live, I don’t know that you won’t hurt someone after we leave tomorrow. It could be my brother, Harry, Jen, that girl Piper. You seem to like ‘em young, and that’s something I can’t live with; knowing I could’ve stopped you.”  
  
Raffy glared up at her and gagged as she pushed the gun deeper into his mouth until it was practically in his throat.  
  
The pantry door opening caught both their attention and they both looked up to see a concerned Harry and an equally concerned Michonne standing behind her as their eyes instantly fell upon the sight of Jo and Raffy on the floor.  
  
“We heard a gunshot. What happened in here?” Harry demanded, noticing the blood on both their faces.  
  
As Jo opened her mouth to reply, Raffy’s hand came up and a switchblade she hadn’t known he had flicked open. Just as he brought it up toward her neck to stab her with it, Michonne was fully into the room with and unsheathed her katana. In what was probably only a second of time, the slightly curved blade fell down upon Raffy’s hand, slicing it off before the switchblade could even break Jo’s skin. Both his severed hand and switchblade fell to the ground as blood spurted out from his bleeding stump. His cries of agony bellowed from around the gun in his mouth.  
  
So much had just happened and Raffy was at the point where he just didn’t seem to care anymore. He mentally fought through the horrific pain and grabbed at Jo’s throat with his remaining hand to choke her. As she tried prying his fingers away with one hand, Harry hurried over to pull her back, but there was no stopping what happened next.  
  
Fueled with disgust and contempt she felt for this man, which was mixed with latent rage over the recent events in her life within the last month, Jo turned her face toward him as he dug his fingers into her throat.  
  
As their eyes met, there seemed to be a glimmer of clarity in his gaze.  
  
He could see what was going to happen before it happened.  
  
Jo pulled the trigger.  
  
Michonne took a step back, as did Harry, as they looked on with shock.  
  
The back of Raffy’s head was missing. Chunks of his skull, hair, brain and blood coated the floor and wall behind him. His grip around Jo’s neck had released and his remaining arm fell limply to the floor while Jo sank back to the ground, still holding the smoking gun with a now shaking hand.  
  
“All I wanted was to take a walk and get some food to eat. I was hungry,” Jo muttered. “He came in here, wouldn’t let me leave. I—I took out my gun as a warning, to just get him to move, but he wouldn’t budge. He said he was going to go after Sophia if I didn’t let him.”  
  
Harry leaned down and placed her hands on Jo’s shoulders, ushering her to stand up. “It’s okay.”  
  
As Jo obliged the older woman, she nodded and then glanced over at Michonne. “Thank you,” she muttered, obviously referring to what Michonne had done to Raffy’s hand to stop him.  
  
Michonne nodded back, shaking the blood from her katana. “He had to be stopped,” she replied, and then glared at Harry. “I’ve been telling you weeks now he’s changed. He wasn’t right in the head anymore. It wasn’t just him drinking. The man could hold his liquor with the best of them and still walk a straight line.” Michonne tapped the side of her head with her free hand. “He wasn’t right in here anymore and you wouldn’t listen. I said we needed to exile him, and you said he was just going stir-crazy, that he was fine. I told you this would happen.”  
  
Harry stared back at the dreadlocked woman and frowned.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Jo muttered. She’d killed people before, out of necessity, but this had felt different. This wasn’t a normal death to her and it left her somewhat shaken and feeling guilty. “I didn’t really mean to kill him.”  
  
“He was gonna kill you with that switchblade.” Michonne pointed to it with the tip of her weapon. “Even after I cut his hand off to stop him, he tried to kill you with his bare hand. He didn’t care anymore. He got what he deserved.”  
  
Jo’s hands shook as she turned the safety on to her gun and shoved it into her back pocket. Turning to look away from both Raffy’s body and Michonne, Jo looked up at her mother. She saw the worry and concern on her face, and suddenly Jo was overcome with emotion. Tears stung at her eyes and threatened to fall as her chin and bottom lip quivered. Despite their more than three decades apart from each other and the resentment Jo had harbored for Harry for so long, she couldn’t deny that now, in a time of need, her mother was there, with literal open arms and was suddenly pulling her in for a hug.  
  
Jo pressed her face into Harry’s chest as Harry wrapped her arms around Jo’s chest.  
  
“It’s okay. I’m sorry it got this far,” she whispered into Jo’s hair. “I’m so sorry, honey.”  
  
The comfort notion of being in her mother’s arms for the first time since she was an infant and hearing her voice speak to her so soothingly was what allowed Jo’s tears to flow down her face.  
  
“Why don’t you take her into your office,” Michonne suggested. “I’ll take care of clean-up.”  
  
“Thank you, Michonne,” Harry replied. “And I’m sorry I didn’t heed your warnings.”  
  
“Too little, too late, but I appreciate you saying so.”  
  
Leaning her face down to glimpse Jo crying against her, Harry frowned. “Come on, Joanna darling. Let’s get you cleaned up.”  
  
It was time for amends.


	35. Horde

_“Our world is a huge mess right now, and not big enough for masses of intolerant people.”  
—_ Tori Amos

* * *

  
Tearing down the stairwell and out the door into the ground floor hallway like a bat out of hell, Rick looked more like contestant for _America’s Next Top Model: The Lumberjack Addition_ by the way he looked, rather than his usual gruff self. He was, after all, freshly bathed. His brown curls were softer with a bounce to them, his beard seemed fluffy, and all he wore was his pair of black jeans. He’d been in such a rush that he couldn’t be bothered with a shirt or shoes or even his belt. He did, however, have his Colt gripped tightly in his hand; ready to shoot anyone in the head that got in his way.  
  
Several paces behind him, Daryl came huffing along, as Rick stepped out into the lobby; slightly wild-eyed as his chest rose and fell with worried breath.  
  
“Where is she?” Rick demanded, staring straight ahead at the skinny redhead behind the check-in desk. He’d forgotten her name since introductions had been made in the late afternoon.  
  
The woman stared back at him like she’d just been physically slapped. “You-your wife?”  
  
“Who the fuck else?” he snapped, stalking onward without waiting for much more of an answer. “Jo!”  
  
A door off the opposite hallway clicked open, catching his attention and out walked Michonne with her katana strapped to her back but Rick’s focus went straight to the slight blood spray on her pant legs. He pointed right at her. He began fearing the worst. Daryl hadn’t been able to tell him much because he didn’t know much of what had apparently happened. All the archer had been able to say was there’d been an altercation involving Raffy and Jo, and Raffy was dead. Jo’s fate wasn’t known because Daryl had taken off to seek out Rick before he got any more details; knowing Rick needed to know as soon as possible that something had happened involving his wife.  
  
“Is that her blood?” Rick asked, starting to look crestfallen. “Is she—is she dead? Did he—”  
  
Michonne held her hands up and approached him slowly, maintaining eye contact and a calm demeanor. “This is not her blood. It’s Raffy’s. I was cleaning up.”  
  
“She’s not dead?”  
  
“No,” Michonne assured. “She’s very much alive, just shaken up.”  
  
Processing this information, Rick got angry again. “What happened?”  
  
Dropping her hands to her side and shifting her weight primarily onto one leg, Michonne’s eyes wandered over Rick’s shoulder to the approaching and skeptical figure of Daryl. “Raffy tried to pull some shit with her and Jo wasn’t having it. He wouldn’t let her leave the pantry, they fought and she got the upper hand,” she began to explain, watching how Rick took this all in. “He tried to stab her, so I cut his hand off, and then he tried choking her with his other hand so she shot him in the head; blew his brains out.”  
  
Rick nodded slowly and then scowled. If Jo hadn’t taken her gun with her, who knows how differently things would’ve gone. “Where is she now?”  
  
“She’s in Harry’s office.” As Rick moved to head in that direction, Michonne stepped into his path. “I know you mean well, and she’s your wife, and you love her, but right now she needs her mother.”  
  
He started to say that Jo had never needed her mother before and that he was her go-to person in life, but the insistence in Michonne’s gaze made him feel like he was a disruptive student and she was the authoritative teacher putting him in his place. Daryl’s hand appearing on his shoulder brought his attention away from the katana-swinging woman before him. Looking upon his friend’s face, he allowed himself to be ushered over to one of the lobby’s many couches to sit down and, more importantly, cool down. When he’d be able to go to Jo and personally see how she was doing, he wanted to be calm for her. He wanted to be her rock, the way she was _his_. She was what kept him centered; what kept tethered to his sanity. If it weren’t for her in his life, he was one hundred percent certain he’d be a much darker, angry person.

 

* * *

  
“I was eight years old the first time I remember my father hitting me.”  
  
Jo was wiping the blood from her face with a paper towel and a bottle of water Harry had given to her as both women sat in the office together. Instead of sitting across the desk from her daughter like she had that evening, Harry now sat beside Jo as Rick had. Both women sat relatively comfortable next to one another, having calmed both of themselves down from what had transpired in the pantry and now it was time for some reflection.  
  
Jo stopped wiping and stared at her mother, a little surprised by the admission she’d just heard. “He hit you?”  
  
“Regularly.” Harry shifted in her chair with considerable ease given the subject matter. “He was a hardcore alcoholic. Worse than I ever was, so I guess that’s a good thing. I never wanted to be like that man but, when I got old enough, I discovered that alcohol helped forget the kind of man he was for a little while. It made me forget a lot of things, but only for a little while. And then I would sober up and the world came back to me and it made me angry and it made me want to drink more to forget it all again, and it was a vicious cycle.” Harry looked down at the black, plastic armrest and picked absentmindedly at it. “I was the youngest of three. There was my older brother Jonah, which is who you were named after, and my sister Estelle. There were three years between each of us. When I was eight, Estelle was eleven, and Jonah was fourteen. Each one of us got beat by our father during his drunken rages. Sometimes he used his belt, sometimes his bare hands.”  
  
“My god,” Jo muttered.  
  
Harry shrugged, and then turned to look at her daughter. “When I saw Raffy put his hand on your neck, just before you pulled that trigger, all I could see was myself being attacked by my father the last time I ever saw him. I saw red and I was going to kill Raffy with my own bare hands for daring to touch you. I left you behind with your father because I wanted to prevent forcing you to live the same life I lived. I was scared I would become just like my father and that _your_ father might turn a blind eye the way _my_ mother did; that he wouldn’t stop me in case I became violent. I wanted to keep you from that kind of life, but then this disease spread and everyone died, and the dead rose from the proverbial grave, and it brought the worst out in a great many people. I could’ve never dreamed I would be the lesser monster in your life.”  
  
Jo and Harry locked eyes for a moment and a sad smile passed between them.  
  
“How did you get away from your dad?”  
  
Harry inhaled a deep breath and turned away, looking toward the far wall as she recalled that memory. “I was sixteen. Estelle ran away to California with her boyfriend after she graduated high school. She got away as soon as she could and went as far away as she could, and I never blamed her for it. The last time I saw her was about fifteen years ago. She’s probably dead now from all this. Her husband and daughter, too.”  
  
“So, I have California relations, huh?”  
  
Harry nodded. “Her daughter, Madison, is about five to ten years older than you, I think. I know she got married and had two kids, a boy and a girl. She’s a high school guidance counselor in Los Angeles, if I remember correctly.”  
  
Jo smirked. “So was my husband, Oscar.”  
  
“My brother Jonah, he’d just graduated college. He was attending Kennesaw State on a full ride for football. He was built like a brick shithouse, kinda like your black friend Tyreese. Well, he’d come home, just after graduation, which my mom had promised to bring me to. My dad hadn’t been invited, for obvious reasons, but my dad found out and got angry, as per usual. He decided that if _he_ couldn’t go, _none_ of us could. He beat my mother until she was unconscious and then he hit me. I locked myself in the bathroom and armed myself with a curling iron but he gave up after a while. I was honestly shocked he didn’t try busting down the door. He’d done it before.”  
  
“Damn.”  
  
“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “My brother came home that evening, found my mother sporting the worst bruises ever, and couldn’t find me anywhere, but there was my dad; sitting in his chair with a beer in his hand and wouldn’t even acknowledge Jonah when he arrived. Jonah demanded to know where I was, and I remember hearing my father say something about ‘the bitch is in the bathroom like the piece of shit she is.’ And then my brother was there, knocking on the door, asking me to open up, and I did. I was covered in blood, but some of it was my mom’s, not mine. I couldn’t see out my right eye, and to this day I still get blurred vision out of it. I think my dad did something to it, but I never sought medical treatment for it, so I guess that’s my fault. Jonah was furious. He lashed out at my father who, tried to choke me, and Jonah reacted badly to that. He was much bigger than my father by then, and stronger, and also, sober, so his reflexes were faster. He beat my father and gave him a taste of his own medicine. He shoved the old man back into his chair and said if he laid a hand on me ever again, he’d kill him. He then told me to pack what I could; that I was leaving with him.”  
  
“Where did you go?”  
  
“He had an apartment already off campus, so I stayed there with him for two years until I turned eighteen. He’d given up his bed for me to use and attempted to get named my legal guardian but I had decided to just drop out of high school by that point. I got a job as a cleaning lady at a motel that was off the books and helped out around the apartment, but then I discovered the bar life when my brother brought me out one night with his friends, and soon enough I fell in with some real partying types. And it was so freeing to just let loose and be loud and laugh and not have to worry about what my father would do to me.”  
  
Jo cupped the bloodied tissue in her hand and looked down at it. “How’d you meet my dad?”  
  
Harry smirked. “We were at the same bar one night. He bought me a drink and told me I was one of the prettiest things he ever did see. I was so used to the bad boy type by then that I barely gave your father a second glance until he asked me to dance when some Fleetwood Mac song came on over the jukebox. No guy had ever slow danced with me before.”  
  
“Dad really liked Fleetwood Mac. He used to have a thing for—”  
  
“—Stevie Nicks, yeah. I remember that.”  
  
“Did you ever love him?”  
  
“I think I did, or I just loved the idea of him,” Harry admitted. “I was pretty much on my own by that point. My brother had gotten married and I was too far gone with my own problems and was causing issues for him and his wife so he more or less kicked me out of his life. I’d been dating this guy, another bad guy, who was…well, let’s just say he wasn’t much better to me than my father. Fortunately for me, he got arrested and sent to prison for a dime and it was around then that I met your dad. He was this breath of fresh air and I got caught up in him. I actually thought I could be a normal girl with a normal boyfriend. I vaguely remember telling him plans I had to go back to school and get my GED and go to college to get a nursing degree. And then I ended up pregnant and I got scared. I felt trapped and your dad was so kind and doting and I just wasn’t used to that. I had the opposite reaction that a person _should_ have to someone like that. He drove me nuts and I almost wanted him to get angry and throw things at me or hit me when I acted like a bitch to him, but he never raised his voice. He was always quiet and kept it all to himself. He would never talk to me. He just held it all in and it made me even madder.”  
  
Jo snickered. “Sounds like someone I know.”  
  
“Rick?”  
  
Jo nodded. “His ex-wife used to tell me he was the same way. He could never just talk about his feelings with her; that he hated confrontation with her and would just walk around internalizing everything. They could never seem to communicate very well together. The world changing the way it did, and losing their son and other personal issues thrown in just made it worse for them, and they just stopped being together, and it wasn’t until they weren’t together anymore that he could finally open up and argue with her the way he should’ve been able to do when they _were_ together. Too little, too late, you know?”  
  
“He seems very easily angered and very capable of expressing how he feels now,” Harry remarked. “You have something to do with that?”  
  
“Did I have something to do with him getting angry?”  
  
“Not exactly, no. You were probably just the right person for him to feel comfortable enough to truly open up to,” the older blonde clarified. “I don’t think I could’ve ever been that for your father, even if I’d stuck around and wasn’t the way I was then. He needed someone less volatile than me, and I’m sorry he never did.”  
  
“He held you up on a pedestal and I never understood why,” Jo commented, honestly.  
  
“Neither did I.” Harry frowned. “I barely liked _myself_. I couldn’t fathom anyone else _loving_ me.”  
  
Mother and daughter fell silent again, which was when Rick had begun shouting out in the lobby. Both women looked over their shoulders, glancing at the door, expecting the blue-eyed former cop to barge right in, judging by the way he was demanding to know where Jo was in a slightly panicked voice. Michonne’s voice appeared next, in a more cool-headed tone.  
  
“How’d you find her? Michonne, that is.” Jo turned her attention back to her mother with curiosity. “I like her sword.”  
  
Harry grinned. “It was about a month after I found your brother. She came wandering out of the woods, onto this road in Brooks we were traveling on. She had two walkers behind her, leading them on like pets. She had ropes around their necks, and their arms and jaws were missing so they couldn’t scratch or bite.”  
  
“They were her cover to get by other walkers,” Jo deduced. “They masked her scent.”  
  
Harry nodded. “It was pretty smart, though it was a little sad, too. I eventually got her to open up about who those walkers were,” she informed. “One was her boyfriend Mike and the other his friend. The camp she’d been at got overrun. They got bit and turned, and her son, who was only a toddler, died as well. Michonne didn’t go into that much detail, other than Mike and his friend were high when it happened. She still won’t talk about it.”  
  
Jo looked back down at her bloody tissue, tears welling in her eyes again, which Harry noticed. When her mother handed her a fresh tissue, Jo used it to wipe her tears away. “I’m scared my daughter’s dead,” she blurted. “I try not to think about that. I keep trying to focus on _when_ we find her and not _if_ we find her, or I try not to think about _what_ I’ll find when I find her. Will she be alive and well? Will she be have been killed and turned on the side of the road somewhere? Will there be just a small grave with a small roadside marker indicating where she was buried?”  
  
“Those are some hard thoughts to ignore. I imagine Rick’s gotta be thinking the same things, but it’s good the two of you still have each other, and all those people you arrived here with,” Harry said, reaching a hand out and touching it down upon Jo’s wrist.  
  
“I don’t know if Finn told you what Rick and I told him; that Hope, my daughter, isn’t Rick’s biological daughter and that he didn’t find me until I was already seven months along.”  
  
Slowly, Harry nodded. “Finn gave me the cliff notes version. He didn’t go into detail and I don’t think he wanted to. I know he seemed pretty angry at himself. Up until he found you in the lobby, he’d have moments, every so often, where he’d get sad and I’d find him crying, alone in his room. I know he was thinking about you and wishing he’d found you. I think hearing what you’d been through made him feel like if he’d found you right in the beginning, he could’ve prevented the bad things you suffered.”  
  
“Rick’s said as much to me, too,” Jo remarked. “If those walkers hadn’t sent Sophia and me off course, leading us away from the road and getting us lost, we could’ve made it back to the road and Sophia would’ve never been separated from her mother and Rick’s original group. I would’ve joined them then and I wouldn’t have ended up in Woodbury. After he found me and got to know me, the more he relayed he’d wished he’d done more to find Sophia and, by extension, me. I just try and block out my time in Woodbury these days. It happened to someone else, not me. I’m a different person than that woman who got trapped there. I’m not her anymore. I had to become someone different to survive; not just physically, but mentally. I mean, there were days—weeks, really—where I wanted to die. But then I’d feel Hope move inside me and I knew I had to fight somehow, for her. Everything had to be for her.” She looked over at Harry and held her eye for a moment before looking over at the desk. “I see myself as an agnostic, but I thank the Powers That Be for putting Merle in my path and helping me get out of that place with Sophia. Because of him doing what he did, Rick _did_ find us, and we got to live someplace safe for a long while. There were ups and downs, a few losses, but it was home and we were all together. Rick delivered my baby there.”  
  
“Did he now?” Harry questioned rhetorically with a smile.  
  
“He did,” Jo confirmed with a nod. “She was born a month early. It was a stressful time. I think my body was just messed up.”  
  
“You and your brother both came a month early, too. Hope arriving when she did might’ve just been a genetic thing and nothing you could’ve prevented.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I guess. She wasn’t as small as I thought she’d be, considering she was a month premature.”  
  
“Or maybe you lost track of time and didn’t realize you were further along than you thought.”  
  
“That could very well be.”  
  
As they fell silent again, Harry turned in her chair and leaned forward, pressing her knees together and cupping her hands in her lap. “My mother died never knowing you, Finn or any of her grandkids. She never got to be a grandma because of the way things were between her and her children. She wouldn’t leave my father, no matter how bad he got. He was the alcoholic but she was the one who was addicted. Her addiction was him and she let it become her world instead of what really mattered,” she spoke sadly, peering up at Jo through some strands of blonde hair that had fallen in her face. “I don’t want to be like my mother, the same way I didn’t want to be like my father. I wasn’t the mother you needed or deserved, but I’d like to start being it now, if you’ll let me. I’d like to be Hope’s grandmother; _when_ you find her, not _if_.”  
  
Staring back at her mother, Jo’s tears returned. Her nose turned a shade of pink and her chin quivered as she bit her upper lip. “It _is_ pretty ridiculous to hold a grudge against you anymore. I’ve lost so much already, so many people I loved. I lost a husband, my father, friends, and possibly my daughter. Gaining my mother back…I think it’s a necessity at this point.”  
  
The way Harry reacted was the same as Jo. Her nose also turned a shade of pink and her bottom lip quivered when she got emotional. The pair of them really was mother and daughter. There was no denying it. Despite never being in each other’s live until this point, the nature aspect of the nature versus nurture argument proved valid yet again.  
  
Making the bold decision, Jo leaned up off her chair and grabbed Harry’s hands in her own and then pulled her mother in for a hug. This time it was different from the embrace in the pantry. She wasn’t looking for consoling after a dreadful ordeal; she was looking to simply hug her mother, and Harry readily welcomed and accepted the gesture with literal open arms.

 

* * *

  
When Jo finally left her mother’s office and made her way into the lobby, Rick practically jumped up to his feet and was at her side in seconds. His strong hands went first to her shoulder and then up to her face where he found traces of dried blood. Furrowing his brow, he looked at her with such concern that it made her heart swell.  
  
“Are you okay?” he asked.  
  
Instead of speaking, Jo simply nodded and pressed her forehead into his neck as she wrapped her arms around his waist. Rick took the hint and wrapped his arms around her back, holding her tight against his chest.  
  
“Let’s go back upstairs and get some sleep. We can talk about it in the morning if you want, okay?” Glancing over Jo’s shoulder in the direction of the office, his eyes fell upon his mother-in-law and gave her a nod of acknowledgement and then moved to lead Jo off down the hall.  
  
Daryl watched the pair go and then looked at the other onlookers that had gathered in the lobby; Finn, his girlfriend Jen and a few other Communers that had been in the courtyard. “Whatcha lookin’ at?” he spat. “Move along. Nothin’ to see here.” With a flick of his wrist he made a shooing motion at them all before glancing over at Michonne and giving her a nod. “You want any help getting rid of the body?”  
  
Michonne shoved her thumbs into the pockets of her jeans and considered the offer for a moment. With a slight tilt of her head and raise of her eyebrows, she shrugged. “Sure.” As she turned, she gestured for him to follow.  
  
As the pair walked down the opposite hallway to the pantry where Raffy’s body still was, Finn walked up to his mother with Jen in tow. The look in his eyes was not just the concern for his sister and the situation she’d just been in with Raffy. There was something that brought a deep frown to his handsome, young face.  
  
“Lena’s not gonna be happy about this.”  
  
“No one’s gonna be happy about this,” Harry remarked, folding her arms across her chest. “He was a Founder.”  
  
“I don’t care what anyone else thinks. Raffy was always an asshole, and tonight he crossed the line for the last time. I’m just concerned about what Lena will do when she finds out he’s dead.”  
  
Harry, Finn and Jen looked between each other and frowned.

 

* * *

  
Just after daybreak, Rick’s eyes fluttered open and he found himself staring into a wall of blonde hair which brought a lazy smile to his lips until he remembered the night before. The smile faded considerably as he lifted his arm and placed it down upon her hip; her body the little spoon to his big spoon. Leaning his head up, Rick pressed his lips upon her shoulder and gently worked his way up along her neck and to her jawline before reaching the spot just behind her earlobe.  
  
A slight moan reverberated from within Jo’s throat as his kisses began to wake her up, causing his smile to return somewhat.  
  
“We need to get up, babe,” he muttered into her hair.  
  
“Mmmkay,” she mumbled back to him. She was lying on her left side, as her right was still too sore to lie on. As she slowly turned over to lie on her back she could feel Rick shifting beside her and she allowed one eye to pop open to spy on him. “How do you manage to look so good when you first wake up and I always feel like a rotten potato?”  
  
Rick snickered as he sat up and tossed his legs over the edge of the bed. Casting a glance back at her over his shoulder, he shook his head. “Trust me, you’re not a rotten potato,” he insisted with an amused smirk. “If anything, you’re sweet potato pie.”  
  
“Ew, that’s worse. I hate sweet potatoes.”  
  
Turning at the waist, he shot her a frown. “How can you hate sweet potatoes? They’re nature’s candy.”  
  
Jo grimaced and pretended to gag. “Well, it looks like I have no choice but to divorce you now,” she quipped. “I want the house and the Benz.”  
  
Letting a hearty chuckle escape his lips, Rick turned back around to look forward as he got up to his feet and sauntered over to his bag to pull out the shirt he planned on wearing for what would probably end up being a few days. Doing laundry on the road wasn’t exactly easy and clean clothes tended to be a luxury. As he pulled the grey T-shirt on, he turned enough where he could see Jo getting up and out of bed as well. There was blood down the front of her shirt that was easier to see now in the light of day that he hadn’t really noticed the night before and what had happened returned to the forefront of his thoughts.  
  
“Do you wanna talk about it?” Rick gestured to her shirt.  
  
Looking down at her front, Jo sighed and shrugged. “There’s not much to say,” she replied. “I went to get some food from the pantry and Raffy came in. He blocked my way out and started to get a bit pervy. He wouldn’t move and he taunted me, so I pulled my gun on him.”  
  
“Is that when you shot him?”  
  
“No, he got the gun away from me first and then I headbutted him and wrestled him to the ground and got the gun back.” She walked over to the sink and grabbed a washcloth, which she stuck under the faucet when she turned it on. As she began to wipe the wet cloth over the front of her shirt to try and get some of the blood off, she looked back over at Rick. “He tried to stab me with a pocket knife of some sort but Michonne and Harry had gotten there in time and Michonne cut off his hand. His only option was to try and choke me, and _that’s_ when I shot him. He had nothing left to lose in choking me at that point and I sure as hell didn’t think when I pulled the trigger.” Jo looked down for a moment, inwardly happy most of the blood seemed to be coming off and hadn’t stained too bad. When she looked back up at Rick, she found him just standing there, gripping the back of the desk chair with one hand and leaning most of his weight on one leg as he looked back at her. “I didn’t feel a thing when I shot him. I didn’t care that I killed him, that he was dead. I think what shook me up the most was the _fact_ that I didn’t care and how easy it was to just kill a man like that.”  
  
Rick nodded and gestured at her with a limp flick of his wrist. “I know all too well what that’s like.”  
  
“I mean, I’ve killed people before. We all have. We _had_ to. I didn’t _have_ to kill Raffy,” she admitted. “I wanted to. Killing him was…cathartic. That’s what was scary. Not just that I didn’t care, but that I might’ve found some pleasure in it.”  
  
Taking the steps needed to close the gap between them, Rick placed his hands on her hips while she looked down toward the ground. He leaned his forehead against her and closed his eyes. “Raffy was one of the bad guys, even if he was one of the founding fathers of this little hotel-commune-whatever. The things he said when you’d gone off with Mika, and when I was hitting him, he deserved it. He deserved the beating I gave him, but I wanted to take it farther and I probably would’ve if Daryl hadn’t pulled me off. I wanted to kill him.” Rick reopened his eyes and stared down his nose at hers. “You just beat me to it.”  
  
“I don’t want to feel so unaffected about killing someone. I want taking a life to have an impact on me. I don’t want to get desensitized to killing a living person like I am to killing walkers.”  
  
“If it means your survival or the survival of our people, I don’t care if we have to kill a hundred living people. I will choose us over outsiders any day.”  
  
Jo lifted her head and frowned. “Bad outsiders, though. I don’t even want to think of killing a good outsider to save one of us.”  
  
“Let’s hope we never have to make that kind of decision.”  
  
Bringing his hands up to either side of her face, Rick ran his thumbs along her cheek and then pulled her in for a kiss, which she welcomed quite readily. The warmth of his breath on her lips and the taste he left upon them was a little piece of heaven to her. The increasing growth of his beard scratched at her chin, but in a ticklish sort of way that made her bite her lips together to keep from smiling too much about it.  
  
“What’s so funny?” he perceptively noticed.  
  
Jo shrugged and shook her head as they pulled back from one another. “Oh, nothing.”  
  
“Bullshit.”  
  
“Well, maybe your beard is very ticklish.”  
  
“Is it now?” he questioned with one raised eyebrow and a smirk that could melt her panties right off her. Stepping right back up to her, Rick buried his face against her neck and brushed his beard along the skin of her neck and up to her jawline on purpose; giving it few gentle rubs that made her instantly try to pull back and laugh.  
  
Slapping him on the shoulders with her hands, Jo managed to push him away with a bright smile on both her lips and in her eyes. “Okay, enough of that or I’ll cut it off in your sleep.”  
  
“It _is_ getting a bit out of control,” he remarked, giving the ends a tug. “Maybe I can ask your brother if he has some sort of shaving kit I can use before we leave.”  
  
Jo’s face practically paled at his comment. “No. I like the beard. Then again, I’ve never even seen you clean-shaven except in that picture Shane found for Lori.” As she began to smile, it faded when the memory of Lori receiving the picture came to mind and she knew Rick was thinking about it, too.  
  
That picture was back at the prison, which was lost to them. There would be no going back for it, just like there was no going back for a lot of things.  
  
The sadness of the moment enveloping them and bringing them back to the task at hand, Rick turned away and began zipping up his bag. “We need to make sure the girls are up, see that they're fed before we get back on the road. If you wanna do that, I’ll go ‘round knocking on doors to get the rest of our people up and moving if they aren’t already.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Sure thing. I’ll meet you down in the lobby in fifteen?”  
  
“Yeah.” Rick handed her bag over to her and, as she took it from him and slung it over her left shoulder, he leaned in and gave her a soft peck to the lips. “Be careful.”  
  
Knitting her brow together, Jo snickered. “I’m just going to get the girls.”  
  
“And last night you were just going for a walk to get some food.” Rick flashed her a knowing look and she understood he was still concerned about everything that had played out.  
  
“I’ll do my best.”

 

* * *

  
The girls were both already up by the time Jo got to their room and insisted they take turns taking quick showers before they got dressed. She sat out in the room, waiting with Mika while Sophia took her turn first, attempting to play Barbie dolls with the girl for the next five minutes. When Sophia came out of the bathroom, dressed in fresh clothes and her long, damp hair hanging down around her face, Jo shooed Mika off to take a shower next. The ten year old set her dolls down and grabbed her clean clothes from her bag and then skipped off to the bathroom.  
  
Jo watched as the door clicked shut, and listened for the water to start running before turning her attention over to Sophia, who was shoving her dirty clothes into her bag and grabbing for her brush.  
  
“How’s your neck?” Jo asked.  
  
“It’s fine,” Sophia replied. “Just a little achy.”  
  
“I’m sorry you had to get whiplash like that yesterday.”  
  
Sophia shrugged and smirked. “It’s okay. It’s not it’s your fault. Shit happens, right?”  
  
Jo raised an eyebrow. “Oh, so we’re swearing now, huh?” she teased.  
  
“Me swearing is the least of our worries.”  
  
“And a smartass, too. Oh, now. I’ve officially got a moody teenager on my hands.” As Jo stood up, she walked up to the girl and gave her a side hug and then ruffled her hair. “Love ya.”  
  
Sophia giggled a bit and nodded. “Love ya, too.”  
  
After both girls were showered and dressed, Jo led them downstairs; passing Rick in the hall just as he was knocking on one of the doors. The pair shared a loving look and then continued with their respective tasks. Once the ladies were downstairs in the lobby, they were greeted by their people, who were sitting around, as well as a few Communers; namely Michonne and Daryl.  
  
Harry appeared a short while later, looking slightly flustered, with John on her tail.  
  
“What’s up?” Jo wondered.  
  
Harry looked over her shoulder at John and frowned upon looking back at her daughter. “You remember meeting Lena yesterday, right?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I think so. Did she have the brown hair and the permanent scowl?”  
  
“Yeah, that’d be her,” John spoke. “Finn and your mother broke the news to her last night about Raffy. The two of them were somewhat of an item.”  
  
A derisive snicker echoed from behind the check-in desk and the threesome looked to find the redhead nurse Nicole sitting there, flipping through an old magazine.  
  
“Let’s be honest, they were fuck buddies. I’d hardly construe that as being ‘an item.’”  
  
Harry rolled her eyes and looked back at her daughter. “Either way, when we told her last night she didn’t handle it very well, as we pretty much expected. We just went to check on how she was doing this morning and she wasn’t in her room and we can’t find her. We’re just worried she’s going to do something reckless and get herself hurt.”  
  
“Well,” Jo muttered. “I, uh, hope you find her.” She didn’t know the young woman and, to be honest, she wasn’t bothered by her apparent disappearance. If Lena was so enamored with a man like Raffy, it said little about her as a person, in Jo’s opinion.  
  
Focusing more on her daughter now, Harry smiled ruefully. “You’re leaving soon, aren’t you?”  
  
“Where you headed again?” John asked.  
  
“Yes, and Washington DC,” she answered them both. “Our only lead as to where our friend Shane and my daughter went was a message on a billboard telling us to go there, and that’s what we have to do.”  
  
“When you make it there, and if by chance you come across a woman named Francine, Francine’s my niece,” John remarked. “I was living in Montgomery, Alabama and headed to DC myself when the shit hit the fan. I never had children of my own and the closest thing I have is my niece. She’s the only family I have left. Her parents, my sister and brother-in-law, died a few years ago: both to cancer. Finn and a few found me just south of the city while they were on a run. I had a sprained ankle and a bunch of walkers were headed my way. I thought I was a goner. They brought me back here and I just ended up staying.”  
  
“Why? What kept you here once you were healed?”  
  
“I found a purpose here. I couldn’t make the trip to DC alone and no one here had a reason to go north with me.”  
  
“You could come with us now,” Jo offered.  
  
John smiled, and she noticed how his eyes shifted subtly toward Harry. “I appreciate it, but this is my home now. I belong here with these people. This is my family now.”  
  
Jo looked between her mother and John and smirked. “Alright.”  
  
“But if you find my niece—”  
  
“Francine.”  
  
“Yes,” he nodded. “If you find her, tell her I hope she’s well and I love her, and if she wants to come here, if your lot do decide to return here to Atlanta, that I’m here and she has a safe place to call home here.”  
  
Jo nodded back at him. “I’ll see what I can do on the off chance I cross her path.”  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
“You’re welcome.” Jo looked back at her mother and smirked, watching as John retreated to give the duo some space to get their goodbyes out of the way. Once he was out of earshot, she muttered, “I think he’s sweet on you.”  
  
“John?” Harry made a face that suggested this was brand new information to her.  
  
“He looks at you like you’re the sun and he’d doesn’t care if he goes blind.”  
  
A tinge of color reached Harry’s cheeks as she blushed, pushing some hair off her face. “Oh, don’t be ridiculous. We’re just friends.”  
  
Jo tilted her head and grinned. “So were Rick and I at first.”  
  
As if on cue, Rick came sauntering down the hall with his usual bowlegged gait. Jo turned and looked over her shoulder, hearing the footsteps and already knowing at once it was him. He walked heavily when he wasn’t trying to be quiet due to some sort of threat. When all was calm, he trudged. When they made eye contact with each other, he winked at her and ruffled the top of Mika’s head before approaching his wife and mother-in-law.  
  
“Everyone’s just about set. Karen’s just getting out of the shower, and then she and Tyreese will be down,” he informed. “Sam said Ana’s already down here. She wanted to get a look at the garden or something before we left. The others will be down in a minute, too.”  
  
“We should get the vehicles ready then; have them parked facing out so loading the trunks will be easier with our bags, and then we can just easily leave.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah,” he agreed as Merle moseyed into the lobby, wearing the same clothes as the day before, and the day before that. Rick looked at the older man with slight amusement. “We’re gonna back the vehicles up toward the door, facing out toward the street to make it easier to load up.”  
  
“Whatever,” Merle replied, pulling the keys to his truck out of his pants as he flashed a flirtatious grin over at Nicole.  
  
Nicole noticed and rolled her eyes, returning to her magazine, which only made Merle smile even more. The older Dixon seemed to have eyes for the redhead and he also seemed to see her indifference toward him as a challenge. As he walked out the front doors, Daryl stood from where he was slouching on one of the couches.  
  
“Yo, Rick, gimme your keys,” the archer offered. “I’ll get your car ready.”  
  
“Is it even road-worthy anymore after yesterday?” Jo wondered.  
  
“Yeah, it runs fine,” Daryl replied. “We got it here after all. The passenger doors are just a bit scraped up and dented. Your door sticks a little, though.”  
  
“How’d you even get me out?”  
  
“I pulled you out from my side,” Rick answered. “Daryl helped me carry you to the van, and then he drove the car here with the girls.”  
  
“You were the only one unconscious and bleeding so getting you here first, where they said they had a doctor, was the priority,” Daryl added, catching Rick’s keys when the former cop pulled them out of his pants and tossed them over.  
  
Jo turned and looked up at Rick with a smile, placing her hands on his firm stomach and gripping the material of his grey shirt. “My knight in soiled armor.”  
  
“This is a clean shirt,” he informed.  
  
“The one from yesterday wasn’t.”  
  
“Alright, you got me there.”  
  
“We need to find you some new pants, too. I swear you’ve been wearing the same pair for as long as I’ve known you.”  
  
Rick smirked. “Probably longer.”  
  
“Ew.”  
  
“I’ve washed ‘em,” he insisted.  
  
Jo just made a knowing face at him.  
  
“Okay,” he caved. “So, you and Carol took turns washing them for me. I did have a backup pair back at the prison that I wore, if you recall. Remember the denim jeans with the hole in the kneecap?”  
  
“The pair that that walker’s intestines fell out on when Merle sliced its stomach open and then it fell dead on you after Shane shot it in the head?”  
  
Rick grimaced at the memory. “One in the same,” he confirmed. “Shit, I forgot why I did away with them.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Yeah, those were beyond saving. Didn’t you burn them?”  
  
“Along with the shirt I was wearing.”  
  
Jo’s chuckle turned into a cackle. “Oh god, yeah; you walked back up from the yard in just your boxers and Andrea was catcalling you.” As Rick nodded, shaking his head with a smirk, Jo leaned in and wrapped her arms around his waist, lowering her voice. “That was just after we got back from that supply run to that Piggly Wiggly. Do you remember _that_?”  
  
Rick looked down at Jo, following her train of thought and grinned warmly as the two of them silently shared a particularly enjoyable memory which had resulted in making the most of finding a package of condoms down one of the store’s aisles.  
  
Once the entirety of Team Family had finally gathered in the lobby, and once all four vehicles were at the ready, goodbyes began to get exchanged.  
  
Jo was busy hugging Finn goodbye and Rick was followed suit; both hugging Harry as well and thanking her for the hospitality, which they found funny since they _were_ technically in a hotel. Sam and Ana were conversing with another younger couple their age, and seemed very engrossed in whatever it was they were talking about. Merle was trying to chat up Nicole who was having none of it, and then there was Sophia who seemed to have made a friend in the girl Piper who was about her age, but probably a year or two older. Jo almost hated to separate the two girls from each other.  
  
“Okay, now I know I mentioned it yesterday, but I’m gonna say it again,” Rick began, addressing everyone; his group and the Communers alike. “We got a long journey ahead of us to DC and we don’t know what’s in store for us, but this is a trip Jo and I need to make. Anyone who wants to continue north with us, we’re leaving in five minutes. When I say anyone, I mean anyone.” He focused on the Communers mostly when he said that. Then, focusing on his own people, he added, “If you want to stay here, that’s fine, too. We want to come back here eventually, regardless of what we find waiting for us in DC.”  
  
Jo concurred, nodding her head. “We’ll be back,” she assured.  
  
“I sure hope so,” Finn muttered with a small smile. “And you better have my niece with you.”  
  
“So do we,” Rick replied with a more serious expression. It had felt like forever since he and Jo had seen their daughter and there was always going to be that fear that they might not ever see her again.  
  
“I’d like to come with you.”  
  
Rick turned to where the voice came from and saw that it was Michonne. She had her katana slung over her back and was gripping onto duffel bag. Harry looked at her as well, with mid surprise.  
  
“You’re leaving?” she inquired of her right hand woman.  
  
Michonne shrugged, but nodded. “I need to go with them,” she insisted. “The world out there has gotten darker and they’re gonna need the extra help when it gets rougher. If I had a chance to get my son back, I’d want all the help I could get along the way. I can’t let another mother lose her child forever.”  
  
Jo’s heart swelled at the selfless offer. Stepping forward, she placed her hands around Michonne’s shoulders and hugged her. “Thank you,” she spoke quietly. “For everything.”  
  
Michonne had remained stiff during the embrace but seemed to warm to it after the fact. She nodded back at Jo and then eyed Rick, who nodded at her as well.  
  
“We’re staying,” Sam spoke up. He gestured between him and Ana when Rick caught his eye. “We’re appreciate you guys bringing us back to that prison and giving us a home, even if that home didn’t last long, and for everything you did to help save us since then. But Ana’s leg can’t take a long journey like that and this place is safe, and you said yourself you’ll be back, so it’s not like we won’t see you again. At least, I—we hope we’ll see you again. I guess you never really know.”  
  
Ana smacked him across the chest with the back of her hand. “No negative thoughts.”  
  
“Sorry,” he nodded with a nervous smile. “We’ll see you again and we’ll have a party to celebrate when you return with Shane and Hope.”  
  
“See?” Ana smirked. “That’s more like it.”  
  
Rick inhaled and exhaled a deep breath, and looked around the lobby. “Anyone else staying or going?”  
  
Jo thought she saw Milton start to say something but then he just remained quiet off to the side of everyone else. Piper, however, stepped forward and gave a shy wave. Several pairs of eyes fell on her when she made her presence known.  
  
“I’d like to come.”  
  
“You sure?” Rick asked, a bit wary about the teenager coming with them. It was hard enough keeping an eye out for Sophia and Mika during all this. “It’s not gonna be some easy-going road trip.”  
  
“If Sophia can do it, so can I,” Piper contended. “And I was on the road by myself for a while before Finn found me. I can take care of myself. I don’t need anyone to hold my hand.”  
  
“This one’s a little firecracker, ain’t she?” Merle quipped.  
  
Rick caved. “Alright, then. Go get whatever you wanna bring with you.” He glanced around again at the lobby. “Anyone else?”  
  
There was silence.  
  
Everyone looked between each other but no one else spoke up one way or the other.  
  
“Okay then. That’s settled.”  
  
As Rick smiled over at Jo and then at his group, he nodded at them and they all stood up, if they weren’t already; indicating to start loading up the vehicles again. One of the Communers, Jamal, walked over to him and Jo with a plastic shopping bag with some fresh vegetables from the Commune garden to take with them. There were tomatoes, carrots, green peppers, onions and green beans. He thanked the other man and passed the bag off to Karen who took it with her to her and Tyreese’s truck.  
  
With two new people traveling with them, but two less, sitting arrangements in the vehicles wouldn’t be hard at all. With Sam and Ana staying behind, that opened up two spots in Morgan’s car. Piper and Michonne had known each other a while so there would be no awkwardness in sitting together in the same vehicle. There was also room enough in Rick and Jo’s car that Piper could sit in the backseat with Sophia and Mika. They’d figure it out once the girl returned and they were all outside.  
  
As Rick watched Jo and Finn hugging one last time, Merle, Tyreese and Karen came running back into the lobby, pushing others back; wild-eyed and tense. Instantly, the hairs on Rick’s arms and the back of his neck stood on end as he sensed something was clearly very wrong. Merle was the last person you’d expect to scare so easily. Before Rick could even ask what was wrong, Lena appeared, rushing inside the lobby as well, panting and covered in blood. Whether it was her own, though, was hard to determine at the moment.  
  
“Rotters,” she blurted. “A _lot_ of ‘em!”  
  
“How much is a lot?” Rick anxiously asked.  
  
“Have you ever been to a southern high school’s Friday night football game?” Merle asked. “You familiar with how packed those stands get?”  
  
Rick’s face fell. “A herd?”  
  
“More like a fucking _horde_.”  
  
“Sonofa _bitch_ ,” Rick growled. He darted for the doors and stepped just barely outside and then stood stock still; listening.  
  
There was nothing out of the ordinary at first, and then there was the smell. A foul odor began to grow stronger, wafting along with the breeze.  
  
Then came the sound.  
  
It sounded akin to hundreds of people snoring in unison mixed with the shuffling of feet.  
  
Before Rick could turn back into the hotel, they appeared at the entrance to the hotel parking lot. There were only a handful of walkers that began to amble forward, spotting him, which he cursed under his breath at, and then, suddenly, there were tens of them and the amount didn’t seem like it would stop anytime soon.  
  
“Shit.” Whipping around, Rick darted back into the lobby and the others looked anxiously at him. “We ain’t getting out that way. Merle’s right. That’s a horde about to come down on us.”  
  
“We’re safe in here, though,” Nicole called out from the check-in desk.  
  
“For now,” Rick shrugged with a tilt of his head. He pointed at the doors. “Those are glass, and enough walkers on them and the doors will crack and break under the collective weight. I’ve seen it happen in a department store here in the city in the early days.” He tossed a look around his people. Only Merle had been there that day he was referring to, but Merle had been handcuffed to a pipe on the roof at the time. “We need to barricade the doors, push the couches up against them. All the windows on this level, too. And stay away from the windows. None of you are new to any of this. Y’all know movement attracts them.”  
  
Finn gestured to several of his people. “Let’s get these couches up against the doors. We’ll stack one on top of the other if we have to.”  
  
Finn gestured to his friends Milo and Jamal, who helped him drag over one of the couches. Daryl and Tyreese grabbed the second. As the first couch was pushed against the glass doors, all five of the men lifted the second couch up, turned it around and then flipped it upside down so that it fit on top of the first like a puzzle piece. Peering over the tops of both, however, Jo shook her head with a concerned frown.  
  
“I don’t get it,” she muttered.  
  
Rick looked at her. “What?”  
  
“Those walkers are determined to come this way, as if they were drawn here. I mean, there’s no one outside right now and they can’t possibly see movement in here through two sets of glass doors with the sun shining on the glass, unless they’re simply noticing their own reflections. Once the others got back inside, they should’ve slowed down a bit and began to wander, don’t you think? But they’re coming right toward the doors.”  
  
Rick turned and looked back toward the entrance and could see exactly what she meant. Narrowing his gaze, he thought more on it when something came to mind. Whipping his head around, he set his sights on Lena, who had been covered in blood when she entered the lobby from outside. However, she was now nowhere to be found.  
  
“Where’s Lena?” he asked aloud to whoever chose to answer.  
  
Others looked around for her, but came up just as dumbfounded.  
  
“She ran down that hallway,” Nicole mentioned, pointing toward the direction of pantry and Harry’s office. “She might be going to clean up.”  
  
“At a time like this, cleaning up should be the last thing on anyone’s mind,” Jo remarked.  
  
“Something doesn’t smell right,” Morgan added his two cents, “and I don’t just mean the decaying crowd outside.” He turned toward Rick and looked almost thoughtful. “Why was she covered in so much blood? There didn’t look to be a wound anywhere on her. And why was she outside on her own? She didn’t go out with our group to help load up the vehicles.”  
  
“She’d been missing since early this morning,” John offered. “She was upset about Raffy dying. She might’ve gone off to be alone and deal with her grief. Maybe take it out on some walkers.”  
  
Jo placed her hands on her hips, a thought coming to mind. “No,” she shook her head, looking at her mother. “You just got done telling me she had feelings of some sort for Raffy, and now he’s dead, because I shot him. She’s not just upset, she’s angry. She’s pissed and grieving, and that can lead to reckless behavior in the best of times. Lena’s going to want justice of some sort, retribution.”  
  
“Were you some sort of psychiatrist in the old world?” Milo quipped.  
  
“No, but my first husband was a guidance counselor, if that counts toward anything.”  
  
“Are you thinking she led them here?” Harry asked, folding her arms across her chest; looking out toward the parking lot at the approaching horde that was barreling down on the main entrance.  
  
Jo shrugged. “I think it’s a likely situation.”  
  
“Why would she lead them here, though?” Nicole demanded, sounding a little nervous. “We’re her friends. This is her home.”  
  
“She fashioned herself in love with Raffy,” John remarked. “Love makes you do stupid things.”  
  
A small glance passed between him and Harry, which Harry was suddenly more keen to ever since the comment Jo had made to her about him.  
  
“She _did_ come running into the parking lot from the road just before we noticed them approaching,” Tyreese informed. “I think it’s a good possibility she’s responsible, whether it was intentional or not.”  
  
“I don’t care what her reasons are. What matters is that we have a metric ton of shit about descend upon us and ain’t none of us doing anything ‘cept standing around talking about some chick’s feelings about her asshole booty call,” Merle bit out, glaring anxiously at the others.  
  
The sound of glass shattering somewhere in one of the downstairs rooms echoed from down the hall to everyone’s left. All heads snapped toward it and then among each other when haphazard thumping soon followed.  
  
Finn dispatched Jamal and Milo to see what it was while Harry decided to go seek out Lena. John offered to come with her, as well as Jo as, who felt that she might be able to help; as she was trying to see things from Lena’s point of view and feeling a bit bad about everything, even though Raffy’s death had been necessary. Turning toward Rick, Jo grabbed his hand and placed a kiss on his cheek, letting him know she’d be right back, and to “hold the fort”. He smirked and told her to be careful and agreed to keep an eye out on the girls as well.  
  
Jo wasn’t halfway down the hallway to the right with her mother and John when she heard the shouts coming from the left hallway. She turned abruptly around to see Milo bursting out of a room, backward, and shooting his gun into the room and then slamming the door shut and holding it closed with his back.  
  
“Where’s Jamal?” Jo heard Finn shout, which also caught both Harry and John’s attention as well, stopping them in their tracks as they looked over their shoulders.  
  
“One of the windows was open!” Milo shouted back. “Walkers broke through the other one and they were falling inside like fucking dominoes! Jamal got—he’s gone.”  
  
“What?” Finn was too dumbstruck for words. “No…”  
  
“Got him right in the face, Finn. Right in the fucking face.” Milo shook his head, tears streaming down his face as he struggled to keep the door shut as walkers on the other side were obviously pushing back against it. “They won’t stop coming, man.”  
  
Suddenly, there were more sounds of broken windows echoing from different rooms on the front side of the building’s ground floor, which meant the pantry and Harry’s office were likely victims. All those in the lobby turned back to the doors and peered over and around the couches to find the horde of walkers were smashing their bodies against the glass. Several heads smashed so hard they killed themselves and their bodies dropped; leaving room for more walkers to attempt to get inside.  
  
“Get away from the doors and windows!” Rick shouted. “If they're close enough, they’ll notice movement inside here and not their reflections anymore.” He turned and looked upon each person. “We need to secure this ground floor. Every room facing out to the parking lot needs to be blocked off. Lock the doors or barricade them with whatever you can so any walkers getting in from those fucking windows can’t get any further inside. We’ll also need to check the rest of the downstairs perimeter.” Turning to focus on Finn, he tapped the young man on the shoulder as Tyreese slipped down the left hallway to assist Milo in holding the door closed to the room Jamal had just been killed and devoured in. “Finn, is there a way to get onto the roof? If we can get up there, a few of us can go up there and begin taking those walkers out one by one with sniper rifles; thin the herd.”  
  
Finn shook his head. “It’s a pitched roof.” Then, “The fourth floor, though. Several of the rooms facing the parking lot have false balconies. The windows can be opened and someone could step out just enough to get a good enough aim.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Alright, then that’s what we’ll do.” Looking to Daryl and Tara, he didn’t even need to say anything to them. They just looked back at him and nodded in understanding.  
  
“On it,” Daryl announced, grabbing up one the rifles that were set down on one of the tables, as Tara did the same.  
  
Both of them took off down the same hall Jo was in with her mother and John; running right past the trio to the very end stairwell. Jo’s gaze followed after the pair and then she looked back at Rick who gave her a nod, assuring her they’d be fine and to go ahead.  
  
Turning back to Harry, Jo ushered the older woman and the man who was crushing on her to continue forward. They went up the same stairwell Daryl and Tara had just gone up, listening to their rushed and heavy footsteps a flight and a half above them. Harry and John stopped on the third floor, though, leading the way out into the hallway and down several doors on the front facing side of the hotel before stopping at a room with the door that was open a crack.  
  
Stepping inside stealthily, John led the way in, and then Harry knocked on the door.  
  
“Lena, honey; you in here?”  
  
“Fuck off,” was the reply they received.  
  
A slight breeze was permeating through the hotel room and the trio noticed Lena standing at the window, which was open; the curtains flapping very slightly. The younger woman was leaning forward, her body protruding out the window enough where she had a decent view of the horde in the parking lot below.  
  
“Lena, did you lead them here?” Harry questioned, stepping cautiously forward.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
All three weren’t prepared for the immediate honesty.  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because Raffy’s dead, and none of you seem to give a fuck,” Lena replied, turning around and realizing Jo was standing there, too. “You let someone you don’t even know kill him and you’ve done nothing to get justice for him!”  
  
“Lena, Jo’s my daughter. She’s not someone I don’t know.”  
  
“You’ve never been in her life. You said so yourself. You _don’t know her_. You know _us_ , Harry. _We_ are your family, not _her_.”  
  
The trio quickly realized Lena was holding a gun in her hands. It was a small one, a revolver of some sort, and it was most likely loaded judging by how tensely she was gripping it.  
  
“Raffy attacked Jo. He was going to kill her, Lena. It was self-defense,” Harry continued.  
  
“He hadn’t been operating at one hundred percent for a while now, honey. You have to have seen that,” John spoke in a calm voice. “We know you cared about him, and we’re sorry how terrible this loss is for you, but what happened had to be done. It was unfortunate and we wish it could’ve been prevented, but it did happen and we need to work together to get through this. But right now, we need to work on taking care of the issue outside first.”  
  
“I want them to come for her,” Lena bit out, glaring daggers at Jo as the sounds of gunshots rang out from a floor above, indicating Daryl and Tara were on task.  
  
Jo glared right back. She didn’t have time for this shit. “Well, they got Jamal instead,” she informed. “You led them here and Jamal just got killed by a walker in one of the first floor rooms because of you. _That_ is on you.”  
  
Lena looked toward the floor, letting the information sink in, but then shook her head. “No, I just—no.” She smiled. “They’re coming here for you. I brought them here for all of your people.”  
  
“Where did you even find that many?” Harry wondered.  
  
“Raffy took me on a few runs, just me and him. We found them locked in the Bobby Dodd Stadium where the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets used to play their football games. I broke open the doors and let them out, killed a few and wiped their blood on me so they wouldn’t really attack me and then played a little game of follow the leader.”  
  
“Oh my god,” Harry gasped. She turned to look over at Jo and John with her hand over her mouth. “That stadium can hold just over fifty thousand people in the stands alone.”  
  
Jo’s face fell. “Oh my god,” she repeated.  
  
“Exactly,” Lena smirked, eyeing Jo. “You took from me the one person I cared the most for in this fucking shithole of a world and now the world is going to take everything from you. I call it divine retribution, you fucking cunt.”  
  
“Lena, now stop it. It doesn’t have to be this way,” John approached.  
  
“There’s nothing for me left, John.”  
  
“Yes, there is. There is life.”  
  
Lena rolled her eyes. “Shut _up_ ,” she barked, raised her gun and shot John in the chest.  
  
The blast echoed throughout the room, stunning the trio; especially Jo, who was painted with John’s blood as she had been standing off to the side from him. As he fell backward to the floor, bleeding profusely, Jo turned to stare at the man at her feet long enough to steel herself and shut down emotion to do what came next; what seemed to come naturally to her now.  
  
Whipping her attention away from John, Jo pulled her gun from her back pocket and fired a single shot into Lena’s forehead without batting an eyelash.  
  
Because Lena had been standing directly in front of her opened window, the force of getting her head blasted, the same as Raffy, knocked her backward; causing her body to tumble feet over head out the window. There was no sound of her body splattering to the pavement below because her fall was broken by the bodies of the swelling sea of walkers. There was, however, a decipherable exclaim of “what the fuck” from Daryl that wafted in the window from whatever upstairs false balcony he was on.  
  
Harry, having snapped out of her initial shock of what had all just happened, dropped to her knees and scooped John into her arms and began to cry over him.  
  
“No, no, no, no, no,” she whined.  
  
“Jo—” he tried to speak, and Jo crouched down to his level. “Make sure…tell Francine…”  
  
“I’ll tell your niece you love her if I find her,” she assured, assuming correctly what he was going to say.  
  
“Thank…you…” A gurgling of blood got caught in his throat and he coughed it up. “Harry,” he glanced up at the older woman, “I wanted to—to tell you…”  
  
“I know, you idiot.”  
  
“I love you,” he finished.  
  
“I know,” she insisted, pressing her lips down to his forehead. “I love you, too.”  
  
“Ahh,” he grimaced, half in pain and half in some sort of amusement. “Too little…too la—”  
  
And then he just stopped; mid-sentence.  
  
John’s eyes stared lifelessly up at Harry and quickly glazed over, determining he was gone. Harry began to sob from her loss, rocking his body to her chest, which caused his blood to soak through onto her shirt, but she clearly didn’t care.  
  
“Mom,” Jo muttered, touching her hand to the older blonde’s shoulder. “I’ll take care of him, so he doesn’t return.”  
  
“No, I’ll do it,” Harry insisted, shaking her head.  
  
“Are you sure?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
Frowning, Jo slipped a knife that was sheathed on her left hip and passed it to her mother. “Here. Take this.”  
  
Slowly, Harry looked down at the blade and begrudgingly accepted it as she brought her tearful green eyes up to look into her daughter’s same green eyes. “Thank you,” she replied. “Go to Rick and Finn, and all the others. Tell them how many of those rotters we have outside. Get everyone out now before all the exits are blocked.”  
  
Jo stood up slowly and nodded. “Okay,” she agreed. “I’ll be back up to get you.”  
  
Giving her mother’s shoulder a squeeze, Jo turned around and hurried out of the hotel room, and shuddering slightly at what had just transpired as soon as she was alone in the hall. She wasted no time, though, heading immediately for the stairwell and taking the stairs two at a time.  
  
Nearing the ground floor, she began to make out the sounds of gunfire and her nerves began to fray. Whipping through the door to the ground floor hallway from the stairwell, Jo turned toward the direction of the lobby and saw people scattering. Guns were raised and firing off toward the main entrance and the closer Jo got, she could see the doors had been shattered under the weight of all the walkers pressing against the glass; both sets of glass doors, too. The couch that had been stacked on top of the other had toppled over and walkers were spilling into the lobby and coming out of other rooms from the ground floor via windows they’d crashed through.  
  
People were screaming in fear or shouting directions of where to go and what to do next and all Jo wanted was to find Rick, Finn, Sophia and Mika. Those four were her priority, no matter how much she loved the rest of her people. Rick was her husband, Finn was her brother and the girls were her daughters now. They meant the most to her before anyone else.  
  
“Rick!” Jo shouted, trying to determine where he was in the foray.  
  
“Jo!” she heard him shouting back.  
  
Narrowing her gaze, she could barely make him out at the other end of the opposite hallway, firing a few shots into two or three walkers.  
  
“Rick!” she called out again. “Where are the girls?!”  
  
“Mika’s here! I don’t know where Sophia went!”  
  
“Fuck,” she grumbled. “We need to leave—NOW! There're thousands of walkers out there! We need to go before it’s too late and we can’t leave!”  
  
“Head for the back of the hotel! I’ll meet you there!”  
  
“I need to find Sophia and get my mother!”  
  
They both paused and held eye contact.  
  
As several walkers suddenly began to pile out of the room closest to Jo, she jumped backward and removed her gun, firing a few shots into their heads.  
  
“I’ll find you!” Jo shouted to Rick.  
  
“I won’t leave without you!”  
  
“You can if you have no choice!” she called back as she retreated to the stairwell again. “You get out of here if you get both the girls!”  
  
“ _NOT WITHOUT YOU!”_ he practically screamed, trying to make her hear over the increasing din of gunfire, frantic shouts, shattering glass and walker snarls.  
  
“Yes! Without me!”  
  
She didn’t wait a second longer. Jo darted into the stairwell and tore up the stairs like a bat out of hell, running through to the second floor, calling out Sophia’s name…


	36. Goodbyes

_“And another one gone, and another one gone  
Another one bites the dust”  
—_ Queen

* * *

  
There wasn’t a moment to waste. There was no time to just stand still and think about options or outcomes. It was all about going with your gut and just moving at a time like this.  
  
Jo ran at full speed down the hall, her blonde hair flapping behind her as if she was running against storm winds. She was in a panic but yet somehow keeping her wits about her as she shouted out Sophia’s name at the top of her lungs. Sophia was her priority in this moment. Sophia was her daughter, regardless of what DNA said. She knew Rick had an eye on Mika and could keep the younger girl safe, but Sophia had gone off, gotten separated. Her brother Finn was a grown man and capable of saving himself, as harsh as it sounded in her head, and her mother, as harsher as it sounded, could do the same if it came to it. Jo could only think about Sophia as she ran and shouted.  
  
If there truly were tens of thousands of walkers out on the road, starting to force their way into the hotel’s ground floor, it was only a matter of time before the accumulative weight and unwavering, undead persistence allowed them to push open the doors to the stairwells and make their ways upwards to the second, third and fourth floors.  
  
It was all about getting Sophia and getting the fuck out, and hoping like all hell that the others made it out successfully.  
  
“Sophia!” Jo screamed once again, turning the corner.  
  
“Jo!”  
  
Sophia whipped around in a flurry of motion and found the teenager ducking her head out of one of the rooms that overlooked the parking lot and no doubt had a terrifying view of the horde outside.  
  
“Oh, thank God,” Jo muttered.  
  
As she retraced her steps to meet Sophia halfway down the hall she’d just torn through, the teenager stepped out into the hall with Piper behind her.  
  
“What’s happening?” Sophia demanded, embracing Jo for a quick moment. To say she was nervous was the understatement of the year.  
  
“Lena was upset over Raffy dying. She broke all those walkers out there out of some college football stadium a few blocks away and led them here. They’re already getting in, that guy Jamal’s dead, and soon enough they’ll figure out how to make their way here,” Jo replied. She looked between both girls. “It’s time to abandon ship. C’mon.”  
  
Without hesitation, but with a nod of her head to signal onward, Jo ran with the teens in tow toward one of the other stairwells at the backside of the hotel. As soon as they burst through the doors to that stairwell in question, they could hear the snarls not far off. The walkers must be filling in the ground floor pretty damn quickly.  
  
Jo turned around and glanced at Piper. “Is there a fire escape to this hotel at all?”  
  
The slightly older teenager shook her head. “No,” she replied, garnering an immediate sigh of frustration from Jo. But, then, she added, “There are a few back doors, on the ground floor that lead down a sort ramp-like entrance onto the street behind.”  
  
“But the ground floor is filling up with an enormous amount of walkers.”  
  
“I don’t know what else to say,” Piper shrugged. “You’re the grown-up. You’re supposed to lead us to safety, right?”  
  
Frowning, Jo sighed. “Well, you’re not exactly a child, either. I mean, yes, I’m going to lead you both to safety as best as I can, but it’s time to grow up now. The adults in your life aren’t gonna be around forever and you need to know how to protect yourself and get yourself out of tough situations like this. If you can’t, you’ll end up as one of them.” Gripping the gun in her hand, Jo gestured for both girls to follow her as she led the way in the direction of the back of the hotel. “We’ll go down one of those back stairwells. Hopefully there aren’t too many walkers coming at us once we get to the main floor.” Turning to Piper, she eyed the girl. “You will show us where the exit out the back of the building is. Can you do that?”  
  
“Yes,” Piper nodded.  
  
“Good. Stay close and don’t break rank from me.” Once down the remainder of the hallway, Jo pushed the door open a hair to the stairwell they were now closest to. Listening carefully, the sound of snarls was quite distant, giving her a bit of hope. “Alright, c’mon.”  
  
Once the door was opened more, she made sure both girls were right there with her as she led the way down the stairs. Reaching the ground floor door happened mere moments later and the sliver of a window that peered out into the hall beyond the door provided insight of what they were in store for. Narrowing her gaze through the darkened corridor, she tried making out how many walkers were approaching. Without running electricity or windows to offer any other form of light, it was very hard to determine shapes.  
  
Taking a steadying breath, Jo opened the door slowly and cautiously as she felt Sophia’s hands reach for the hem of her shirt out of comfort. She cast an assuring look back at her surrogate daughter and poked her head out into the hallway, where the sound of snarls and shuffling feet were getting louder.  
  
Pulling her head back inside the stairwell and closing the door quietly and quickly, Jo whipped her head around and looked at both teens. She needed to see that they got out alive, but something was clawing at her mind and filling her with guilt; a sort of unfinished business, if you will. She bit her bottom lip and frowned as she acknowledged the task she had to undertake.  
  
“Alright, you gotta do this now and you gotta do it quick.” Jo cast a glance at Sophia and then at Piper before looking down at the gun in her hand. “Have you ever shot a gun?” Jo asked suddenly.  
  
Piper shook her head. “I always had a knife.”  
  
“Do you have a knife on you?”  
  
“Y-yes.”  
  
“Take it out and hold onto it like it’s part of your hand.” Turning her gaze back to Sophia, Jo handed her gun over. “Take this, use it if they get too close, but only if you need to. Gunfire will draw more of them to you.”  
  
Sophia nodded obediently. “Got it—wait. Aren’t you coming with us?” she asked nervously.  
  
“My mother’s upstairs. I need to make sure she gets out, too,” Jo admitted. “I can’t—I can’t leave her behind. Not after I just found her.”  
  
Piper looked terrified by Sophia seemed to accept this information. “If it was my mom, I’d do the same.” Sophia nodded with a strength in her that made Jo swell with pride and wish Carol was around to see. “We’ll be fine. We’ll get out. We’ll find the others and meet up with them. But you gotta promise you’ll get out, too. I can’t lose you.”  
  
Tears began to sting Jo’s eyes; happy ones. She cupped her hands on either side of her adoptive daughter’s face and smiled. “You won’t. I’ll find you when all this is over,” she assured. “You get out, and you find Rick for me, and you let him know I’ll be right out as soon as I can.”  
  
Placing a kiss on Sophia’s forehead, she leaned back to see the girl nodding. She looked between both girls then and nodded at the door. Without another word, she ushered them out of the stairwell and watched them run like bats out of hell, crying out briefly as one walker got a little too close to them for comfort, but Sophia pistol whipped it to buy them time.  
  
And time was something they were all running out of the longer they remained in the hotel.  
  
Removing the knife sheathed at her side, Jo jumped back in surprise when upwards of ten walkers began piling toward the door she was standing outside of. Pulling herself back into the stairwell, she shut the door and jumped again at the sight of decaying faces pushing up against the sliver of window in the door. The door had clicked shut, but it hadn’t locked and soon enough they would push it open.  
  
Praying to a God she didn’t actually believed existed, Jo inhaled and exhaled a nervous breath and then turned to run back up the stairs, wincing at the pain in her shoulder that was flaring up at the most inopportune moment. She didn’t stop at the second floor, but did at the third where she knew she’d left her mother. Running out of the door and down the hall, she turned right and continued to head back toward the room her mother was supposed to be “taking care of” John in.  
  
“Harry!” she called out. Then, “Mom!”  
  
She burst into the correct room and found John on the floor, slumped over on his side, facing away from Jo. There was blood on the side of his head from an obvious puncture wound, indicating Harry had kept her word and indeed put John down before he reanimated. The sound of water running in the bathroom alerted Jo and she pushed open the door to find her mother washing her hands.  
  
“What are you doing? There’s no time for hygiene,” Jo admonished, turning off the faucet and grabbing at her mother’s shoulder.  
  
“I did it,” Harry muttered, looking down at her hands. “I killed him.”  
  
Jo frowned solemnly. “No, he was already dead. You just provided him with the dignity to  _stay_ dead.”  
  
Harry shook her head. “No, I didn’t. I couldn’t do it. Everything I’ve been able to do in this new world and I couldn’t do that.”  
  
“But there’s a wound in his head.”  
  
“Yeah, I did do it… _after_ he…he woke up.”  
  
“Okay, well, good. But we gotta go _now_ or we won’t get out at all,” Jo insisted. “They’re all getting in. I made sure Sophia and Piper got out safely. There’s a back exit or two apparently? It’s gonna be difficult, but if we leave now, we’ll be okay.”  
  
“I can’t…”  
  
“Yes, you can. You can do this. _We_ can do this. Together.”  
  
Harry looked so happy, and yet so sad at the same time as she looked back at her daughter. “No,” she muttered, pulling the collar of her shirt away from her neck to reveal a bloody gash in her shoulder. “He came back when I was holding him.”  
  
“He bit you?” Jo’s heart fell.  
  
Harry nodded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to leave his side. I thought I had more time to hold him and say goodbye. He just…he came back so quickly. He caught me off guard, and that’s when I stabbed him, because I knew he wasn’t John anymore. John would never bite me.” She sighed. “I used to think I had all the time in the world. I thought I’d have the time, _this_ time to get to know you better; to meet my granddaughter.”  
  
Tears stung at Jo’s eyes as she leaned her head down against her mother’s chest for a moment. “We got time,” Jo insisted, lifting her head back up. “We’ll get you out of here.”  
  
“No, see, I have to stay.”  
  
“No, you don’t,” Jo shook her head as if Harry was insane.  
  
“I do. See, John was in the military. He’d only just retired about a year or so before the outbreak. His specialty was in explosives. A couple of months ago, we developed a plan in case this place fell. We always knew about the stadium; the risk it posed being so close with so many rotters inside.” She was staring off toward the window that Lena’s body had fallen out of. “He made a run to Fort Benning weeks ago with Finn, Milo and Raffy. They came back with explosives, _a lot_ of explosives; enough to take down a building this size.”  
  
“For what?”  
  
“For a moment like this,” Harry replied. “If the Commune fell to that many rotters, everybody would make a run for it and the detonation device would get switched on.”  
  
“Wouldn’t you need electricity?”  
  
Harry smirked. “We’re talking about a fifty-year-old explosives expert with thirty years of military training. He didn’t _need_ electricity.”  
  
“When does it detonate?” Jo wondered nervously.  
  
“When I connect the wires and push the button.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“No, you’ll get stuck in here.”  
  
“Joanna, I’m dead regardless. If I can die containing as many of those things as possible so you and the others can get safely away, then you gotta let me do that. Let my death have purpose.”  
  
Jo closed her eyelids shut tight, trying to come to terms with this. Her breathing felt erratic from nerves and grief from the impending loss of the mother she had finally just gotten back into her life. “Where is this detonation device?”  
  
“In my office.”  
  
Jo’s shoulders slumped. “The ground floor is getting overrun. You’ll never make it there alone.”  
  
“Maybe not in one piece, but I will do what needs to be done.”  
  
Jo knew that sentiment all too well. “Okay, fine,” she nodded. “But I’m going with you.”  
  
“Jo, no. You have to get to Rick and those girls. You need to find Finn.”  
  
Shaking her head, Jo grabbed her mother’s hand and moved to lead her out of the hotel room. “Try and stop me.”

 

* * *

  
Gunfire echoed off the walls as Rick had run backward in order to keep the approaching mass of walkers in sight. He emptied his gun within moments and, with shaky hands, reached into his pocket to grab a few spare bullets to reload. Not wanting to waste those bullets, however, Rick holstered his Colt and removed his red-handled machete from his side, holding it out in front of him as Mika cried at his side and Nicole, the redheaded former ER nurse, held a stapler in her hands as her only weapon.  
  
“Where’s an exit?” Rick barked at Nicole, his head whipping over to her with an anxious and expectant stare.  
  
“O-over there,” she stuttered, pointing toward doors on the back side of the hotel. “It’s some maintenance rooms. Bu-but they have doors that lead out to th-the back. There’s a street directly behind the h-hotel.”  
  
Leaning down, Rick scooped Mika up with his left arm and she immediately clung to him for dear life as he allowed Nicole to lead the way. As they got near the door in question, she reached a hand out and struggled to get it open.  
  
“What the fuck—is it locked?”  
  
“No, it’s stuck,” Nicole whimpered, banging on the door out of frustration.  
  
“Stop that. We don’t need anything else to draw them in.”  
  
“This fucking place,” she muttered. “I told Milo to oil these damn hinges. They’ve been getting stuck for weeks.”  
  
“Here,” Rick spoke, passing Mika off to Nicole, who took the girl into her arms in surprise. Stepping back, Rick lifted a leg and kicked at the door and then grabbed at the handle, trying to jerk it open. “There’s no way this is just stuck. Someone locked this door.” He pointed at the handle with the tip of his machete and turned to his right to see the walkers ambling closer. “Is there another exit?”  
  
Nicole nodded. “The door next to it,” she replied.  
  
Sighing out of frustration and reluctance, Rick grabbed for the second door and, surprisingly, it did open for him. As he ushered both females inside, a walker reached right for him but dropped moments later before it could even lay a finger. There was a bolt lodged in its skull and Rick snapped his head up to find Daryl and Tara running toward him with their respective weapons raised.  
  
“Daryl,” Rick called out. “You okay?”  
  
The archer nodded, removing the bolt from the walker's head. “As good as can be,” he answered as he slipped inside the room with Rick and Tara in tow. “We took out as much as we could from the fourth floor, but we ran out of bullets.”  
  
“Did you see how many were out there?” he asked, shutting the door behind them. “Did you see Jo or Sophia on the way down?”  
  
It was pitch black in the room so Rick couldn’t see Daryl shaking his head. He had to rely on the sound of his voice only.  
  
“There’s hundreds or thousands of those bastards outside. There’s too many of them,” Daryl remarked. “And we didn’t see Jo or Sophia. Where did you last see them?”  
  
“I don’t know where Sophia went but Jo went to look for her.”  
  
Rick felt a strong hand on fumbling to grasp at his shoulder. “S’alright, brother. They’ll both make it out.”  
  
“Will _we_?” Tara wondered, her eyes slowly adjusting to the dark, the same as the others.  
  
“Nicole, right?” Rick called out. “Where’s this exit?”  
  
“This way,” Nicole replied, her voice leading the way toward the back of the room. The sound of a table of some sort dragging on the ground echoed off the walls and offended the senses in such close quarters. “We never used this room other than as an emergency exit, which we never had to use before. So…so don’t mind the clutter we gotta move around.”  
  
She spoke a little too late as Rick walked right into the corner of the same table that had been moved out of her way. Cursing under his breath, he began feeling even more anxious than he already was.  
  
“Daryl,” he muttered, as the sound of walkers began to pass by the door they had just entered in.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“I gotta find Jo. I can’t leave without her.”  
  
“Well, you ain’t getting out that way now, unless you wanna find her as a one of 'em.”  
  
“Well, I can’t _not_ do something.”  
  
“You could scale the building like Spiderman,” Tara remarked.  
  
“Funny,” Daryl snickered sarcastically.  
  
“I wasn’t trying to be,” she insisted. “I’m serious. Every building typically has drain pipes. Rick could try climbing up one to a window upstairs, break the glass with his gun to get in.” When there was no audible response, she added, “It’s a suggestion, and it’s better than  _no_ suggestion.”  
  
“I appreciate it, but I don’t think that’ll work,” Rick muttered. “Soon as I even attempted something like that, I’d probably pull the pipe away from the building and fall off with it.”  
  
He sighed nervously as Nicole pulled the outer door open and light finally filtered into the room. It was virtually silent outside, except for faint sound of the walkers snarling in the parking lot at the front of the hotel, echoing off the other buildings surrounding the area. At least they hope it was just echoes and not the herd making their way onto the road which was their only exit out of the area.  
  
As they began to slip out the back door quietly, Rick raised his machete and shielded his eyes from the sun with his free hand for a moment until his sight adjusted to the brightness. Straight ahead of them was a large, bright blue dumpster right near the concrete ramp down the back of the property that led to the road directly behind the building. Rick and Daryl both spread out to ascertain the safety of their immediate surroundings with their respective weapons at the ready. The snarling from the front of the building was much louder now that they were outside but the line of trees lining the back of the property on the curb prevented them from seeing what the threat level was in either direction on the road.  
  
Stepping up to the property fence, Rick peered through and looked to his left. “There’s a Citgo at the corner. We might be able to find some different vehicles.”  
  
“That’s the direction the walkers came from. There’s probably stragglers and once a few see us, more will,” Daryl remarked. “I say we go right, down that side street across the road, make a run for it once we got our people together.”  
  
“And where do we do that? Do we just stand here and wait until everyone figures out where to go and meet us?” Nicole questioned, still holding Mika.  
  
Rick bit his bottom lip. “The apartment building across the street,” he said, gesturing through the fence. “We’ll go inside there and keep a lookout.” He looked at Daryl who nodded, accepting that plan for now. Then, noticing Nicole struggling with the ten-year-old’s weight, he turned his back to them both and pointed to his back. “Hop on, Mika.”  
  
The girl moved quickly, grabbing her hands onto his shoulders and hooking her legs around his waist as she climbed onto his back. Rick held onto her left leg as he got accustomed to her weight on him which wasn’t that bad. He had to hunch forward slightly, but he could still move with enough ease with her. It was a necessary move. She wasn’t armed and wouldn’t be able to run as fast as the adults with her short legs.  
  
Not wasting anymore time, Rick led them down the concrete ramp and unhooked the cast iron gate at the bottom, pushing it open slowly while keeping a careful eye out. The other three hurried quietly behind him as they stepped up to the sidewalk and stopped to look both ways; not for traffic, obviously, but for walkers.  
  
As they began to dart across the street in a straight line, one behind the other, toward the apartment building, the sound of gunfire echoing in the air alerted each of them. Their heads whipped to the left to see a few of the random Communers their group hadn’t really gotten to know, along with Finn, Milo and Merle. They were coming from the Citgo gas station at the corner, firing their guns at a small group of walkers that had broken off from the herd, on the road that intersected with the one they were all on.  
  
“Merle!” Daryl shouted.  
  
The older Dixon grinned big when he spotted Daryl. “Little brother!” he shouted back, firing a single shot into a walker’s head.  
  
As the group coming from the corner ran to join Rick’s group, a walker stepped out from a parking lot across from the gas station and clamped its teeth down on the shoulder of one of the unfamiliar Communers. As the young, nameless man pulled himself away, screaming in pain, Rick grimaced. The young man just kept screaming, which was the last thing any of them needed.  
  
A woman ran to his side, crying out hysterically and shot at the walker, but missed; only managing to hit it in the throat, so it kept on coming. Finn growled angrily and made the kill shot. As the walker fell backward, another walker stumbled forward and grabbed onto the woman, biting down on her face, ripping it away as she screamed as well. Blood sprayed out everywhere as Milo shot the offending walker in the head, dropping it.  
  
As there was no saving either of them at this point, and with their screams only drawing attention from the herd that was literally only a block away, Rick made eye contact with his brother-in-law and both men nodded. Passing Mika back off to Nicole, he quickly told his group to head to the apartment building. He then hurried over to Finn’s side and crouched down with him at the wounded couple as Milo and Merle took out the stragglers.  
  
“Shh,” Rick urged the couple, to no avail. “You gotta stop screaming.”  
  
Taking a steadying breath, he shot Finn another knowing look. Rick placed a hand over the wounded man’s face and turned it away from him as he stabbed him through the side of his skull with his machete. The wounded woman screamed again, but it was more from the shock of what she’d just witnessed Rick do.  
  
“Nina, I’m sorry,” Finn insisted; hesitating to do what he knew needed to be done.  
  
“Finn,” Rick muttered urgently.  
  
“I know,” the younger man replied solemnly. Aiming his gun at Nina’s head, he pulled the trigger and dropped her.  
  
Turning away, Finn avoided eye contact with Rick; not because he was angry at Rick for anything, but because he was just upset with everything at the moment.  
  
“Did you see Jen or my sister get out?” Finn asked as he joined Rick’s side; both of them running toward the apartment building Daryl had led the females to.  
  
“Jo went upstairs to find Sophia,” Rick replied, his nerves frayed. “I didn’t see Jen.” He could see the younger man’s shoulders slump, the same as how his were. “I’m sorry.”  
  
“If they don’t make it…” Then realization hit him. “Shit—and my mother.”  
  
“They’ll make it. They have to,” Rick insisted, although there wasn’t too much conviction in his voice. “They have too much to live for. I don’t know your mother or Jen very well, but I know your sister, and she is a fighter. She’s gone through too much to go out now, stuck in there.”  
  
“We all gotta go sometime,” Merle remarked, having been listening to the brothers-in-law talking as they walked up to the front steps of the apartment building.  
  
“You’re gonna want to stop talking,” Rick hissed. As Daryl opened the door for them and they began slipping in, Rick hesitated and turned around, looking toward the back of the hotel. His hand gripping the handle of his machete was shaking. “I can’t…” Turning around and facing his friend, he cocked his head slightly to the side. “Daryl, I gotta—”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” the archer cut him off, stepping outside onto the porch to stand guard in the event of walkers approaching the building. “Go find your woman. I got this.”  
  
Rick gave him a nod as Finn moved to join him. “No, Finn. Stay here. If I don’t make it back, you help lead the rest of any survivors away from here with Daryl. You go to DC with them, and you find my daughter, your niece. Understand me?”  
  
Finn huffed. “Jen’s in there.”  
  
“And I will try and find her, too. Just stay put.”  
  
Without waiting for confirmation that his brother-in-law agreed to what he said, Rick ran back across the street and up the concrete ramp just as a second floor window shattered. He looked up to see glass showering down to the ground, followed by bedsheets tied together like a rope dropping down from the window. It looked so cliché, but in the time like this it proved necessary.  
  
Stepping back slightly to get a view at who was about to exit the window, Rick spotted Karen climbing out, carefully avoiding any remaining shards of glass, and then descending the rope, gripping it tightly in her hands. She slid down as far as she could before she could drop safely the rest of the way to land on her feet without breaking or spraining a foot. Rick hurried over to her, to spot her as she dropped the rest of the way in case she needed something to break her fall. She _did_ slightly lose her balance when she touched down, and winced as mild pain shot up her leg from her foot, but smiled with relief to see Rick there.  
  
“Who else is up there with you?” he inquired.  
  
“Tyreese and Sam.”  
  
“Anyone else?”  
  
Karen shook her head sadly as Sam began to descend the rope next. “Ana got attacked on the stairs. She wasn’t fast enough to get away. The walkers grabbed her leg and pulled her down and they just surrounded her so quickly,” Karen informed, tears stinging her eyes. “Oh God, her screams.”  
  
Rick grimaced. Sure it was sad about Ana, but he was imagining Jo suffering the same fate. He turned his face away from Karen and looked up to see Sam dropped down to the ground as Tyreese climbed out next. Sam looked completely shaken but he was in one piece, even if covered in a little bit of blood. Rick couldn’t help but wonder whose it was.  
  
“Go across the street, to the apartment building just there,” Rick pointed through the property fence. “Daryl and a few of ours are there waiting.”  
  
“Are Jo and the girls there?” Karen asked.  
  
Rick shook his head slightly. “No, well, Mika is. She was with me, but Jo went off looking for Sophia and neither of them have come out yet.”  
  
“I’m sorry, Rick,” she muttered.  
  
“They’re making their way up the stairs now,” Tyreese announced as he dropped down to the ground, placing his hands on his knees to brace himself as he straightened his posture. “The second floor is gonna be swarming with them soon enough.”  
  
That was the last thing Rick wanted to hear and it showed on his face as his own tears stung at his eyes.  
  
Fortunately, one good thing happened next.  
  
The same door he’d come out of with the others burst open and out tumbled Sophia and the other teen girl, Piper. As soon as his adoptive daughter saw him, she ran right over to him and threw her arms around him with a cry of relief.  
  
Rick wrapped his arms tightly around her back and sighed with relief as well, although it was short-lived. “Did Jo find you?”  
  
Sophia pulled back and nodded. “Yeah, but she went back for her mother.”  
  
Rick’s shoulders slumped. There had been such a glimmer of hope there for a second when he saw Sophia come out and now it was gone. “Okay,” he nodded, feeling a bit distracted by his thoughts. “Where’s her mother?”  
  
“I don’t know.”  
  
“Alright,” he muttered. “Go across the street. Daryl’s waiting in an apartment building with some of our people. Hurry up.”  
  
“Aren’t you coming?”  
  
“I gotta find Jo,” he insisted.  
  
Tyreese placed a hand on his shoulder. “The entire first floor is overrun, Rick. You won’t get in. You’ll get killed before you could take two steps in any direction.”  
  
Rick shrugged Tyreese’s hand away. “I gotta do _something_.”  
  
“Surviving is doing something,” Karen remarked. “Jo would want you to survive so at least one of you could go find your daughter. You know that’s what she’d want.”  
  
“It’s not what I want. I want _her_.”  
  
“She’s probably dead, and you want to go get yourself killed,” Sam grumbled bitterly. “You have people who still depend on you; you have children, Rick.”  
  
Rick glanced at the towheaded man. “You don’t think I know that?” he growled slightly.  
  
“If you do, then why are you going to risk your life?”  
  
Tyreese frowned. “Sam’s right, man. You can’t go back in.”  
  
“You gonna stop me?”  
  
“I can and I will,” Tyreese replied. “I’m a big man. You know I can knock you out with one punch. I will throw you over my shoulder and carry you away from here if I have to.”  
  
Rick hesitated, clenching his jaw as well as his fists. “Goddammit, fine.” Gesturing down the concrete ramp, he added, “C’mon, this way.”

 

* * *

  
At the base of a different stairwell she’d originally gone up earlier to first go looking for Sophia, Jo peered through the sliver of window in the door to see plenty of walkers bumping into each other in the ground floor hallway on the other side.  
  
“Shit,” she muttered.  
  
“There a lot of ‘em?” Harry questioned.  
  
“Hell yes.” Throwing an anxious look over her shoulder at her mother, she sighed heavily. “There’s only one way we’re getting through that hall and to your office in one piece.”  
  
Inhaling deeply, Jo opened the door slowly and as quietly as possible. Reaching a trepid hand out, she grabbed onto the arm of a walker and yanked it toward the door, which she opened up a bit wider to pull it into the stairwell. She had to move fast as she shoved the door shut with her body and simultaneously stabbed the eternally hungry creature in the head with her knife.  
  
As the body slumped down the stairwell wall, other walkers out in the hall began pounding at the door, having been alerted to movement.  
  
“Keep that door shut,” Jo commanded, as she crouched down in front of the walker.  
  
“What are you going to do?” Harry wondered, pressing her back against the door with as much strength as she could muster.  
  
Holding her knife in front of the walker’s chest, Jo grimaced. She answered her mother’s question by stabbing the walker and dragging the knife up from gut to gullet. Blood and intestines began to spill out onto his lap, and Jo didn’t stop there, despite the immediately offending stench that filled the air. She stabbed the legs, the arms and the face; just hacking away and ripping it apart with her hands.  
  
“I think I’m gonna be sick,” Harry remarked, bringing a hand up to cover her nose.  
  
“You can be sick when you’re dead,” Jo commented, and then looked up sheepishly, realizing what she’d said. “I’m sorry. I forgot.”  
  
“It’s okay,” Harry assured.  
  
As Jo returned to ripping apart the walker with her hands, having set her knife down on the floor, a door to one of the upper floors opened up to the stairwell, followed by heavy and hurried footsteps descending the stairs. Both mother and daughter looked upward expectantly. They could tell that kind of movement didn’t belong to a walker, so they felt safe enough at the moment.  
  
Then, at the top of the landing several feet above them, Michonne appeared with her katana at her side and covered in blood. She looked as relieved to see them as they were of her.  
  
“Oh, thank God. There you are,” Michonne exclaimed, hurrying down the rest of the stairs and looking at what Jo was doing with curious eyes.  
  
“We need to get to Harry’s office, but this floor is full of walkers,” Jo informed, pulling intestines out, and having to stop for a moment when the stench and gore suddenly got the better of her.  
  
“What’s in the office?” Michonne wondered.  
  
“This building has been rigged to blow up in case something like this ever happened,” Harry replied. “John set it up a few weeks ago with plenty of C-4 he found at Fort Benning. The detonation device is in my office. I just need to connect the wires first and as soon as I press the button: boom.”  
  
“You’re doing it by yourself?”  
  
“I’ve been bit.” Harry reached up to reveal her wound to Michonne. “Long story short: John did it. Lena shot and killed him. Jo killed Lena. And then John came back and bit me. The end.”  
  
Michonne frowned, and then looked away from Harry to Jo, who was fighting back the urge to vomit. Crouching down beside the blonde, she set her katana down and began grabbing the intestines as well. “We’re gonna wear this shit, ain’t we?”  
  
“That’s the plan,” Jo struggled to reply over the lump of vomit stuck in her throat. She swallowed it back as best as she can, but couldn’t do it anymore. Turning around quickly, Jo threw up on the floor behind her; hunching forward on her hands and knees. Spitting the rest of it out of her mouth, she turned back toward the eviscerated walker with renewed vigor. “Alright, I’m good.”  
  
She and Michonne both began to wiped the blood all over their arms and chests, getting each other’s backs as well. They wiped the blood on their faces; careful to keep it away from their eyes and mouths. They rubbed it in their hair and clothes and then stood up to coat Harry as best as they could. There was plenty of blood to go around, and it was offending Jo again as her stomach began to sour.  
  
Draping intestines and other body parts around their shoulders in order to mask their own scents and smell like the dead, which they sure as hell did, they were prepared for making the risky trek into the walker-infested hallway.  
  
As the three of them stood there, Jo and Michonne each reached back down for their respective weapons as they looked at Harry who was struggling to maintain her weight against the door with her gradually weakening state from the infection in her system. Michonne took over, grabbing onto the door handle and making the decision to lead the way out since she had the larger weapon. Although, she would have to keep it lowered as they made their way through the hall.  
  
With a nod of agreement, Michonne determined it time to open the door.  
  
Slowly and quietly, she pulled it open and the other two stepped in time behind her. Several walkers’ heads turned toward them but they just kept their wits about them as best as they could. Neither one spoke nor did they try making eye contact with any walker, as if the undead would somehow know they were alive from that alone. Walkers came close to them, sniffing aimlessly in their direction. Several bumped into them as well, because the hallway was just that congested. The women were tensing; jaws and fist clenching as they breathed quietly and steadily out their mouths because of the overwhelming smell.  
  
It was working rather well.  
  
The walkers didn’t seem to give a shit about them. There were one or two that got a little too close for comfort, possibly able to sense something human about them, but then getting pushed off by other walkers. The women tried snarling to fit in better, but Harry wasn’t that good at it. Just before they reached her office, the walker of a child, as sad as that sight was, came stumbling up against Harry, which startled her. The noise that came from her alerted other walkers, especially the child one, who bore its teeth and bit into her hand.  
  
Jo and Michonne snapped their heads toward Harry and then grabbed her quickly as they darted the rest of the way to the office, which was only a couple of feet away. Michonne raised her katana and swung, removing heads in her way with graceful ease while Jo jammed her knife into the heads nearest her; both kicking at others to keep them back as best as they could.  
  
Jo struggled with the door knob a little at first and then was able to shove it open; pulling her mother inside. Michonne piled in after them and immediately threw her back up against the door before setting it on lock with the deadbolt and then stepped away to let out a breather.  
  
“Getting out is gonna be much harder than getting in here,” Michonne remarked, giving her blade a shake of excess walker blood.  
  
Harry sauntered tiredly over to her desk and pulled open a bottom drawer. She pushed some papers aside and lifted up to reveal there was a false bottom as she removed the detonation device in question. Jo and Michonne watched anxiously as the older female turned and crouched down to pulled something out from underneath a shelf, which turned out to be two wires. Leaning against the wall behind her, Harry sank down to the floor with a tired sigh and twisted both wires together.  
  
“How long until this places blows?” Jo inquired.  
  
Harry looked up at her daughter and smiled sadly. “The second I hit the button, which is why you two need to get out of here as soon as possible,” she replied. “I might have fifteen, maybe twenty, minutes left in me. I need to press the button before then or it won’t happen at all. Please make sure you get away from here quick. Find the others that got out, get them away from the building. Don’t let my death be in vain. Please.”  
  
Jo and Michonne both nodded as they watched Harry shove the tangled wires into the end of the detonation device and then let her thumb hover just below the trigger mechanism.  
  
“Are you sure you can do this?” Michonne asked.  
  
Harry nodded. “I have no choice. I have to do this. I _need_ to.” Turning her gaze up to Jo, she stared warmly. “You and your brother were the best thing I ever did. The only happiness I ever felt in my life was the moments you were born. I wasn’t there for you during your life, but I will be there for you with my death.” She nodded at her own comment and looked over to the left. “There’s an axe in that cabinet, and some extra bullets. Take ‘em.”  
  
Michonne stepped forward and pulled the cabinet door open. She grabbed the box of bullets up and shoved it into one of the deeper pockets of the cargo-style pants she was wearing and then passed the axe to Jo who needed the larger weapon more than she did. Taking it gingerly, Jo nodded at Michonne and then crouched down to her mother’s level.  
  
“Thank you,” she muttered. “For everything you did and didn’t do for me.”  
  
Harry smirked. “Give that daughter of yours a big kiss for me when you find her. Tell her Grandma Harry is watching out for her in heaven, or wherever it is I end up in the afterlife.” She chuckled at herself and then, as an afterthought, she added, “Give that husband of yours a kiss for me, too. He’s a good lookin’ man, and if I were twenty years younger…”  
  
Jo chuckled as well, but her slight laughter was tinged with grief as tears began to roll from her eyes. “I will. I’ll kiss them both and hug them tight and never let go. Finn, too. I’ll tell him you love him.”  
  
“Thank you, Joanna. My girl.” Harry gestured toward the door with a nod of her head. “It’s now or never, you two. Stop wasting daylight.”  
  
Michonne reached a hand out and gripped Jo’s shoulder to get her to stand up. Jo just nodded and stood back up to her feet.  
  
“Love ya,” Jo muttered, stepping backward toward the door.  
  
“Love ya, too.” Just as Michonne unlocked the door again and was about to open it back up, Harry called out, “Hey.” Both women at the door looked back at her. “Goodbye.”  
  
“Bye, Harry,” Michonne replied.  
  
“Goodbye, mom.” Jo smiled ruefully and then turned to look at Michonne.  
  
With a flurry of motion the door was lurched open and Michonne swung fast and efficiently, allowing Jo to close the door behind them so no walkers would get inside the office and prevent Harry from doing what she needed to do. Side by side, both women ran toward the lobby, which was a mistake, since that’s where most of the walkers were still piling in from. There was definitely no getting out that way or down the opposite hallway, and the way they’d come from was too congested with walkers that knew they were alive. Their only option — as walkers began gaining on them — was through the courtyard and hopefully find a way out on the other side.  
  
With her axe raised, Jo struck the glass of the door. As it shattered before them, they then moved through the opening, careful not to scratch themselves on any shards because of the walker blood coating their skin. At breakneck speed they darted across the courtyard as walkers began spilling in behind them. The door on the other side gave them a perfect view of the hallway at the back side of the building, which was congested with walkers now. And it seemed they were officially screwed.  
  
Michonne, however, had been part of the Commune basically since the beginning and new all the ins and outs. “This way,” she pointed with the tip of her katana toward a window as they ran in that direction. “That window leads into a room. We break the window and crawl in, and then make a run for the stairs that’ll be just outside that room. We get to the second floor, break another window, and we’ll hafta jump down.”  
  
“And hopefully not break our legs in the process.”  
  
“If we do, we crawl the rest of the way out.”  
  
With her axe, Jo once more broke the glass, this time to the window. Michonne pulled a chair over to help them climb in. She hurried up and removed her brown, leather vest and draped it over the ledge so they didn’t cut themselves on the shards sticking out, letting Jo climb in first. Once both had made it into the room, they wasted no time looking back except for Michonne to take her vest with her. They hurried over toward the door and pulled it open, immediately kicking at walkers in their way and swinging their respective blades into skulls.  
  
To their immediately left was a door to a stairwell that they yanked open. A walker very nearly clamped its teeth down on Jo’s arm, but Michonne’s blade swiftly lodged itself into the walker’s cranium, dropping it like a hot potato.  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“Don’t mention it,” Michonne muttered as the two of them slipped into the stairwell and then took the stairs two at a time.  
  
If they had ten minutes left to get out, that was definitely a lot, but the clock wasn’t the only thing they were forced to fight against.  
  
Once in the second floor hall, they heard screams of what could only be someone being ripped apart. And, sure enough, when they looked down the hall, they saw it was the doctor, Gavin Trevitt getting his face and neck torn open from decayed teeth and hands. His unfortunate fate allowed them the distraction to head toward a room facing the back of the building without too many walkers in their way.  
  
As they darted into the room, they found they weren’t alone. Inside were Milton and Jen, cowering and holding what appeared to be simple kitchen knives in their hands.  
  
“Oh, thank God,” Jen muttered. “How do we get out?”  
  
“We jump out a window,” Michonne remarked, deadpan.  
  
“We’ll break our legs in the fall,” Milton admonished.  
  
“We don’t have any other choice,” Jo replied. “My mother has this place rigged to explode within the next five to ten minutes, give or take. We need to go now.”  
  
Michonne stalked up to the window and swore under her breath. “There’s bars on this window. We gotta find a different room.”  
  
“Why are there bars?”  
  
“I forgot. We installed them to use this room as a type of jail cell, so no one could get out that we put inside here. _Fuck_.”  
  
“Alright, come on.” Jo led the way back out of the room as walkers came stumbling toward her and the others.  
  
As they neared a room at the end of the hall that faced the side of the building, Michonne opened the door and looked back at Jo, letting her in first and then as Jen got close, a walker practically launched itself at her and bit down on her hand, removing two fingers in the process. Jen screamed out in pain as blood spewed from where her fingers had been. Michonne and Jo looked back in shock and, as another walker came to finish the job, Milton shoved Jen toward the other two women, condemning himself in order to save Jen. The approaching walker bit down on his arm and as he yanked it away, two more walkers came up to him; one biting into his neck and another at the ear on the opposite side. He screamed out in pain, matching Jen’s agony, but when Jo made eye contact with him, he seemed rather resigned to his fate and Jo could only nod at him.  
  
He’d earned her respect at last. He’d put someone else’s life before his own.  
  
Without another word, Jo slammed the room door shut and turned around to see Jen hunched forward and bleeding on the floor.  
  
“Oh my God, I’m gonna die!” Jen cried out. “No, no, no, no…”  
  
“Shut up,” Jo bit out. They didn’t have time for her cowering. “Hold your hand out.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Just do it, dammit.”  
  
As Jen obliged, Jo raised her axed up and then swung down at the floor, severing Jen’s arm; halfway between the wrist and the elbow to play it safe as she didn’t know how fast the infection might’ve already spread.  
  
Jen screamed out in agony again, but Jo pulled her up to her feet. “Get up or we’re leaving you.”  
  
“You cut off my hand!”  
  
“To save your damn life,” Michonne remarked as she went to the window and shattered it. She took the comforter off the bed and draped it through the window and gestured for the other two to come over.  
  
“No, you go first,” Jo insisted. “You drop down and then be there to help break Jen’s fall. I’ll climb out after.”  
  
“You sure?”  
  
“We don’t have time to debate this. Just fucking do it.”  
  
Michonne nodded. Sheathing her katana, she crawled up onto the window’s edge and then stuck her legs out. Twisting her body around, she gripped the edge with her hands, straining to keep herself up and not just fall backward out the window. Using as much upper body strength as she could muster, Michonne slowly lowered her body down the side of the building, her feet dangling and then, with a shaky breath, let go.  
  
The spewing of expletives and the soft thud coming from outside indicated that she’d gotten out just fine.  
  
“Okay!” Michonne shouted up. “Send out Jen!”  
  
Quickly removing a pillowcase, Jo draped it over Jen’s severed hand and wrapped it tightly around the stump just as quickly and tightly as possible while leading her over to the window. “You can do this, Jen. Think of Finn waiting for you.”  
  
Jen’s lips and chin were quivering. She was crying out of fear and pain as she nodded begrudgingly as Jo helped her crawl up onto the windowsill. Gripping as tightly as she could on the younger blonde’s forearms, Jo did her best to dangle her out the window without just unceremoniously dropping her.  
  
She did, however.  
  
The door to the hotel room clanged open and walkers began to spill inside, which distracted Jo. Her grip on Jen released and the younger woman fell. Fortunately, Michonne was down below and broke Jen’s fall. As they clambered to their feet, Michonne looked wildly up at the window.  
  
“Jo! Come on!”  
  
There was no response.  
  
“I think walkers got into the room,” Jen muttered, lethargically. Blood loss was getting the best of her. “She had to let go of me.”  
  
“Oh God,” Michonne muttered. “Jo!”  
  
Still nothing.  
  
But then, “Go! I’ll be right behind you!”  
  
Michonne stared up at the window, having heard Jo’s voice to know she was still alive. At least, for the moment she was. With minimal relief, Michonne threw Jen’s good arm over her shoulder and began to lead her toward the back of the building, toward the concrete ramp.

 

* * *

  
Rick was pacing in the front yard of the apartment building with his fingers twitching over his holstered Colt. His nostrils were flaring, his jaw clenching and unclenching, and his heart was beating so fast he felt like he was going to drop dead.  
  
“You’re gonna wear a hole in the grass, man,” Merle quipped, leaning against the porch railing with his bladed arm draped across his lap.  
  
“I’m gonna wear a hole through your head if you don’t shut up,” Rick sneered, throwing a dangerous look over his shoulder at the one-handed man.  
  
“You’re going to draw attention to yourself, Rick,” Morgan spoke.  
  
He had made it out of a third story window moment with the help of a rope he’d found, minutes after Rick had led Tyreese, Karen, Sam, Sophia and Piper across the street. Morgan had gotten out alone, losing two Communers that had been trying to escape with him up to the third floor. When he had informed Rick that he hadn’t seen Jo either, Rick had headed straight into the apartment building, kicking open the door to the downstairs apartment on the right and knocking shit over out of frustration.  
  
When Rick had seen how shaken Mika looked to see him acting so rashly, he felt an instant pang of guilt and went back outside to calm down.  
  
“We need to think about getting the hell out of here,” Milo advised. “Eventually the herd is gonna split. Not all of them will fit inside the hotel and those fuckers are gonna spread out. They’ll come this way. We need to be on the move.”  
  
Rick turned around and glared at the bearded blonde man. “You wanna go, then go. I ain’t keeping you here. But I’m staying until Jo gets out.”  
  
“If she hasn’t gotten out by now—”  
  
“If you wanna keep your fingers, you won’t wanna finish that sentence,” Daryl threatened, knowing how hard of a time his best friend was having at the moment.  
  
If Rick lost Jo he was certain that would be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Daryl knew that Rick cared for Sophia and Mika as his own, that he loved them as his own, but he also knew Jo meant so much more to him. The couple had been through so much together since Jo came into his life. Losing the prison, their friends, and not knowing whether their daughter was alive or dead in the world had been tough enough to try and deal with. But through all that, at least Rick and Jo had each other. The entire group was a family, of that there was no question, but Jo was his lifeline. Without her, Rick would lose himself and become something less.  
  
Daryl could almost see pieces of it now in his friend’s eyes. The light was going in them. Rick was hardening, becoming a shell at the thought of walking the world without his other half. Daryl knew how that felt. Sure, he and Carol had never had the chance to become anything more than just good friends who loved each other, but he knew something more could’ve developed between them and with that chance gone forever, a part of him died with her back at Terminus and he was certain he’d never get it back. He didn’t want that for Rick.  
  
Everyone’s attention was drawn back to the hotel at the sound of shattering glass echoing off surrounding buildings. A few walkers up the road stirred at the noise and started ambling forward with renewed vigor.  
  
Rick, along with Daryl and Finn hurried up to the property line, stepping up to the sidewalk parallel to the street and stared with anticipation toward the hotel. Then, moments later, they saw two figures walking down the concrete ramp, through the trees lining the sidewalk at the back of the hotel’s property. One was a dark-skinned woman and the other was a blonde woman, being helped along by the former.  
  
His heart swelling with hope, Rick darted out across the street. Pulling out his Colt, he shot an approaching walker in the face as both women hurried away from the concrete ramp and out onto the pavement.  
  
“Jo!” Rick called out with relief, but then stopped in his tracks.  
  
Michonne looked up at him with a grimace as he realized the blonde woman wasn’t Jo.  
  
“Jen!” Finn shouted as he rushed past Rick and pulled his girlfriend into his arms. She cried out in pain upon the gesture and he pulled back to notice she was holding what looked to be a bleeding hand wrapped in a pillowcase. “What happened?”  
  
“Rotters bit my fingers off,” Jen whimpered.  
  
“Jo cut off her hand with an axe to prevent the infection from spreading,” Michonne informed as she limped away from the hotel while Finn scooped Jen up into his arms bridal-style.  
  
Rick turned toward Michonne at the mention of Jo’s name. “Jo—is she?”  
  
Michonne shrugged. “She was right behind us.”  
  
“I’m going back for her,” Rick decided, taking a step forward but was stopped by Michonne grabbing his arm.  
  
“No, we need to get as far back from the hotel as we can.”  
  
“Jo’s still in there!” he growled.  
  
“Harry had the hotel rigged to blow sky high if it ever got overrun like this. If we have two minutes left, that’s a lot.”  
  
“I only need one.”  
  
“Rick, don’t be an idiot.”  
  
“Oh, shit, the failsafe,” Finn muttered. “Rick, Michonne’s right. John found a shit ton of C-4, planted it all over the hotel.”  
  
Michonne eyed the younger man. “Your mom was bit, twice. We got her to her office and she’s in there with the detonation device. She said she loves you.” As Finn nodded solemnly at that information, Michonne turned back to Rick, trying to pull him back toward the house where she saw the others. “She gave us fifteen, twenty minutes tops. And time is up, Rick. I’m sorry.”  
  
A wave of so many different emotions began to hit Rick, but at the forefront was anger and denial. He couldn’t just stand there and let Jo die in an exploded building. He had to do something. He had to save her. He had to—  
  
A series of orchestrated blasts from inside the hotel suddenly went off. The ground below everyone’s feet rumbled like an earthquake had struck, car alarms in cars thought to be long dead came alive and then came the windows to the hotel shattering outward as the entire building suddenly imploded. Like dominoes or a game of Jenga, the building collapsed inward on itself. A huge billowing of smoke and debris shout out in every direction causing everyone at the apartment building to take cover or just drop to the ground as not to be injured from the blast or any form of shrapnel.  
  
As smoke continued to fill the air around them and coat them with the dust, each person got back up and stared across at the empty space which was once the hotel. There were a few small fires burning here and there, but mostly it was just all smoke, which caused almost everyone to cough and hack.  
  
“No,” Rick muttered, scrambling up to his feet. “No, no, no, no, no…”  
  
He wiped the dust from his face a bit to see better and waved a hand in front of him to clear some of the smoke as he began stalking toward the rubble. Daryl was at his side, placing a hand on his shoulder.  
  
“Rick, she’s gone.”  
  
“ _No_ ,” Rick whined, tears stinging his eyes worse than the dust and smoke.  
  
His nostrils were flaring again, but it was from the overwhelming feeling of grief he was trying to rein in but failing miserably at. He got halfway into the road and dropped down to his knees. His hands were outstretched slightly in front of him and then he just dropped them to the pavement and hunched forward onto the ground as he sobbed loudly. His sobs wracked his entire body and he was virtually inconsolable at the moment.  
  
Everyone else seemed just as stunned and shaken. Karen was holding Mika close, who was crying as well, but Sophia was the other one to take this new development as hard as Rick. She dropped to her knees, sitting back on the heels of her feet and began to cry. Daryl stepped back toward her and crouched down beside her, pulling her into his arms to hug her close. He couldn’t imagine how the teenager was feeling, having losing one mother so soon after the other. Jo and Sophia had been through so much together, just as Rick and Jo had.  
  
Falling over onto his side, Rick curled himself into a fetal position and just continued to cry for the loss of the love of his life.


	37. Carrion

_“Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war;_  
_That this foul deed shall smell above the earth_  
_With carrion men, groaning for burial.”_  
_—_ William Shakespeare, _Julius Caesar_

* * *

  
“Rick…Rick, man, you need to get up now.”  
  
As the smoke cleared and the dust began to settle, there was a ringing sound becoming more and more evident in Rick’s ears as he casually lifted his head and looked up toward the rubble that was once the hotel. He blinked once, twice; straining to see from the dust that had gotten into his eyes and stung quite a bit. His brain had shut down on him and he seemed to have forgotten who he was and where he was for a moment. His mouth opened to speak, but no words wanted to come out.  
  
Placing his hands out on the dust- and debris-covered pavement before him, Rick spread his fingers wide and the memory of when he’d first returned home after waking from his coma re-entered his mind.  
  
Was any of this real? Was he dreaming?  
  
He had a feeling that he wished it was all a dream but, again, he suddenly couldn’t remember why.  
  
“Rick.”  
  
The ringing in his ears was slowly subsiding, allowing him to register that it was Daryl’s muffled voice calling out to him. Before he could even attempt to sit up completely and turn his head, the archer was crouched down in front of him, waving a hand in his face to grab his attention. Rick stared blankly back at his friend, as if waking up from a particularly deep sleep.  
  
“Rick, the walkers that didn’t get taken out from the blast are on the move,” Daryl was saying. “We need to move. We can’t stay here any longer.”  
  
Jo.  
  
That name came to mind instantly, and then the face the name belonged to and Rick’s heart felt like it was being ripped from his chest and eaten in front of him. The pain of his loss came rushing back like flood waters breaking through a levee. The tears in his eyes were no longer from the dust, but once again from his grief as the most utterly heartbroken expression spread across his face.  
  
“I know, brother. I know,” Daryl continued, placing a hand on Rick’s shoulder. “But we gotta go.”  
  
“Jo…”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“No…not without…not without Jo,” Rick insisted, shaking his head and fumbling as he pulled himself up to his feet.  
  
“She’s gone. She’s gone, Rick.” Daryl grabbed onto Rick’s shoulder a bit tighter when the former cop made a move to walk toward the rubble with sudden determination. “She wouldn’t want you to die here, too. She’d want you to go on and find Hope.”  
  
Without warning, Rick grabbed the front of Daryl’s shirt and got right in his face. “She’d want to be alive!” Rick shouted, drawing unwanted attention their way, but he clearly wasn’t in the mood to care much about that at the moment.  
  
“No doubt,” Daryl agreed. “But she’d want _you_ to live as well; for her, for _them_.”  
  
Rick followed Daryl’s gaze over to Sophia and Mika who were huddled together with Karen at their side; both girls sobbing and sniffling from the grief they shared with Rick, as well as the others who knew Jo. Slowly, he nodded his head, despite wishing he could deny what Daryl was saying to him. Daryl was right. Those girls needed him now more than ever.  
  
“Jo’s body, though…”  
  
Daryl nodded. “We’ll come back. We’ll try looking for it— _her_ —later. But we gotta go.” He lowered a hand to Rick’s arm and pulled him back off the street, meeting with slight hesitation at first.  
  
Turning away from the rubble, Rick allowed himself to be led away by Daryl as Merle seemed to take lead in rallying everyone together with a whistle and a wave of his remaining hand.  
  
“We’ll take that side street and just keep going until we can put enough distance between us and those skin bags. Then we’ll find some cars and get back on the road,” the older Dixon announced as everyone began to follow behind him off the front lawn of the apartment building. “C’mon, you lazy asses. Time’s a-wastin'.”  
  
One by one, and two by two, the survivors took off on foot around the corner, and down the side street. The entire time, Rick could barely feel his feet touching pavement; as if he was floating in a dream or, rather, a nightmare he couldn’t wake up from. He trailed behind with Daryl close by as everyone reached the end of the road and turned right, and then another left where they came upon an enclosed parking lot with several abandoned vehicles ready for the taking.  
  
“Jackpot,” Merle announced.  
  
A few straggling walkers were easily done away with as they made their way down that side street, looking for an entrance into the parking lot to what had apparently been an Aramark Uniform Services building, when there was a smaller building with an even smaller parking lot behind it. What was more was the yellow school bus just sitting there in that second, smaller lot, as if it was begging to be utilized.  
  
“Even better,” Milo remarked, pointing out the bus. “We get that running, and we can all travel easily together.”  
  
“That’s a better plan than separate vehicles,” Morgan agreed. “We see if it runs, if it needs any fuel, and then we get on the road. We can look for supplies once we’re clear of the greater Atlanta area.”  
  
“I gotta go back,” Rick mumbled; his voice barely above a whisper.  
  
“You can’t right now,” Michonne asserted, staring at him with a hint of regret in her eyes. “That herd needs to pass.”  
  
“It won’t pass unless it has a distraction,” Finn spoke up, standing there with Jen ready to pass out from blood loss at his side. “If we get a few cars together, we can lead them away. And I want to go back as much as you, Rick,” the younger man insisted, trying to gauge eye contact with his brother-in-law, “but we have to take care of a few of our injuries first.”  
  
Nicole stepped forward. “Let’s get Jen inside this building and I’ll see what I can do for her.”  
  
“Fire,” Sophia muttered out of the blue.  
  
Several faces turned toward her.  
  
“What about it?” Finn asked.  
  
“When Maggie, a friend of ours, lost her arm, Jo suggested heating up a metal bucket with some sort of fire and then pressing it against the wound to stop the bleeding and prevent it from getting infected with a normal infection. It worked.”  
  
Nicole nodded at the teenager. “Cauterizing the wound will definitely work, but we gotta move quickly. Jen’s already lost quite a bit of blood. She’s soaking through that pillowcase.”  
  
As Finn and Nicole began to lead Jen over toward the building, which seemed to have been some sort of non-denominational life church in the old world, Merle and Tyreese offered their services in going first to make sure the inside was safe enough.  
  
“Don’tcha worry there, blondie,” Merle quipped. “I’ll make ya somethin’ like what I got to wear in place of your hand once ya heal. I’ll show ya how to use it, too.”  
  
“Thanks,” Jen muttered sleepily as she began to pass out from her blood loss.  
  
The rest of the survivors remained outside, keeping an eye out for walkers or talking among themselves about what to do next. Michonne sidled up beside Rick and touched her hand to his arm; drawing his distracted attention somewhat toward her.  
  
“We’ll go back for her,” she assured. “We’ll find her and we’ll bury her. Maybe in that park, or whatever that is, over there.”  
  
Rick glanced down the road at where Michonne was gesturing and then looked back. “It doesn’t feel like she’s gone,” he spoke quietly.  
  
“It’s fresh, it just happened. It’ll take getting used to.” Michonne shrugged. “Sometimes I still feel like my boyfriend’s still alive. I’ve even talked to him.”  
  
“I already lost my son, my ex-wife, and possibly my daughter.” Rick shook his head. “I can’t lose Jo, too.”  
  
“How long were you married?”  
  
“I…” Rick tried recalling how many days, and then he remembered the conversation the evening before in Harry’s office with Harry, Finn, Jo and him, and his stomach twisted into several knots. “A week ago tomorrow morning.”  
  
Michonne frowned solemnly. “Shit—I’m sorry.”  
  
“I wasn’t the happiest person when I met her. I wasn’t in the best place. I had a lot of anger in me; from losing my son, my first marriage falling apart and falling out with my best friend,” he rattled. Tears were stinging his eyes again, but his face was void of emotion. “And then there she was; this very pregnant breath of fresh air, giving me a reason to be happy again — to be _in love_ again. I thought I’d lost that chance forever. _Now_ I have. There is no such thing as third time’s a charm, and I don’t want there to be. I loved my first wife, I did. But Jo was— _is_ —the love my life. And that love,” Rick paused, cocking his head slightly to the side as his tears began falling down his face despite his best efforts to rein them in. “That love died with her.”  
  
“What about your daughters?”  
  
“That’s different. That’s a different love—a _father’s_ love.”  
  
“It’s clear inside!” Tyreese announced, appearing at the opened, front door of the church.  
  
Rick and Michonne both looked toward the building, and then briefly at each other.  
  
“We get settled inside for now, then we gather a few of us together. We’ll take a couple of cars and head back to hotel, or…lack thereof,” Michonne commented, holding Rick’s eye. “We’ll lead those rotters away—”  
  
“Walkers.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“My people, we call them walkers,” Rick muttered, raising his hand and gesturing lamely at nothing in particularly. “And if something didn’t happen to Jo’s head and she comes back as one of them before I can find her…just don’t call them rotters. Walker sounds…kinder; less…less final.”  
  
Michonne nodded in understanding. “We’ll lead the _walkers_ away,” she obliged. “We’ll honk horns, rev engines and shout at them out to lead them from the rubble. When the coast is clear enough, a few more of us will check the debris. We’ll see if there’s anything to find.”  
  
Rick nodded back in appreciation, although he was still quite preoccupied with his grief. “Thank you.”

 

* * *

  
In what had once been some sort of youth room inside the Atlanta International Church where Jen was laid up on a sofa, a fire was set inside a metal bucket full of old papers. A clean rag had been balled up and shoved in Jen’s mouth so she had something to bite down on and to muffle the screams everyone knew would come when the end of her arm was shoved into the scorching flames. The others stood around full of different emotions but also anxiety with having to watch the pain Jen was going to have to suffer in order to help cauterize her wound.  
  
Karen and Tara waited in another room with Mika, Sophia and Piper to keep them distracted and so they weren’t present to witness what would happen, even though all three girls had witnessed much worse in their short lives. Sam seemed a little comatose as he sat in the same room as Karen and the girls, just staring at the floor, no doubt distracted by his own loss. The expression on his face wasn’t all sadness, though. There was a considerable amount of anger in his otherwise blank gaze and the hints of a sneer at the corner of his mouth. Everyone was affected by their own losses and most members of Team Family, along with Finn, were mostly thinking about the loss of Jo, and how terrible for Rick to have lost the woman he loved, but Sam was suffering the same as Rick. Ana was the woman he loved and he _did_ see her die, whereas Rick would never have to witness such a thing. Sam watched walkers swarm and devour Ana, he’d listened to her screams of agony and there hadn’t been a thing he could do to help her. He didn’t have a gun on him to shoot her in the head so he could put her out of her misery. All he’d been able to do is run away with Tyreese and Karen to seek safety.  
  
The screams from within the youth room cut into everyone’s consciousness like a sharp knife and their attentions immediately diverted to the suffering of the young woman who’d lost her hand. Even with the gag in her mouth, Jen’s screams were still loud and agonizing. They were also, however, short-lived. Hot flames burning her open wound with all those exposed nerve-endings was too much for her to handle while awake, so her mind shut down and she consequently passed out.  
  
Morgan had been helpful in finding a First Aid kit with plenty of ointment packets for Nicole to use later on. With the severed limb properly cauterized, as best as could be managed in those circumstances, the tourniquet that had been created with Finn’s belt before the cauterization was loosened and dressings were applied with a white, choir robe cut into thick strips and dampened. There were a few packets of pain medication in the kit as well, but those couldn’t be given to Jen until she woke back up.  
  
For now, it seemed like Jen would be okay, but only time would tell. Her injury was still fresh and no one knew if the infection, from getting her fingers bitten off by that walker, hadn’t already spread much further up into her arm beyond where Jo had amputated from.  
  
It would be a waiting game and Finn was nervously pacing, but Michonne assured him that Jo’s actions had been quick. She had reacted without wasting time and she believed Jen would be fine; that her limb would eventually heal over with the care Nicole was able to administer.  
  
But now, Jen’s problems had to take a backseat to the issue of diverting the walkers away from the hotel’s rubble.  
  
Because Rick wasn’t at one hundred percent operating capacity where his mental state was concerned, and Finn was just as equally preoccupied, Michonne and Daryl seemed to tag team in taking lead over the two adjoined groups of survivors. They orchestrated who would do what; where, when and how.  
  
It was decided that Tyreese, Merle, Morgan and Milo would be best at leading the walkers away; two to a vehicle. Heading to the Aramark parking lot next door, they rustled up two large trucks sitting vacant, which had a decent amount of gas. They would take their respective trucks to the roads in front of the hotel property and behind it and lead the herd south toward the city center, and further if possible. Leading them all south would make it easier for the group to head north without much hassle, if at all, after the trip back to the rubble and the burial of Jo’s body took place.  
  
Of course, that was considering there was even a body left to bury.  
  
And it wasn’t just Jo they would bury.  
  
Anyone from either group that could be found amongst the rubble would be given a proper burial, while any remaining walkers that the blast hadn’t completely killed would be left to rot even further.  
  
At that bit of information, Rick could only think back to life at the prison, when they burned walkers but buried their own. He never thought he would actually live long enough to bury Jo first. He had always just assumed it would be the other way around. It was what he had wanted. He never wanted to outlive her because he never wanted to _live_ without her, but he had no choice now. He had to live. He had to go on for the girls; for Sophia, Mika…for Hope.  
  
That killed Rick even more.  
  
If and when he found Hope, he’d have to watch his daughter grow up without her mother. He’d have to answer those questions she would someday ask about what her mother was like, and he realized he didn’t have a picture of Jo to even show Hope someday. He remembered Jo had taken a few pictures from the frames in her house in Decatur. At the time he hadn’t known what they’d been pictures of, but in the months that followed he had learned they were just pictures of her father, brother and even of Oscar. But none had her in them.  
  
Rick wondered if maybe they couldn’t make a brief stop back at Jo’s old house. It wasn’t that far from where they were now. With no detours or road obstacles, they could get there in twenty to thirty minutes if they drove cautiously enough. He could go back into that house and find a picture of Jo and keep it safely for years to come.  
  
If he _had_ years ahead of him yet to come, of course.  
  
When Merle, Tyreese, Morgan and Milo set out for Operation Pied Piper, as Milo was calling it, Michonne, Daryl and Finn joined Rick in heading back toward the hotel. They went by foot, traveling north up the main road they were taking shelter off of, by the name of Glen Iris Drive. The name, in itself, was not lost on either Daryl or Rick as they both glanced up at the street sign at the same time. They both were thinking of their fallen friend who had died from the sickness back at the prison just before the prison, as a whole, fell due to The Governor’s attack.  
  
Instead of turning down the same side street they’d initially come down after fleeing the hotel, the armed foursome went one block further to North Avenue, the road intersecting with Glen Iris, which also intersected with the roads in front and behind the hotel property. They turned left onto the road, dispatching a few walkers that had strayed from the herd, which was a great release for the four of them. The undead were perfect scapegoats for their respective anger and grief of the day’s turn of events.  
  
They had no walkie-talkies to communicate with the guys in either of the trucks to know how they were doing with leading the herd away, but they could determine when it was safe to head to the hotel site by simply peering discreetly around the next corner at the Citgo station. They had to hang back behind the Food Mart because there were a lot of walkers in the gas station parking lot and on the streets that they just didn’t have a good chance of taking out without getting bitten or injured in some other way.  
  
Rick, however, was more than ready to just walk right out into the thick of it. Fortunately, Daryl pulled him back and gave him a knowing look.  
  
“There’s too many. We gotta wait until more of them move down the road,” the archer remarked, leaning against the brick façade of the building with his crossbow lowered and pointing at the ground.  
  
Michonne narrowed her gaze, focusing on nothing in particular. “I can hear the horns from the trucks honking. They’re not far enough away yet.”  
  
“Walkers move slow,” Rick muttered. “It’ll take the guys a while.”  
  
Finn peered carefully around the corner of the building. “They _are_ moving, though. They’re taking note of the sound,” he denoted, referring to the walkers.  
  
“We could be here for a while,” Michonne added. She looked up and saw how antsy Finn got at that. “Jen might wake up before we get back. You should be there for her when she does. You can tell the others back at the church we might be gone longer than planned, too.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “She’s right. It’ll be getting dark in a few hours. We don’t know how long we’ll have to wait here. We might have to stay overnight somewhere around here. You don’t want to be away from your girl that long.”  
  
“But Jo’s my sister,” Finn commented. “I should be there, too, for—”  
  
“They’re right,” Rick cut him off. “You should be with Jen right now. She’s still alive.” The brothers-in-law looked each other in the eye and Rick frowned solemnly. “Take advantage of that, as much as you can, _while_ you can, ‘cause you never know…”  
  
Slowly, Finn nodded and then reached out a hand to take Rick’s. As both men shook, Finn then pulled Rick in for a half-hug. “You make sure you get back safe to the church. Aside from Jen, you’re the closest thing I have to family anymore.”  
  
“I can’t make any promises,” Rick replied dourly. “But I’ll try.”  
  
“Good enough for me, I guess.”  
  
“If I don’t make it, tell Sophia and Mika I said I love ‘em, and then you go find my daughter Hope for me, and you take care of her as your own, with the others.”  
  
Finn exhaled an anxious breath. “I will.”  
  
With a nod at Rick and the other two, Finn backtracked down the road toward the direction they’d come from, armed with his gun, but also a long, hunting knife.  
  
Turning his attention to Daryl and Michonne, Rick shifted his weight from one foot to the other and gripped the handle of his machete tightly in his right hand. His gun was safely secured in its holster because the sound of firing it would only draw attention the walkers that were supposed to be following the trucks.  
  
“I don’t know how much of a leader Finn is so, if something happens to me, I need to know you’ll take over where I left off,” he said to Daryl. “Morgan and Tyreese are strong where fighting is concerned but they’re basically teddy bears. Sometimes there’s things that need to be done that are necessary and I know they’d hesitate. Your brother can be a loose cannon at times. Karen, Tara, and Sam…they’re a bit soft around the edges, too. I only trust _you_ to lead; to do whatever needs to be done for the good of everyone else. I trust _you_ can make the tough decisions.”  
  
“We ain’t gonna get to that point, ‘cause you ain’t dying anytime soon,” Daryl responded, shaking his head.  
  
“If I _do_ …”  
  
“Nope.” Daryl scratched at his nose and looked defiantly back at Rick. “You got more people that need you alive. Those girls lost too much already, and now Jo. They ain’t losing you, too, Rick.”  
  
“Daryl…”  
  
“Merle’s my brother, my blood, so me and him are bound because of it, even if he is an asshole and winning no brother of the year awards anytime soon. But you’re my brother by choice and I won’t let you get yourself killed, understand me?”  
  
Rick attempted a smile as he cast his gaze downward. “Yeah,” he nodded. “I understand you. I just…I don’t think I have much more fight left in me.”  
  
Daryl grunted. “’Course you do. You’re Rick _fucking_ Grimes. You ripped out a man’s neck with your teeth when you thought all was lost and you had no more options left. You’ve kept us all alive, time and again, despite all the bullshit flung at us from walkers and the living alike. You can survive anything, brother.”  
  
“ _Damn_ ,” Michonne muttered. “I’m kinda jealous.” Both men looked at her and she snickered slightly looking back at Daryl. “I wish I had had a friend like you to talk me up whenever I was down and out.”  
  
Letting out another grunt, a smirk appeared at the corners of Daryl’s lips. “You can use my services whenever you need ‘em.” Slinging his crossbow over his shoulder, he nodded at her. “My rates are fucking expensive, though.”

 

* * *

  
An hour and a half of standing behind the Citgo station had come and gone before the herd had progressed far enough down the road to the point where it was safe enough for the trio to cut through the gas station’s parking lot. They wove between some small trees and the side of another brick building on the opposite street corner, edging their way closer to the hotel rubble with their melee weapons ready to use. Coming upon what was left of the Commune, it seemed like their breaths became stuck in their throats. They didn’t dare utter a sound for a few reasons. For one, they didn’t want to draw any unnecessary attention themselves from the tail end of the herd only a couple blocks down the road from where they were. Second, with the dust settled and setting eyes on the rubble with more clear heads, they were just too dumbstruck at what had happened. And, third, it was like they were traipsing up to a graveyard which, in a sense, they were. This was where the bodies of their loved ones were entombed under piles of concrete, steel, plaster, wood and other heavy materials.  
  
“Where did you last see Jo? Which section?” Rick asked quietly, his eyes scanning the area as they ascended the concrete ramp, stepping over several large pieces of debris in the process.  
  
When they reached the property’s main elevation, Michonne gestured to their right with the tip of her katana. “The side of the hotel over there, near that dumpster.”  
  
Rick didn’t wait for her or Daryl to join him. He marched on ahead of them, making sure not to trip and impale himself on any of the sharp objects sticking out of the rubble. He kicked some smaller pieces aside with the toe of his boot or with the tip of his machete while his heart began to race at what he might find.  
  
A part of him was hoping there was nothing whatsoever to find, because he didn’t want to discover Jo’s body completely shredded to bits from the blast and the hotel falling down upon itself. Or maybe walkers had gotten to her before then. He didn’t know, and Michonne didn’t know anything other than Jo having told her she would be right behind her.  
  
But she hadn’t been; she hadn’t gotten out right behind Michonne and Jen.  
  
This wasn’t a rescue mission for Rick.  
  
It was a recovery mission.  
  
His chest felt heavy and fresh tears began to sting at his eyes as he looked around at…everything. Some steel framing from the building still stuck upright, as a testament to the construction workers who had worked hard at building the building umpteen years ago. There were a few fires burning in spots, or at least smoldering, which had been sparked from the blasts. There were also a few broken water pipes, spewing streams of water, here and there. It was an utter wreck and, aside from the specific section of the building that was no more, Rick had no idea where and how to begin.  
  
So, with a quivering chin and tears streaming down his face, he sheathed his machete at his side and hunched forward, picking up pieces of concrete and plaster and tossing them as far away from him as he could. Daryl was at his side almost immediately, following his lead. Moments later, Michonne pitched in as well.  
  
The three of them worked hard and tirelessly to try and find any sign of a body for a solid hour when Daryl suddenly stood completely upright, and backed up a foot or two. Rick caught sight of the archer stopping and tensing up. Standing up straight as well, Rick turned his body toward Daryl and narrowed his gaze toward him. The early evening light was hitting the dust they were kicking up in such a way that it gave the property an eerie haze, which did little to calm Rick’s nerves. Daryl suddenly acting the way he wasn’t didn’t help the situation any.  
  
“What is it?” Michonne wondered, noticing as well.  
  
Daryl licked at his bottom lip and wiped his nose with the back of his hand; either because of dust in his nostrils or to rein in the urge to cry. The expression on his face seemed to suggest the latter.  
  
Placing his hands on his hips, Rick planted his weight as his shoulders slouched; understanding that Daryl had found something. “Did you…?” he began, apprehensively; uncertain he could say the words. “Is it Jo?”  
  
Daryl simply stared back at Rick and said nothing, but his lack of words spoke volumes.  
  
His heart ready to pound out of his chest, Rick brought his hands up to his head and pushed his hair from his face and then dropped his arms down to his sides in defeat as he stepped over toward where Daryl was standing with a feeling of trepidation. Looking down at the rubble before them both, Rick saw what had visibly caused the reaction in Daryl.  
  
It was a lifeless hand sticking out from between the debris.  
  
Sure, the skin was dusty and covered in soot, as well as dried blood, but they could tell the skin color was Caucasian.  
  
Rick’s legs buckled underneath him and he dropped to his knees, which was painful considering the sharp edges to the debris underfoot. He wasn’t bothered by the physical pain he was feeling. He was too enveloped by the emotional. Gritting his teeth and hold in the sobs preparing to escape his throat, Rick hunched forward and began clawing at the debris around the hand and dislodge the rest of the arm to get to the body underneath.  
  
The _body_. Christ. That’s all Jo was now, wasn’t she? Just a body. The person she had been was gone now.  
  
Then something more distressing occurred. As Daryl crouched down beside Rick to help him move the debris aside, Rick took the cold, dead hand in his, with his tears spilling down his face, and pulled up slightly, only to launch backward. He’d been expecting a struggle with trying to pull Jo upward through the opening he and Daryl were creating, but that wasn’t what happened. When he realized what had happened, he almost wanted to vomit.  
  
Rick was still holding the hand in his.  
  
But that’s all it was.  
  
Just a hand and half of a forearm.  
  
“Oh, God, no…” he blubbered.  
  
“Wait!” Michonne hissed, stepping forward. “Drop it.”  
  
“What?” Rick muttered, glaring up at her as if she had just insulted all his ancestors.  
  
“The hand, the arm—it was cleanly severed,” she pointed out. “It wasn’t ripped away from the rest of the arm. Are there fingers missing?”  
  
Rick released his grip on the hand and set it down over a broken section of door. Looking down, he noted the pinky and ring fingers were missing. “Yeah…”  
  
“Shit,” Daryl muttered with a small breath of relief. “It’s Jen’s hand that Jo cut off. It’s not Jo.”  
  
Rick threw his hands up with a sense of defeat as he brought his knees up to his chest and rested his head in his hands. “I don’t know if I should be grateful or upset about that.”  
  
Neither Michonne nor Daryl knew what to say.  
  
Being grateful the hand didn’t belong to Jo didn’t help anything because it meant Jo’s body was still trapped somewhere in the wreckage and it was likely they might not be able to get her out. Being upset was pointless because, either way, Jo was buried in the rubble, and there was no saving her. It was a lose-lose situation all around.  
  
“No,” Rick blurted, pushing Jen’s arm aside. “I gotta find Jo. I can’t leave until I do. You two can head back if you want, but I can’t.”  
  
Daryl looked over at Michonne who nodded back at him in silent agreement. Neither would leave either until they uncovered something, anything. Even if they only found Jo’s  _actual_  hand, at least it would be something for Rick to bury and find a sliver of peace in, and possibly even some closure on his long road of emotional recovery that lay ahead of him.  
  
Another hour later saw the sun setting and the only body parts they were finding were obviously those that belonged to walkers. The decay was too advanced to be someone who was recently deceased. After a while, Daryl and Michonne had move toward the front parking lot, killing the walkers still writhing around that were pinned under pieces of debris or who lost the limbs they required for wandering away. The pair cleared off Team Family’s abandoned vehicles, managing to pry open the trunks of the car or the cabs of the truck and retrieved a few of their supplies.  
  
Rick looked up from his relentless search for Jo’s body to notice Daryl holding Jo’s bag in his hands and looking solemn.  
  
Without missing a beat, Rick stood up and clambered over the rubble to snatch the bag away.  
  
“Don’t touch that,” he barked, not meaning to sound so harsh toward his friend. Grief was merely getting the best of him. “That’s Jo’s. That’s her stuff.”  
  
Pulling the bag open, he peered inside and bit down on his bottom lip as he pulled out her hairbrush. It was the one she had grabbed from that Ulta shop just a couple of days before with Sophia. There were a few strands of her blonde hair woven through the soft boar bristles. His chin quivered and he set the brush back in and then pulled out that bottle of perfume Jo had swiped from that store as well. Setting the bag down on the back of the car he’d been traveling in with Jo and the girls, Rick removed the cap to the perfume and brought the dispenser to his nose to inhale a bit of the scent.  
  
He would keep these things to help him remember her by.  
  
He would keep them to show Hope when she got older, so she knew what her mother’s hair looked like and how she smelled.  
  
Placing the cap back on the bottle, he set it into the bag and then rifled around some more while Daryl and Michonne looked on quietly, out of respect, while also keeping a look out for any walkers in the near vicinity. The rueful expression Rick had come to wear upon inspecting the first two items fell away when his fingers touched upon something else. Grabbing it up in his hand, Rick pulled out a pack of playing cards and that was what broke him.  
  
The memories of getting to know Jo at the prison began with playing cards late at night while everyone was asleep, just before Hope was born, and they continued to play cards with each other for months afterward. It was one of the pastimes they enjoyed with each other. As recent as a couple of days ago in that grey house, they had played.  
  
“Go fish,” Rick muttered aloud, but neither Daryl nor Michonne understood the reference.  
  
It was the card game Rick and Jo had chosen to play that night in the grey house. She’d beat him, and he folded. The night had ended so well, with making love to her in that twin bed. It now felt likes years ago. How foolish they were to think they’d have so much time ahead of them.  
  
“There’s never enough time,” he continued to mutter.  
  
Rick threw the pack of cards into the bag and then gripped the strap as he turned from Daryl and Michonne. Despondently, he began to trudge back across the rubble to resume digging around. With light disappearing from the sky, however, it made that task so much harder to do, and Daryl and Michonne knew no more progress would be made that night, and possibly never at all. There was just too much rubble to dig through and they didn’t know how far down the building’s collapse would’ve taken Jo’s body.  
  
Wandering toward the front parking lot, from the same route the herd had originally come from, a few walkers began to amble toward them.  
  
“We got company,” Daryl announced.  
  
“Rick,” Michonne called out in a lowered voice. “It’s getting dark. It’s not safe to still be out here right now.”  
  
“Michonne’s right,” the archer agreed, firing a single bolt into the head of one of the approaching walkers. “We can pick this up at sunup. I hate having to say it, but Jo ain’t going anywhere. _We_ are.”  
  
“The fuck I am,” Rick growled, ignoring the fact that his fingertips were bleeding from the scrapes and cuts he’d given himself due to all the debris he was trying to sort through and was tossing aside.  
  
Angered strictly by his sadness at seeing his friend in such a state, Daryl traipsed over the rubble and grabbed Rick’s arm, yanking the grieving man up to his feet. “It weren’t a suggestion, Rick.”  
  
Rick tried grabbing his arm back but Daryl was surprisingly strong. Not that he wasn’t normally, but more so now in his determination to get Rick away from the wreckage.  
  
“We’ll come back in the morning,” the archer continued. “I promise.”  
  
“We’ll stay across the street in that duplex or whatever that is where everyone had taken cover when this place fell,” Michonne offered up. “It’s close. You don’t even have to sleep if you don’t want to. You can stay up all night on one of the upper porches staring at all this if you want to, but we gotta go.”  
  
Rick looked around at the rubble; at the progress they hadn’t actually made. His tired, blue eyes glance beyond the pair in front of him, over their shoulders, to the nearly fifteen or more walkers still approaching. After a moment, he nodded begrudgingly. With that, Daryl released his grip on Rick’s arm and Rick finally yanked it away. He gripped Jo’s bag eve tighter in his hand and made the dejected journey across the rest of the rubble to lead the way away from the hotel property and back down that concrete ramp to the road below.  
  
Releasing a shaky breath to calm his nerves, Rick continued across the street and into the front yard of that same apartment building from that afternoon. The windows were all busted and the front door hung somewhat loose on its hinges from the force of the blast, but it was still a decently safe option for them for the night. There were only four apartments to choose from; two downstairs and two upstairs. Both were narrow and separated by a small hallway in the center of the building. It was possible the building might’ve been a single family home at some point, decades in the past, only to be subsequently remodeled in order to become an income property.  
  
That was neither here nor there, though.  
  
Rick ascended the stairs; figuring, if they were going to seek safety, they were better off higher up for the least likelihood of any walkers reaching them. Daryl and Michonne were right behind him, following him upstairs, but making sure the downstairs door into the building was barricaded to keep walkers from getting inside. Once inside one of the two upper apartments, they set their respective weapons down and just kind of stood around, not sure what to do with themselves.  
  
Daryl was the first one to do anything. He plopped unceremoniously down upon a beaten up couch and stretched out across. He tucked one arm under his head while he chewed on the thumbnail of his free hand, staring at a framed picture of two smiling boys who were elementary age. A few toys in the living room was the other inclination that children had once lived in the apartment.  
  
Michonne sank down onto a tacky, floral recliner that in no way matched the other furniture, but it was quite comfortable. That was all that mattered.  
  
Rick paced for a while. He moved around the apartment, lingering the longest in the kitchen, just overturning dirty pots and pans set out on the countertops and opening up drawers and cupboards in an aimless search for what he wasn’t sure of. Food, perhaps? He didn’t know. He just couldn’t sit still at the moment. He had to keep his mind occupied and distracted to stop himself from dwelling on his loss, but it felt like everything and anything reminded him of Jo.  
  
Just the act of looking the kitchen over made him think of all the houses he had scavenged with her; her father’s house, her house, that bungalow in Decatur where they’d first made love, the houses in the cul de sac where they’d found Sam and Ana, the house they settled into for a few days after the prison while he started healing from his wounds, and the grey house, to name a few. Each house, despite the somber or serious reasons that brought them there, had always seemed to see a good memory created there between them. It was like, no matter what, there was something to look forward to. There was a light in the dark, a silver lining.  
  
There was none of that for Rick now that he could see.  
  
After a while, Rick pulled himself away from the kitchen and sauntered quietly toward the front of the apartment and stepped through the door onto the apartment’s porch. He closed the door behind him with a gentle click and then walked up to the railing, which seemed a bit weak under his grip. Whether it was from age and general disrepair or from the blast was unknown.  
  
Maintaining his hold on the railing regardless, Rick crouched down and tipped his head forward as he stared at the concrete flooring of the porch. His mind began to wander and his eyes began to water and he just wanted to put his Colt to his head and pull the trigger. He was tired of all the loss.  
  
What was the point of it anymore?  
  
Closing his eyes, he tried to attempt thinking happy thoughts, which was more or less a waste of his energies. It simply made him miss what he’d never have again even more. It felt like losing Carl all over again, the only difference was that he’d been there in his son’s final moments. He’d been holding his hand as he took his last breath. He had been there at his side, sobbing like an idiot as Lori cradled his body, sobbing the same. He remained in the room with Carl’s body for those few hours later, also with Lori, just staring at his body or at inanimate objects to avoid looking at each other while they refused to let anyone remove Carl and while they both refused any form of sustenance. Nothing had mattered to them then; not when they’d lost their only child.  
  
Parents weren’t supposed outlive their children, but over time Rick and Lori had come to terms with their loss and their grief. If they had had Sophia in their group in the months that had followed, Rick felt as if maybe the transition from being parents to being childless might’ve been easier; what with having another child to transfer their energies into helping Carol raise her as part of their group. That had not been case, unfortunately, but finding Jo with Sophia had been the turning point in their lives.  
  
Rick had felt so immersed in the death all around them up until then. There didn’t seem to be anything to look forward to anymore.  
  
Not until Jo, and Hope.  
  
The family he’d created with Lori and Carl was a thing of the past. Jo and Hope had become his future.  
  
Now that was gone.  
  
Without Jo, there wasn’t much optimism for finding Hope. If she was alive still, he hoped she was with good people who were taking care of her; whether it was still Shane or someone else. He hoped they were keeping her safe and loved her in place of Jo and himself.  
  
“There room for one more out here or do you want to be alone?”  
  
“I hate being alone,” Rick admitted, lifting his head and turning slightly to see Michonne stepping out onto the porch behind him.  
  
“I do, too,” she replied. Walking over to one of the side balustrades, she leaned her ass against it and then lifted her leg; outstretching it before her on railing in a half-sitting, half-standing position. In her hands she was fiddling with a Precious Moments figurine while she glanced across the street at the rubble. Rick wasn’t saying anything further, and she would normally be perfectly fine being there in silence, but she felt the need to fill the air with conversation. “I lost my boyfriend and my son at the beginning, and I was alone for too long, in a bad place, mentally, when Harry and Finn found me. Being around people helped bring me back. It gave me a purpose, something to live for.”  
  
“You trying to say _I_ don’t think I have anything to live for?” he questioned, pulling himself up to his feet and peering over the edge of the front of the porch.  
  
“Don’t you?”  
  
Rick cast a sidelong glance at her. “This right here,” he gestured between them both with his index finger, “is this an attempt at reverse psychology or something? Get me to talk about my feelings? Maybe you got some ink blots I can look at and tell you what I think they look like?”  
  
His tone was increasingly bitter, and she understood the motive behind it. It was his anger and grief stewing inside him like a turbulent storm.  
  
“I’m just sayin’ I know what it’s like to lose the people you love the most and struggle to find your place in this world now. But you got other people, friends. You said it yesterday that they’re your family as much as Jo was. You got those girls, Sophia and Mika, and another daughter out there — a baby — that need you. Your family needs you,” Michonne spoke gently, but firmly. “I’m not saying you have to ignore the pain you’re going through and not wallow in it. You’re more than allowed to. I’m just saying, don’t let it consume you and don't forget you _do_ have something to live for, even if it’s not your wife anymore.”  
  
Rick turned fully toward her, taking a step back and leaning against one of the porch posts. “Oh yeah?”  
  
“Yeah,” Michonne nodded. “You have a place in this world still, Rick Grimes.”  
  
He looked down at his left hand, at his wedding ring and twirled it around his finger. It was hard to believe he and Jo had only married themselves barely a week before. It was weird. It felt like it was just yesterday, and as if it were years ago at the same time. “I’m not ready to let go.”  
  
Michonne knitted her brow together, staring over at him. “You only just lost her hours ago. No one’s saying you have get over it right away,” she assured. “You never really get over anything like this. Time just makes it hurt a little less. You hold on as long as you need to. Just remember to hold onto what you still have, too. That’s the point I’m trying to make.”  
  
“I appreciate it, I do,” he replied, casting his gaze across the street. “I just don’t think I wanna listen to any words of encouragement right now.”  
  
“Alright.” Michonne turned her gaze back to the rubble as well with him.  
  
“You don’t have to help me in the morning. You only just met Jo. You have no obligation to me or her. You should go back to the church with your group.”  
  
Michonne frowned. “Harry was like a mother to me, a friend. And, in case you didn’t notice, there’s barely anyone left of _my_ group,” she remarked, looking back at him. “You and your family, along with the survivors of mine, _are_ my group now. Safety and comfort in numbers and all that.”  
  
Rick looked at her with his peripheral vision and nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“And I want to help,” she continued. “I may have just met all of you, but I liked Jo, and I need to find my purpose in this world where I can, same as anyone.”  
  
Rick nodded again. “Okay.”

 

* * *

  
During the night, despite his determination to not sleep and instead stare forlornly at the rubble, Rick fell asleep anyway. While seated on the floor of the porch, his back up against the outer wall beside the door with his legs crossed at the ankles in front of him as he stared across the street through the balusters, Rick had succumbed to his physical and emotional exhaustion. He hadn’t known what time it was when he must’ve closed his eyes and fallen asleep or how many hours had passed, but when he suddenly woke up, the sun had already begun to rise. If the porch was facing east, the light would’ve beamed him right in the eyes. However, the apartment was west-facing and he couldn’t exactly explain why it was he awoke. He still felt tired, and a little disoriented. Rick couldn’t remember where he was for a solid thirty seconds until his eyes focused and he rubbed the crust away from his eyelashes.  
  
Squinting down at his left wrist, he checked the time. It was just before seven in the morning and there was a serious crick in his neck from how he’d slept. Lifting his hand to the back of his neck, he gave it a generous rub and cocked it from side to side to release the tension with some. Leaning forward, he flexed his shoulders blades and listened to the sound of his back cracking, which felt wonderful. He then rolled to his side and climbed up to his feet by pushing up with his knees first.  
  
_Definitely no spring chicken anymore_ , he thought to himself as he tallied all the minor aches and pains.  
  
He remembered when he could run and jump and, hell, even do cartwheels without breaking a sweat or waking up debilitated the next morning. Now his body practically screamed at him most mornings for any sort of overexertion from the day before. Smirking at the so-called “old age” changes in his body, he stood up straight and stretched.  
  
Just as he began to fully realize where he was and why he was there, and everything from the day before, it suddenly felt like he was Wile E. Coyote and an Acme anvil had just been dropped on him. The burden of his grief came back, rearing its ugly head like an STD flare up. Tears once again stung his eyes, making them appear glossy as he tried blinking them away. Rick bit his lips together and scowled in an attempt to hold in the sob that so desperately wanted to be free. His whole, entire face seemed to quiver. He looked upward at the underside of the porch’s wooden overhang as he emitted a shaky breath through his nostrils while simultaneously gritting his teeth.  
  
A part of him had thought perhaps the day before had been just a terrible dream and he was waking up from it. But it was nothing more than a living nightmare he couldn’t avoid.  
  
Turning, he reached for the handle to the porch door but then stopped when he heard the nearby sounds of hard, heavy material clacking against each other from across the street. Craning his neck to peer through the branches of the large oak tree near the edge of the apartment building’s property, Rick could easily make out two figures standing atop the hotel rubble, hunched over and moving debris around.  
  
Giving a shake of his head, Rick opened the porch door and ducked into the apartment to confirm that Daryl and Michonne weren’t present in the living room and dining room combo. It was unlikely they were anywhere else in the apartment which meant those two figures were, without a doubt, Daryl and Michonne. They had gone off without him, without waking him up, to resume the search for Jo’s body, and Rick wasn’t sure whether or not he was grateful or insulted.  
  
Checking to make sure his gun belt was secure and his machete in place, Rick picked up Jo's bag; stalking out of the apartment and down the stairs. Once out the front door, he descended the steps from the front porch and walked that bowlegged walk of his up to the street’s edge where he continued across to the back of the hotel property.  
  
There were two, solitary walkers further on up the road, near the gas station that may or may not have noticed Rick crossing the street but he paid them no mind. They were only two and, from the looks of it, the herd was long gone to some other part of the city thanks to Merle, Tyreese, Morgan and Milo in those two trucks. He had no idea how those four men had made out or if they’d made it back to the church yet. He just assumed they had and were likely waiting for Daryl, Michonne and him to return as well.  
  
Walking up the concrete ramp, Rick stared downward at his feet until he reached the main elevation of the property and began the trek over the debris, careful not to step in any gaps and get his foot stuck.  
  
“You started without me,” he muttered, loud enough for them to hear. He tossed Jo's bag onto his back to secure it on him and just stood there.  
  
Both Daryl and Michonne momentarily stopped what they were doing and looked over at Rick, shielding their eyes from the sun cresting over the roofs of the homes across the street.  
  
“You needed the sleep,” Daryl replied. “Didn’t want to wake you.”  
  
“You should’ve, regardless.”  
  
“We haven’t found anything yet anyway,” Michonne added, somewhat ruefully, as she dropped her hands to her sides and looked around at the rubble. “Nothing consequential, that is.”  
  
“I’d say about ninety, ninety-five percent of what we’ve found is just walker parts,” Daryl continued, gesturing to a pile of decayed severed limbs off to the side.  
  
Rick squinted as well from the morning sun and stared squarely back at Daryl. “Jo would be one of them by now if her head wasn’t damaged by the blast.”  
  
“Nah,” the archer shook his head. “However it happened, she didn’t become one of them. The weight of all this falling down — if the blasts didn’t do it, the collapse did. It would’ve happened quick-like. She didn’t feel a thing.” Rick knew Daryl was trying to be somewhat comforting, but it didn’t really help all that much, and Daryl seemed to realize that. “A quick and nearly painless death in this world is a rare thing. We should all be so lucky when our time comes.”  
  
“She knew she was gonna die,” Rick retorted sadly. “It’d be ridiculous to assume she didn’t. That fear she would’ve felt right before it happened, whether or not she felt the physical pain of death…”  
  
“Don’t dwell on that, Rick,” Michonne advised. “It won’t help.”  
  
Rick cast an eye over to her and held her knowing gaze, and just nodded. “Yeah, well, nothing does.”  
  
Shrugging the conversation off, Rick crouched down and began trying to unwedge a somewhat loose, piece of metal beam that was sticking up. He became so engrossed with it that he barely registered the fact that Daryl had come over to move some of the plaster around the beam to help him, or that Michonne had wandered off to the railing on the north side of the hotel where there had been a pathway alongside the building leading from the front to the back. It was the same side of the building she had escaped from with Jen and something caught her eye that both men were unaware of her noticing.  
  
Gripping the metal railing, which was slightly bowed outward from the blast, she looked down over the edge of the small driveway which led to the loading dock of the business next door. Along the concrete wall that separate both properties, which had been at different elevations, there were three separate dumpsters. Two were a royal blue color and one was a light green. She was familiar with the dumpsters because her fellow Communers utilized them still, but only for items that weren’t biodegradable. Any leftover vegetables or paper products got turned into mulch for the courtyard garden.  
  
The dumpsters weren’t what had intrigued her. It was the shiny object on the ground a few feet away from the green dumpster.  
  
“Find something?” Daryl called out.  
  
Michonne turned around to find both men looking in her direction. “I think I found Jo’s axe.” She nodded at the weapon, barely hidden under debris that had spilled over onto the other property from the hotel. “The blast must’ve shot it out over here.”  
  
Dusting his hands on his pants, Daryl trudged over the rubble under his feet and joined Michonne at the railing to look where she was looking. With a grunt and a nod of his hand, he shrugged his crossbow off his back and handed it to Michonne. “Here. Hold this for me.”  
  
As Michonne obliged him, draping the strap over her right arm, she watched as Daryl slipped between the upper and lower railing and dropped down to the ground of the property next door. The archer then stepped across a minimal amount of debris and hunched forward to push away what appeared to be a sheet of red, metal paneling that had been part of the hotel’s roof. Sticking out underneath it was the head of the axe, glinting in the sunlight. Grabbing it by the handle, he picked it up and gripped it firmly in his hand.  
  
Daryl looked upward at Michonne. “We should bring it with us.”  
  
“I agree,” she replied.  
  
As he moved to head back toward the elevate wall, a bang sound resonated from a few feet away from him, which immediately put him on edge. Daryl’s first instinct was a walker, so he gripped the axe even tighter and turned in the direction of the green dumpster.  
  
Nothing stepped forward, allowing him to release a breath.  
  
However, the moment he turned back toward Michonne, the bang was louder and was followed by scratching noises and groaning.  
  
Michonne narrowed her gaze and cocked her head to the side as she gestured toward the dumpster. “I think a rotter got into the dumpster,” she remarked, forgetting that she had agreed to refer to the dead as walkers now.  
  
Daryl grunted. “How?” he questioned, staring up at her once again. “Did it see a squirrel climb in and then it fell in like Buster Keaton?”  
  
Michonne shrugged. “Maybe. There’s debris on top of the lid, which probably shut when the building collapsed and debris fell on it. Rotters don’t have the competence or muscle strength to pry open a dumpster. It’s probably just stuck in there.”  
  
“Yeah, probably.” As Daryl edged closer to the railing, he hesitated. Looking down for a brief moment at the axe in his hand and then back over at the dumpster and the noises coming from inside it, he shook his head and looked upward again at the woman standing there above him on the higher elevation. “What if it’s not a walker? What if it’s a survivor, one of our own, and that’s where they hid to get away from the walkers storming the hotel?” Daryl peered over the edge of the elevation, toward the rubble where Rick was still busying himself. “You never actually saw if Jo got out or not before the blast. We’re all just assuming she didn’t. I mean, her axe was right there.”  
  
Michonne realized what Daryl was suggesting and looked over her shoulder back at Rick who seemed to not care what she and Daryl were on about. He was too focused on the dislodging that damned beam. “It wouldn’t hurt to look, I guess,” she commented quietly. “If it’s her in there and she’s one of them, do we tell him?”  
  
Daryl glanced in Rick’s direction and nodded. “Yeah. After I put her down,” he replied. “He shouldn’t have to do it. He shouldn’t have her blood on his hands.”  
  
“Do it quick.”  
  
With a heavy heart, Daryl sauntered up to the dumpster and began pushing some of the debris off the top with help from the axe, which gave him more reach. His heart began to race as well when he propped the axe up against the dumpster and gripped the edge of the lid. Before he lifted it up, he looked back at Michonne, squinting in the sunlight, as she looked over her shoulder again toward Rick and then turned back to nod a silent “go ahead” at Daryl.  
  
Releasing a breath, Daryl pushed the lid up and was immediately met with the scent of stale garbage and slight darkness. With extra vigor, he shoved the lid completely open so that it stood upright. As his eyes adjusted to everything inside, he braced himself for a walker reaching up and clawing hungrily at his arms and face, only to be met with something completely unexpected.  
  
Taking a sobering step back, Daryl whipped his head around and shouted, “Rick! _Rick!_ ”  
  
From where he was struggling with the beam, Rick lifted his head and squinted in the direction Daryl’s voice was coming from. He finally noted Michonne standing at the railing and could make out the archer down below at an open dumpster.  
  
“What?” he called; not overly enthused by whatever piece of garbage had caught his friend’s fancy.  
  
“ _Rick!_ ” The urgency in which Daryl called to him finally reached his ears and he stood up. “You need to get your ass over here— _now!_ ”  
  
Frowning, Rick stepped away from what he was doing with careful steps over the rubble once again. Reaching the railing, he glanced at Michonne at his side, who shrugged back at him. It was hard to see what was inside the dumpster, which was clearly very important to Daryl, from where they were standing.  
  
Crouching down, Rick sat with his legs dangling over the edge of the elevated property wall and gripped the lower railing. Sliding underneath it, he touched down to the ground below and walked over toward Daryl's side as debris crunched beneath his boots.  
  
“What?” he asked his friend again.  
  
Daryl reacted with a smirk and grabbing the back of Rick’s neck. “Stop fucking asking ‘what’ and just fucking look, will ya?”  
  
The archer's sudden good mood was confusing Rick as he apprehensively approached the dumpster. He held onto Daryl’s gaze, trying to read him, and then looked away as he let his hands grip the green, metal edge. Furrowing his brow, Rick leaned forward and peered inside as two eyes peered tiredly back up at him.  
  
If it weren’t for holding onto the dumpster, Rick’s legs would’ve given out underneath him and dropped him to the ground. His heart jumped into his throat, which seemed to go dry as he opened his mouth to speak. As fresh tears stung at his eyes, Rick smiled the happiest smile he could ever remember smiling.  
  
“Jo,” he blurted.  
  
There, crouched down in the dumpster, covered in blood and residual walker guts, was Jo, staring up at him as if she was looking up into the face of God. “Rick,” she croaked wearily.  
  
“Oh, God…oh my God…” he muttered, pulling himself up and jumping into the dumpster beside her. He didn’t hesitate in encircling his arms around her waist and pulling her body tight against his; afraid that she was a dream he would wake from or as if she was like a mirage of water in a desert. “Oh my God.”  
  
As he cradled her in his arms and placed his lips against her ear, inhaling her scent despite the odor of dead blood and gore on her, Rick began to cry and Jo just leaned into his frantic embrace.  
  
“I jumped out of the window. I think I sprained my ankle,” she muttered. “There wasn’t time to get any further away from the hotel, so I got down here and jumped inside this dumpster and closed the lid. I don’t know how I made it in with only seconds to spare, but I did.”  
  
“I don’t care how,” Rick whispered against her ear. “I just care that you’re alive. We all thought you were dead.”  
  
Jo snickered. “You can’t get rid of me that easily.”  
  
Rick laughed. “Oh, God,” he murmured again. “Oh, I love you.”  
  
“I love you, too.” She reached her hands up and finally gripped them around his back to reciprocate the hug. “Don’t let me do anything stupid like that again, though. I nearly shit myself, I was so scared.”  
  
Daryl snorted, listening to the interaction and then glanced over at Michonne who had come down over the elevated privacy wall to join them. Both she and Daryl were smiling as they peered inside the dumpster at the reunited couple.  
  
Leaning back from Jo, Rick cupped his hands over either side her face so he could just look at her and just appreciate her. The happy tears stinging his eyes had begun to fall and he then just gave her a thorough onceover. “Are you okay, everything considered? Are you hurt anywhere other than from the car accident or your ankle?”  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, I’m fine,” she assured. “Nothing’s broken, there’s no open wounds, I haven’t been bitten anywhere.”  
  
“Dumb fuckin’ luck,” Daryl muttered with a snort. “You should bottle that up, offer it to strangers we meet in exchange for things like food or bullets.”  
  
Jo glanced upward at the archer, and squinted because of the sunlight. “Sounds like a plan,” she quipped back at him. As they all fell silent, she brought her attention back to Rick who was looking at her with the brightest smile she could ever recall him having, which made her smile right back. It was so infectious. “As much as I’d love to sit here and hold you, I would really like to get out of this dumpster.”  
  
“What—oh, shit, yeah…”  
  
Snaking his arms back around her waist, Rick helped Jo stand up with him and then hopped out of the dumpster. Daryl extended a hand to help Rick pull her out, and both men did so as gently as possible. She wrapped her arms around Rick’s shoulders and leaned her head against his as her feet eventually touched the ground. In doing so, she winced from the pain in her left ankle and had to grip even harder onto Rick when it felt like her entire left leg would buckle underneath her.  
  
“Holy shit,” she blurted suddenly as she took in the lack of a hotel and all the rubble that now remained. Her happy mood deflated slightly. “My mother.”  
  
Michonne nodded knowingly. “You heard what she asked of us,” Michonne remarked. “Not to let her death be in vain. She bought us time to get out. She _died_ so we could _live_.”  
  
“I know,” Jo muttered. “I just wish it didn’t have to end like that. I wish I’d had more time to get to know her.”  
  
“Maybe that dumb luck that got you into the dumpster in time was your mother’s parting gift.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Maybe.” Hopping on her right foot, as not to put her weight onto the left, she looked up at Rick and smiled ruefully. “I hope you don’t mind me leaning on you for a while.”  
  
“You can lean on me for the rest of your life,” he answered without missing a beat. “And you better make sure the end isn’t for decades to come, because the last eighteen to twenty-four hours have been some of the worst hours of my life.”  
  
“I’ll see what I can do,” she obliged him with a smirk while keeping on of her arms around his shoulder. “Where’s everyone else? Who survived? Did Finn—”  
  
“Finn’s alive,” Michonne assured.  
  
“We found a church about a ten to fifteen minute walk away,” Daryl informed. “Those of us that made it out, that’s where we went.”  
  
“Nicole was treating Jen’s arm when we left,” Rick added. “Finn had come back this way with us to find your, uh, body…but we sent him back. We agreed he should be at Jen’s side when she woke up.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Who survived? Are Mika and Sophia okay?”  
  
“Not a scratch on them. Just pretty upset,” he replied, studying her face as she looked a thousand percent relieved. “They thought you died, too.”  
  
“Well, they’re in for a surprise,” Jo remarked with a small laugh.  
  
As Daryl reached out to Michonne to take his crossbow back from her, he picked up the axe from up against the dumpster and passed it to Jo. “Here,” he offered. “This belongs to you, right?”  
  
Jo nodded. “Yeah. Harry gave it to me to use.” She grinned at the archer. “I mean, it’s not my short sword, but it packs a punch, y’know?”  
  
Daryl smirked and nodded back at her. “We still might find you another sword on our way to DC. Don’t you give up on that.”  
  
“I won’t.”  
  
“You carried a sword, too?” Michonne questioned.  
  
“Yeah. Shorter and stockier than your katana, but yeah, it was like a third arm for a long while. Had it taken from me a week ago. I kinda feel naked without it.”  
  
Rick smiled at her and tipped his face toward hers. “We should head back to the church. Get back to our people,” he advised. “They’ll wanna see you’re alive and well.”  
  
Jo smiled back at him, holding onto his eye in such a way that it was like they were having a silent conversation about how much they loved each other. “Sounds ideal.”  
  
As she moved to take a step forward on only her right foot while still holding her arm around his shoulder for support, Rick stopped her and bent at the knees. “C’mere,” he muttered, sliding one arm around her back and the other under her knees as he hoisted her up into his arms, bridal-style. “Today is our one-week anniversary and I haven’t had the opportunity to carry you across the threshold.”  
  
“Didn’t you help carry me into that hotel room after the car accident?”  
  
“That’s not the same. You were unconscious,” he stated. “I’m gonna make up for it now and carry your wounded ass all the way to that church.”  
  
“As you wish,” Jo replied, staring up at him with an acquiescent nod and smile.  
  
Maintaining the same arm around his shoulders, she then passed her axe back to Daryl with the free arm she reached up across Rick’s chest so that both her hands could link together at her fingers. Leaning his face toward hers, Rick kissed Jo’s lips, and both Daryl and Michonne looked away to give the couple another moment to just revel in the fact that they were both alive and together.  
  
Not waiting another moment longer, Rick stepped forward with Jo in his arms while the other two flanked them. As the foursome wandered out onto the street, the walkers that Rick had passed earlier staggered right up to them. Daryl reacted by using Jo’s axe to cut slice right into one’s head, while Michonne decapitated the second one. With the immediate threat removed, the two returned to their places on either side of Rick and Jo and all four continued up the road.


	38. Unexpected

_"Sometimes we let life guide us, and other times we take life by the horns. But one thing is for sure: no matter how organized we are, or how well we plan, we can always expect the unexpected."_ — Brandon Jenner

* * *

 

Rick was staggering by the time the foursome made it back to the church. He was mentally exhausted from the day before and physically exhausted from the day before, and from not sleeping well on the porch, plus from all the exertion of lifting and pulling large pieces of debris to find Jo. However, he fought through it; determined to carry her the entire way despite her insistence against it every few minutes. Although, she couldn’t deny it was nice. Jo rested the side of her face down upon his clavicle and closed her eyes here and there, listening to his laboring breath and his racing heart. When she whispered she loved him, making sure only he heard her, she could feel his chest swelling and she could practically hear his smile of contentment.

They made good time, returning within twenty minutes, and encountered not one walker, which was a small miracle in itself. Milo and Finn were outside in the small parking lot in front of the church, tinkering with the school bus, and Karen was carrying a wicker basket full of some sort of supplies around the front of the bus and stepping up inside through the opened door.

“Hey,” Daryl called out. “Look what we found.”

Finn lifted his head and turned toward the voice and quite nearly had to pick his jaw up off the ground. He ducked out from under the hood of the bus, jumped down from the chair he was using to see into the engine and sprinted directly over to Rick and Jo.

“Oh my god, you’re alive!”

Gently, Rick set Jo down to her feet and Finn wasted no time in throwing his arms around her waist and hoisting her up in a bear hug.

“Yeah, I’m alive,” she concurred with a smile, leaning her face down on her brother’s shoulder.

“Easy now,” Rick urged. “She sprained her ankle. I want Nicole to take a look at her.”

“How did leading the herd away go?” Michonne inquired, stepping over toward Milo.

“Pretty easy, actually,” Milo replied, setting down the wrench he was holding and wiping his hands on his pants. He hopped down from the chair he was also using and looked at the others. “It was basically a straight route. About two miles down the road, over some train tracks, is the Oakland Cemetery. Seemed a sort of fitting place to leave ‘em. Took about four fucking hours, though, but that included the time it took us to get back here.”

“How’d you make it out?” Finn questioned his sister after he leaned back from her.

“Jumped out a window and then jumped into a dumpster with literally seconds to spare before the building went,” she replied wearily. “Sprained my ankle on the fall, though. Hurts like a sonofabitch.”

“Well, Nicole’s inside. She’s been tending to Jen all through the night and I don’t think she’s slept a wink. I think we should give her a break.” Finn eyed Rick when he said that. “One of us can wrap Jo’s ankle tight with an Ace bandage or something. I’m pretty sure I saw some crutches last night she can use.”

“I’m right here,” Jo muttered. “You don’t have to talk as if I’m not. I did survive, you know. I’m not a ghost.”

“And we’re beyond happy.” Taking Jo’s hand in his, Rick lifted her arm and threw it around his shoulder so she could use him as her crutch until she got the real thing. “How’s the bus coming along?” he wondered, nodding at the vehicle before them.

“Oh, she’s fine,” Milo remarked. “We’re just tinkering for tinkering’s safe to pass the time. We’ve started loading up supplies we gathered from inside the church. Merle and Morgan went scavenging the Aramark next door. Tyreese and Tara checked a couple of nearby houses, found some food and blankets.”

Rick nodded. “That’s good.”

“Jo!”

An elated cry of joy rang out into the air from the church’s front door as Sophia ran down the stairs and over to her adoptive mother. Both Jo and Rick encircled their arms around the teenager as she hugged Jo specifically.

“Hey, honey,” Jo smiled, pressing her lips down atop Sophia’s head. “I’m sorry if I gave you a scare.”

“You did,” the girl cried. “I thought I lost you, too. I can’t lose you, too.”

“Well, you didn’t,” Jo soothingly assured. “I’m like the Energizer Bunny. I keep going and going and going.”

“I’m glad.” Sophia lifted her face up and looked between Rick and Jo. Wiping tears from her face with the backs of her fingers, she nodded. “I think I’m ready to call you mom now. Thinking you were gone forever kinda put things into perspective, you know? I won’t get a second chance like this with my real mom, but now I have one with you, and I’m gonna make the most of it. As long as you’re sure you don’t mind me calling you mom, I mean. I know you said I could, when I was ready, _if_ I was ready. And I am.”

Jo nodded and placed her free hand to the side of Sophia’s face. “I meant it when I said it,” she insisted.

Sophia beamed. Taking her eyes off Jo, she then let them fall upon Rick. “And it’s okay to call you dad? You told those people at Terminus I was your daughter, and I know you told Mika it was okay…”

Rick nodded. “It’s more than okay. I’d be honored if you called me dad.”

As the three of them looked between each other with happy smiles, more of their people began to filter out of the church and mutter a few choice expletives and other words of surprise when the realized Jo was there and very much alive. Their feet moved them along as fast as they could manage and they each took turns hugging Jo, commenting on how happy or thankful they were that she was alive. Jo was all smiles and just as happy to be embraced, but before long she was feeling nauseated.

She had spent the day before covered in walker blood and guts, the scent of which had caused her to throw up in that stairwell. That, mixed with spending nearly a full day in a dumpster, had Jo smelling none too pleasant. Everyone else’s scents weren’t helping the situation either. Tyreese had been the last to hug her, but she had to put a hand upon his chest and push him back halfway through the hug. Hobbling away toward the sidewalk where she hunched forward and vomited again. Sensing Rick coming up behind her out of concern, Jo held a hand out toward him and indicated for him to wait. Placing a hand on her stomach, she grimaced at how annoying her stomach churned.

“Are you alright?”

“I smell like death and a sewer gave birth,” she remarked. “Everyone’s sweat and myself is just bothering me. I haven’t eaten or drank anything, so that probably isn’t helpi—”

Before Jo could even finish her sentence, the sour feeling in her gut returned and sent what was left of the contents of her stomach spiraling upward, burning like acid reflux as she vomited once more. Her back arched and tears stung her eyes as she crouched further down toward the ground to brace herself. Rick, despite her hand gesturing for him to wait, stepped forward and gripped her arms firmly and crouched behind her so she could lean back against him if needed.

“We’ll get you some water and some food, then. And you should get some proper rest, too,” Rick stated, rubbing his hands up and down her arms in a soothing fashion. Not caring about the odor on her, he nuzzled his nose against the back of her neck, pushing her hair out of the way, as he pressed his lips to her skin. “I’ll do whatever I have to for you.”

Smiling through her nausea, Jo reached her hand up and behind her, feeling blindly for Rick’s head. When she felt her fingers touch the side of his face, she ran them up into his curls. “The feeling’s mutual.”

“Do you need to stay right here a little longer or are you okay to stand back up?”

“I think I’m okay now.”

“Let’s head inside the church for a bit. We’ll clean you up. I mean, it’s a church. They gotta have some sort of clothing donation bin or whatever. Most churches usually do, I think.” Assisting Jo back up into a standing position, he turned with her to face the building and their people who were either looking on with concern or trying to find something to keep them busy so they weren’t gawking at the “mess” Jo had made. “C’mon,” he urged her along.

Inside the church, Rick led Jo to a bathroom but there was no running water, but had a loveseat that hadn’t seen the light of day since the 1970s. He set her down upon one of the worn cushions and left her alone for a couple of minutes, only to return with a wooden baptismal font which he was dragging along the floor.

Despite everything, Jo couldn’t help but let out a hearty cackle of laughter at the sight. “We’re gonna burn in hell,” she joked.

Rick frowned. “After everything we’ve had to do up until now, using this thing to clean you up is the least of our sins.”

Closing the bathroom door behind him to give them some privacy, Rick removed the lid from the font and pulled a rag out of his back pocket that he had tucked there for safekeeping. Over his left shoulder a clean bit of material lay that he pulled off and set down over the edge of the sink. Curiously, Jo reached out a hand and touched it.

“What’s that?”

“Tara gave me a shirt she found for you to wear,” he replied, sticking the rag into the font’s water and then wiping it along Jo’s face.

“I can clean my own face.”

“I know.” Rick caught her eye, but he didn’t hand the rag over. He simply continued to wash her face for her, as if he _needed_ to do it. “There’s a coatroom. It’s small, but there’s some jackets we can help ourselves to. The nights are gonna get colder the further north we go. That shirt won’t do much for you at night.”

“Well, I do have you, and I’d say that’s better than any blanket,” Jo quipped as he brushed the damp rag over her forehead.

Turning slightly, Rick dipped the rag back into the font and rinsed it a little. He was trying to keep a straight face but a smirk was breaking through his exterior. Although, the smirk didn’t really show up on his lips as much as it appeared in his eyes. A moment later, however, he was back to being serious, and maybe even a little sad. “I was so scared when I thought I'd lost you. I kept going over and over in my head, trying to think about how I’d explain to Hope what had happened to you when she gets older; how I’d describe you.”

“I’m glad you aren’t saying _if_ she gets older; that you really believe she’s still out there, alive.”

“I have to,” Rick muttered. “It’s too painful to think otherwise.”

Jo nodded in agreement. “What would you have told her?”

“That her mother was the most beautiful woman in the world; that her mother was strong and fought hard for her, and somehow found it in her heart to love a broken former cop like me.”

Smiling, as the rag was brought down her neck, Jo reached a hand up and touched her fingers upon Rick’s cheek. “More like how her mother hit the jackpot when the most handsome man in the world somehow fell in love with a broken woman with baby daddy issues.”

“How about two broken people who helped put each other back together?” Rick looked her in the eye rather intently before pressing his forehead to hers. “I didn’t want to do any of this without you. Or rather, I was scared of the person I would’ve become without you.” Letting out a sigh, Rick leaned back and then sat down beside her on the bathroom loveseat but turned at the waist so that they could face each other. “I’ve already had to go to some pretty dark places and do some terrible things _with_ you by my side. The things I’d be capable of doing _without_ you there? I think I’d eventually stop caring or stop being able to rein myself in when I started to get too far gone.”

“You would’ve had the others; Daryl, Tyreese, Morgan, the girls, Finn...”

“I would’ve been no good to them. I would’ve pushed them away.”

“You would’ve just left Sophia and Mika behind?”

Rick shrugged. “I’d like to think I wouldn’t. But I don’t think I’d be someone they _should_ be around. I would’ve become a mean bastard, I know it. They deserve better, or at least they would’ve if I’d lost you and gone cuckoo for Cocoa Pops.”

Offering him a rueful smile, Jo brought her hands to either side of his face. “You’re too hard on yourself. You would’ve gotten over the pain of losing me. You would’ve funneled that energy into fighting to protect our girls, our group. You would’ve survived, and my death would’ve strengthened your resolve. You would’ve become a force to be reckoned with; that is, even more than you already are.” Dropping one hand to his chest, she curled a finger under the collar of his soiled, grey T-shirt. “You’re Rick motherfucking Grimes and God help the poor schmucks that cross you.”

Rick let out a short chuckle and rolled his eyes. “You keep talking me up like that and my head will inflate like a balloon.”

“Better to talk you up than to talk you down.”

“Well, I think there’ll be some occasions where you’ll need to talk me down, like when I wanna bash in some stranger's skull if they so much as look at you the wrong way.” As they both smiled at his comment, Rick brought his hand up to where Dr. Trevitt had stitched up the head wound from the car accident. He lightly brushed his thumb over it, taking special notice of how the bump had gone down considerably. “All things considered, how are you feeling?”

“Physically or mentally?”

“Physically.”

“Achy. I kinda feel like I have a slight headache, but that’s probably a mix between the car accident and when I got jostled around inside the dumpster when the building went kaput.”

“The swelling’s gone down,” Rick remarked, pointing at the bump.

“My shoulder’s still sore, my ankle hurts, and my stomach feels kinda sour. I think everything that’s happened is just messing with my innards.”

Nodding, Rick slid down from the bathroom loveseat and knelt down onto the linoleum floor. Grabbing at her boot on her left foot and began to remove it slowly. He looked up and watched her face when she winced slightly when her ankle was forced to dip so the boot could come all the way off. “Sorry,” he muttered, but she just shook her head to indicate it was okay. After setting the boot down, he slipped her sock off and tried to inspect her foot and ankle as best as he could. “It doesn’t look swollen and there’s no bruising, so that’s a good sign. I mean, I’m no doctor, but I have sprained my ankle before.”

“Oh yeah? When was that?”

“Once when I was in high school,” he muttered, suddenly looking embarrassed. “I was walking down the stairs with an armful of books, late to my next class as usual. I fucking tripped over my own two feet like an idiot and landed the wrong way trying to prevent myself from falling the rest of the way down the stairs. The sprain wasn’t even the worst part.”

“Which was?”

“The fact that I was an awkward, fifteen year old with pimples up the wazoo and a headful of unruly curls I wouldn’t let my mom cut because long hair was really cool then. Except, on me, it looked like a floppy, white boy afro. Not cool.” He chuckled at the memory and at himself. “There were all these really pretty senior girls standing at the bottom of the stairs and they had to jump outta the way when they thought I was gonna slam right into them, and instead, I just basically crumpled at their feet and started crying because it hurt so damn much.”

Jo bit her bottom lip to keep from laughing. She offered him a sympathetic smile, feeling bad for his fifteen year old self but at the same time finding it rather amusing. It was just the kind of thing she needed to make her feel less upset and angry about the storm of shit their lives had been put through for the last few weeks. Placing her hands back to either side of her face, she brushed her thumbs along his cheekbones. “Aww, poor Ricky.”

Rick nodded, looking at her lap although his sight was focused on the memory. “There was a teacher nearby that helped me to the nurse’s office. My dad had to come get me, take me to the hospital for an x-ray. I got a splint and some crutches to use,” he recalled. “I remember feeling this dread in my stomach, thinking my dad was gonna be so pissed that he had to leave work to come get me for something as stupid as tripping down some stairs. But you know what? He wasn’t. The first thing he asked me was if I was okay. He helped me into his truck and bought me a soda from the vending machine in the ER’s waiting room while we waited for it to be my turn. On the way home he told me about how his dad had bought him a soda and took him out for a burger after he sprained his wrist playing football when he was a kid. My dad told me that someday I would have a son or daughter of my own and they would hurt themselves. It would be an accident. It always is. These things happen all the time. It’s part of growing up, he said. He wanted me to promise that I would never get angry when it happened, because the kid’s already in pain. My dad wanted me to promise him I would show my child love and kindness and, more importantly, patience.” Rick looked up at Jo, tears stinging his eyes. “I’m never gonna have that opportunity to buy Carl a soda after he sprains or breaks something because he’s dead. But I can do something nice for Hope, or Sophia or Mika. I don’t know what I can do, but should that time come, I’ll think of something.”

“Will you still do something nice for them even if I’m gone?”

“You aren’t going anywhere. I ain’t letting you out of my sight again.”

“We all have to die sometime, Rick, and if I go before you—”

“No,” he shook his head adamantly.

“If I go before you,” she repeated, “you need to promise me you’ll take care of our girls the same as you would if I was still here. If I have to take time away from my incredibly peaceful afterlife to come back here and haunt your ass until you see sense, I’m gonna be so angry.” Her tone was teasing, but she was unmistakably serious. “What your father made you promise him, I’m making you promise me. Love your children. Be kind, be loving, be patient. They’re gonna need you more than ever.”

“I promise,” he answered truthfully, “but can we talk about something other than death right now?” His shoulders slumped and he lowered his head down onto her lap, gripping her calves with his strong fingers.

“What do you want to talk about?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he muttered. “I just wanna lay right here for a few moments before we head out. I want to focus on you being here with me.”

A contented smile spreading to her lips, Jo tipped her head back as she placed her hands into his hair, holding him in place. “Okay.”

 

* * *

 

Nicole had come around a few minutes later to take a look at Jo’s ankle and then apply an Ace bandage to it. Finn brought Jo the crutches he’d mentioned seeing for her to use and as they all began to file out of the church and make their way to the bus, which was packed with enough supplies to last them all a few days on the road, Rick walked ahead of Jo to make sure she managed down the concrete steps with the crutches well enough. Jen was up and around as well, but looked incredibly emaciated from the blood loss. She moved slow, but with assistance from Finn. Sophia and Mika hung close to Jo but gave her enough space to maneuver toward the bus as she hobbled along.

“Hopefully I only need these for a day or two, because these will be a serious handicap for me,” Jo muttered to Rick in regard to her crutches. She made sure her voice was low so Jen didn’t hear; not wanting to take away from the fact that Jen’s handicap was much greater. “Do you think she’s angry at me?”

“Jen?” Rick asked as he let her take the first seat behind the driver’s seat on the bus.

“Yeah.”

“Why would she be angry at you?”

As Jo sat down, she handed the crutches off to Rick who held onto them as he sat down beside her. “Because I chopped off her hand.”

“To save her life. She’d be dead right now if you hadn’t thought fast. You put your own life at risk to take the time to do what you did. You took time away from getting yourself out. You could’ve left her behind, but you chose to save her, or at least give her a chance.”

As the last few stragglers made it onto the bus, Rick watched as Morgan claimed the driver’s seat, but first turned around to get a mental headcount before sitting down at the wheel.

“You good to drive, Morgan?” Rick inquired.

The other man chuckled. “I never did tell you what I did for a living in the world before, did I?”

“By any chance was it driving school buses?”

“It was.”

“Did you drive for King County? You might’ve had my son on your route.”

“I drove for King County, but for the high school,” Morgan replied.

“Ah,” Rick nodded as he turned to his right and gestured to Tara and Mika who sat across from them. “Can you hold onto these for us?” he asked the young brunette woman, holding out the crutches to her.

“Yeah, sure.” Tara took them and set them between her legs, flashing Rick a smile in the process.

Turning around in his seat, Rick took note of who was sitting where, to make his own mental head count as well. Call it paranoia or whatever, he just wanted to be doubly sure they weren’t about to leave anyone behind.

Two seats behind Tara and Mika were Finn and Jen, huddled together, with Milo just behind them. Directly across from Finn and Jen was Nicole; there to keep a close eye on Jen just in case. Sophia and Piper were sitting opposite each other at the middle of the bus, talking amongst themselves, while Karen and Tyreese were somehow sandwiched together in a seat together. Sam sat alone closer to the back, behind the latter couple, staring blankly out the window, while the Dixon brothers occupied the last two seats in the back of the bus, to keep an eye out for any possible threats. That left Michonne who was seated directly behind Nicole, with her eyes closed; prepared to catch up on some sleep.

“Let’s roll this yellow piece of shit the fuck outta here,” Merle called out from the back.

Despite himself, Rick smirked at the redneck’s uncouth remark as he turned his attention to Jo. As the bus started up and the bus door closed, he slipped an arm around her shoulders and, using his free hand, he lifted her legs carefully up to drape them over his lap, forcing her body to turn so that she could stretch out across him.

“Comfortable?” he asked.

“I am now.”

“Good.” Leaning sideways, Rick pressed his lips against Jo’s. A smile is what he took away when he leaned back and stared her in the eye, while casually brushing his thumb along the side of her face.

“Alright,” Morgan spoke up, as the bus began to turn out of the small parking lot. “Next stop: Washington, D.C.”

The bus was divided.

Half cheered, half remained silent.

Half was happy to be back on the road, headed for their destination to find Hope and Shane while the other half was sullen from the losses they’d experienced with the Commune’s fall.

Even though Jo had just begun to get to know her mother and open her heart to the woman, she was on the side of the happy half. She cared about her mother and was upset that she had died, but it had happened and there was nothing she could do about that now. Jo’s concern would always lie first and foremost with her daughter’s fate.

She couldn’t look behind, she had to look forward.

“Next stop: Hope,” Jo muttered to Rick.

Pulling Jo closer up against him wrapping his arms around her waist, Rick pressed his forehead to hers and nodded. He didn’t respond with words, but simply the smile for how things seemed like they were possibly looking up for them again.

 

* * *

 

“Well, this is an unexpected development.”

“I thought you said this thing was _fine_?” Daryl growled, throwing his hands up into the air out of frustration. “You said you were tinkering for the sake of tinkering. What the fuck were you tinkering with exactly, you fuckwit?”

“Hey, hey, hey, can we just keep it down? We’re in the middle of nowhere and don’t know if there are any unfriendly types around here,” Morgan piped up, trying to diffuse the current situation.

The majority of the group was still on the bus, which now sat unmoving in the middle of a deserted country road, somewhere about four hours northeast of Atlanta. Only an hour earlier they had crossed the Smith-McGee Bridge into South Carolina and passed the sign welcoming them on the other side into the state; a sign that was now barely legible from the tree overgrowth around it. They had all be a little more excited and nervous at the prospect of how well their journey north seemed to be progressing. And now, not ten minutes after refueling with the gas cans they had on board, they were stopped because something had suddenly happened with the engine, causing it to stall and sputter with white smoke coming out of it.

Outside the bus, Daryl stood between Rick and Morgan, staring at the engine after Milo had helped them open it up. Merle was hanging around outside as well, keeping an eye out with his shotgun.

“It didn’t look like there was anything wrong with it. We checked the fluids and they were fine. We were able to fill the gas tank with fuel we syphoned from that Aramark next door to the church.”

Rick ran a hand down his face. “What kind of gas did you syphon? What kind of gas did you put into those canisters?”

Milo shrugged. “It was from whatever vehicles still had gas in them.”

Rick and Daryl caught each other’s eye and sighed heavily.

“He means do you know of it was regular gas or diesel?” Daryl asked.

“I…I don’t know.”

“Well, you can tell the difference by smell and its color. Diesel is strong, it’s kinda red,” Rick replied.

“I’m sorry; we just grabbed what we could.”

Rick placed his hands on his hips and turned toward Morgan and Daryl. “There must’ve already been enough diesel in the bus when we left the church and that’s why we had no problem until we refueled. What we just added a little bit ago must’ve been the regular fuel. That’s why it’s stalled and smoking.”

“We can’t put more of it into the tank,” Morgan commented. “We need to find some diesel or we’re on foot from here on out until we find different vehicles.”

With a nod, Rick looked in both directions of the barren road and then upward toward the sky. “Alright, well, we have about a good five or six hours left of daylight at our disposal. We can’t afford to have all of us walking around yet; not with Jo on crutches and Jen still weak from losing her hand and all that blood. They need to stay put,” he stated. “So, we’ll break up into a few small groups. Three pairings of two people. One goes straight in the direction we were already headed, one goes left into the woods and one goes into the woods on the right. Hopefully either of the latter options comes out onto another road, or to a business or farm with a tractor of some sort that uses diesel. We have three gas canisters on the bus, so we’ll just have to empty them out to fill up with—”

“I don’t think we should empty them out. That’d be a waste,” Morgan stated. “We spread out, yes, and if we find any diesel, there’s a likelihood we’ll find gas canisters to use to transport it back here. Or, if need be, we find other vehicles to bring back here instead and we continue on in those and leave the bus behind.”

Flitting his eyes from Morgan to Daryl, Rick waited to see the archer’s thoughts on what Morgan proposed.

“Morgan’s right,” Daryl agreed, chewing at his thumbnail. Off Rick’s subsequent nod, he turned and looked over at Milo. “You’re with me, dumbass.”

“Come one now,” Milo muttered. “That’s not necessary.”

“Whatever. Just go grab your weapon off the bus. You and me are headed that way,” the archer replied, pointing across the road at the woods on the right.

“Yeah, okay.”

As Milo darted up inside the bus, Morgan stepped toward the hood of the engine and closed it. With the engine off, the bus was okay for now. The smoke was a dissipating but they weren’t about to risk anything by turning the engine back on and potentially cause it to burst into flames. Turning away from the other two, Rick stepped up into the bus as well and went right to Jo who was sitting there in the same place he’d left her, with her legs still outstretched on the seat.

“So what’s the prognosis?” she asked.

“Milo put regular gas into a diesel engine. We can’t continue driving this thing the way it is without diesel. The engine could burst into flames. So, we’re gonna go split up into three pairs and go find some diesel, or at the very least different vehicles if diesel is a no go.”

Jo frowned. “So much for not keeping me out of your sight again.” She attempted to sound teasing, but it fell flat. After everything, she was feeling nervous about being apart from him again and she could tell he was uneasy about it, too.

“Only six of us are going. Daryl’s taking Milo.”

“Who else is going?”

Rick shrugged. “I think Merle and Morgan might be better suited for keeping an eye out here,” he answered, before casting an eye to Tara on his left. “You up for an adventure?”

Tara turned her face up to him and smirked. “You want me to go with you?”

“Yeah.” Looking at his brother-in-law and then over toward Tyreese, he called out their names to get their attention. “You two up to making a run for some diesel?”

Finn cast an eye toward his sleepy girlfriend and then nodded back at Rick. “Yeah, I’m up for it.”

“Where do you want us to look?” Tyreese asked.

“Daryl and Milo will head through the woods on one side of the road, I’ll take Tara through the woods on the other side,” he said, pointing out the windows on his left, which was the right side of the road, judging by the direction they’d been headed. “You two can head straight up the road. We’ll see if we can find some place, any place or vehicles that have diesel. If not, look for cars with fuel in them. Even if you don’t find vehicles with full tanks, we still have three leftover gas canisters with regular fuel in them we can use. We can bring the canisters back to those vehicles and pack our supplies up in them instead. We got about five or six hours to do this and get back before nightfall, so let’s not waste any time, alright?”

Finn and Tyreese both stood up and kissed their ladies before offering parting words and grabbing weapons to bring with them for protection. As they made their way off the bus with Milo and Tara, Rick hesitated, looking around at those who remained on the bus; Mika, Sophia, Piper, Jen, Nicole, Sam, Karen and, of course, Jo.

“The rest of you stay inside the bus. If you have to go to the bathroom, take a partner and don’t go too far into the woods to do it,” he advised. “Hunker down, stay quiet. If walkers come by, let them move along. Don’t draw attention to yourselves. We don’t know this area. There could be more walkers around that would get attracted by any noise, but I don’t really need to explain that. Ya'll are plenty capable.”

“Damn straight we are,” Karen confirmed from where she was half kneeling on her seat and half standing; her arms resting on the back of the seat in front of her.

With a nod, Rick stepped down the aisle over toward Sophia. He reached a hand out and placed it on top of her head. “Stay safe,” he muttered.

“I will.”

“Help Jo keep an eye on Mika. You’re her big sister now, after all.”

Sophia smirked and nodded back. “I will,” she repeated.

With his own smirk, Rick turned around and went to Mika next. He mimicked the same gesture with her that he did with Sophia, by placing his hand on her head. “Be good and stay quiet.”

The girl nodded obediently, with a sad pout on her lips. “Okay.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Will you come back?”

“Of course I will.”

Mika seemed unconvinced. “Mom almost didn’t come back,” she muttered, nodding at Jo. It was the first time she had officially and openly referred to Jo as her mother and it wasn’t lost on either Rick or Jo.

“But she _did_ come back to us,” he remarked. “Nothing's gonna keep us from you girls. You’re safety is our priority.”

“Okay,” Mika replied.

“Okay.”

Just as Rick began to turn around to look back at Jo, Mika spoke up once more. “If you find any Barbie dolls, can you bring them back with you?” she asked politely. “I lost the other ones at the hotel.”

Rick grinned and shot his surrogate daughter a rather amused look. “I can’t make that promise for sure but I’ll do my best to keep an eye out.”

“Cool.”

Snickering, Rick finally brought his eyes over to Jo, who was smiling back up at him. “I’ll be back,” he whispered, leaning in toward her.

Jo turned her face upward to him and held her hands out to grip his shoulders as she met his lips in a warm, soft kiss. “If you get yourself killed I’m going to kick your ass.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

 

* * *

 

After nearly an hour and two miles of uneven terrain north into the woods, Rick and Tara had since made their way onto another road and begun to approach some sort of power plant. It was largely fenced off, but there was a parking lot former employees had once used and some had left behind their vehicles. There were only three cars, but it was better than nothing.

“How are we going to syphon gas?” Tara wondered, holding her handgun down at her side. “Those cars won’t have diesel in them.”

“As long as they have gas in them, they’ll serve a purpose,” Rick muttered, stepping through the overgrown grass toward the parking lot while keeping a wary eye out.

“Wait—there’s a few trucks inside that fence over there,” she suddenly pointed out toward one of the inner sections of the power plant. “They might have diesel in their tanks.”

Rick nodded, although he wasn’t too sold on the idea of checking. The cars in the parking lot were readily available and out in the open. There were no places for walkers to potentially meander out from and catch them unawares. He wanted to take as little risks as possible so they could make it back to their people before sundown.

“These cars will do for now,” he gestured toward them with a limp pointing of his finger while still keeping an eye out around them. “The place does seem secure and I haven’t seen a walker, which is a good sign, but that might not be the only threat we could be facing here. Last time we came to an industrial-looking place like this they tried to kill and eat us.” Rick cast a look at Tara who shuddered at the memory, even if she had been locked in the train car with the others and not had the displeasure of seeing the slaughterhouse in person. She had still been filled in after the fact along with everyone else. “There could be people in here, holed up, using the fences for safety. It’s what I’d do.”

“What if they’re good people?”

Rick stopped as they approached the first of the three cars. “What if they’re not?” Without waiting for any sort of answer, he shook his head. “That’s not a risk I’m taking either. We get what we can and we go.”

As Rick opened the driver’s door and crouched down to push the trunk release button, Tara shifted her weight around while keeping her eyes open for anything out of the ordinary or that might pose a threat while his head was down. “Rick, can I ask you a question?”

“Yeah,” he replied, standing up and walking back toward the opened trunk.

“Why did you ask me to come with you and not Merle or even the new one, Michonne?”

“Why _not_ ask you?”

Tara shrugged and peered inside the trunk with him, looking upon a cardboard box full of empty beer cans. The sour smell of stale beer hit them in the face and made them grimace, although it wasn’t nearly as bad as the smell of human decay they got a little more used to day after day. Pushing the box aside, Rick reached forward and grabbed a tool box which he proceeded to open up.

“You’re plenty capable and your talents are being wasted babysitting Mika, although I appreciate that,” Rick resumed their conversation after a few moments while rifling through the toolbox. “I’m pretty sure I overheard you mention at some point you were in training to be a police officer, right?”

Tara nodded as he cast a glance up at her. “Yeah, I was…before.”

“Well, maybe the world might need new police officers in the future, if ever any of this subsides a little, or if we find a place that is honestly safe. Bringing you out here with me, having you able to hold your own, will help you.”

“I like hanging around with Mika,” Tara muttered. “She reminds me of my niece I lost the day of the prison attack.”

Rick had never heard about that. Standing up straight he gave her a solemn nod. “I’m sorry to hear about that.”

“We left her and my sister behind when we made our way to the prison with Brian—I mean, The Governor.”

“He called himself Brian?”

Tara nodded. “Brian Heriot.”

“His name was Philip Blake. Or at least that was the name he gave everyone at Woodbury. Jo and Merle told me that much. He claimed the people there chose to call him The Governor of their own volition, as a sort of nickname.” Rick snickered. “That isn’t a nickname people give out. Philly, Phil, Lip…P-Diddy. Those are nicknames. The Governor? That’s a title of authority and he ate up every minute of it.” Feeling anger over everything The Governor was responsible for and had done, all the losses attributed to him, Rick clenched his jaw and reined it all in quite successfully. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to go off on a tangent about him. It’s just a sore spot still and will be for a long time, I think.”

“It’s okay. I get it,” Tara assured. “He’ll be a sore spot for me, too. Because of him, my niece is dead and I watched my sister shoot herself in the head from a distance because of it. He led us to the prison under false pretenses. And the people I loved paid the ultimate price. When Morgan and Mika found me, I was cowering behind some fencing inside the prison courtyard. I’d gone looking for my girlfriend and found her dead on the ground with a gunshot to the head. I wasn’t taking everything very well. I tried hiding and wishing it would all just go away. Morgan and Mika brought me out of it. That’s another reason why I don’t mind being there for Mika. She was there for me, even if she’s just a kid.”

Rick nodded, removing a few screwdrivers and shoving them into the satchel he’d brought with him. They could be handy weapons in a pinch. Closing the trunk, he led the way over to the second car. “We all help each other,” he muttered, throwing her a smirk. “It’s what family does.”

Tara smiled. “Yeah, it is.”

Setting the satchel down on the ground beside the car as he opened the driver door, Rick finagled with popping open the trunk the same as he did with the first. As he stood back up and turned, he forgot about the satchel for a moment and caught his boot with the strap. Losing his footing for half a second, Rick stumbled forward and threw his hands out to break his inevitable fall. His knees hit the pavement before his hands and he let out a small, but pained yelp.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

Tara did her best not to laugh. Truly, she did. However, the overall situation was the epitome of slapstick comedy and it laughing just felt so good. She wasn’t heartless, though. She did offer her hand to him to help him back up, which seemed to be a slow process as his joints ached and popped as he stood.

“Sorry for laughing,” she apologized; a smile still plastered on her face.

Rick shot her a look, but couldn’t be mad. “Don’t tell anyone I did that. I’ll never live it down.”

“I'll just hold it over your head for whenever I need something.”

“Gee, thanks.”

As Tara chuckled some more, Rick leaned down and picked the satchel up, tossing it over his shoulder begrudgingly while trying his best not to smile at his own awkwardness.

 

* * *

 

Jo was still sitting the same way another hour later, with her back against the side of the bus and her head leaning against the window while her legs lay outstretched on the seat before her. The only difference now was her eyes were closed and she was trying to rest; something that was easier to do when the bus wasn’t moving. All her life she had never been able to sleep in a moving vehicle. If she even attempted, she got motion sickness. Instead, she would stay awake for hours and hours on end, which wasn’t exactly ideal when her father used to drive them all the way down to Disney World for a family vacation because it was cheaper than flying, and also her father was afraid of flying. What used to make it more tiring was that, as the oldest she got to sit in the front seat, and in the days before GPS devices in cars, she was her father’s navigator. It was up to her to keep track of where they were going on the map, especially when they drove someplace new.

Those thoughts lingered in her head as the din of conversation from the others on the bus barely registered in her mind. Different images melted together in her half-dreaming, half-awake mind. Rick kept appearing, and Hope, all those walkers in the hotel, leaving her mother behind, arriving to her father’s home after Oscar died and finding him dead on the couch with the gun in his hand.

As her green eyes opened to shake away the sad thoughts and memories that started to pop up, Jo frowned and tried sitting up a bit straighter as she looked over the back of her seat toward the others that remained. Sophia and Piper had seemed to include Mika in on a game of Go Fish with a pack of cards they must’ve found back at the church. Jen was asleep again, as was Nicole; both in their respective seats. Sam was staring out the window still, lost in a thought that was most likely the loss of his girlfriend Ana. Karen was still sitting in the same seat as before, but Morgan sat across from her and the two were talking about something or another. Looking to her left, over the driver’s seat toward the front of the bus, Jo spotted Michonne outside, pacing, with her katana unsheathed. It seemed was keeping watch and Jo assumed Merle was somewhere behind the back of the bus, keeping an eye out in that direction.

Letting out a sigh as she began to feel the stirrings of restlessness, Jo began to scoot forward along her seat and reached out for one of the two crutches in the seat across from her. Pulling herself up in such a way as not to put any weight on her left foot, she then shoved the crutch under her left arm and turned to step over toward the door release to open the bus door.

“Jo, where you going?” Morgan called out from the back.

“Gotta go to the bathroom.”

As she tried hobbling down the stairs, Michonne happened to be turned toward the bus at the same moment and came walking up to the door Jo had opened up.

“Where are you going?” Michonne called inside to her.

“Bathroom.”

“I’ll come with you. Rick said we need to take a partner if we need to use the bathroom.”

Before Jo could say okay or even oppose the offer, Karen came walking up the aisle toward her, having heard Michonne, while wielding a roll of toilet paper that had been swiped from the church. “I’ll go with her,” she offered, placing a hand on Jo’s shoulder. “I have to go, too, anyway.”

Michonne nodded and stepped back to give Jo room to exit the bus, but held a hand out to help as she stepped down onto the road. Once Karen joined her at her side, Jo began the tedious task of continuing to hobble as she led the way off the road and in through to the trees.

“How long have they been gone now? Almost two hours?” Jo wondered, paying attention to the ground in front of her as she walked; hoping the base of the crutch didn’t sink into a soft spot of earth underfoot.

“Thereabouts,” Karen replied, half a step behind her.

Jo threw a look over her shoulder to see how far away from the road they were to make sure no one would see her when she crouched down to do her business behind some trees. After a few more feet, she was comfortable with the distance and gave a shy smirk to Karen, who promptly and respectively turned around to give her some privacy.

Resting her crutch against one tree, Jo leaned against another as she undid her pants and slid them down her hips. She grimace when she looked at her gut and noticed how bloated she was starting to look, wondering how many days away her period was. As she crouched down, she closed her eyes and quietly sighed as she began to relieve herself, while also feeling a bit of embarrassment for knowing Karen could hear her as she went.

“Tissue please,” Jo asked when she was finished.

Reaching her arm backward, Karen passed the toilet paper to Jo, who took it and ripped off enough to clean up. She tossed it as far away as she could afterward and the set the roll down as she began the laborious task of standing up and pulling her pants up with her while still trying not to put weight on her left foot. She was just thankful the tree was there for her to lean on.

“Shit, okay. You’re gonna have to pick the roll up,” she muttered. “I’m not bending down for that.”

Karen chuckled. “That’s okay.”

“Alright, then: your turn.”

“I don’t actually have to go,” the slightly older woman admitted, leaning down to pick up the roll of toilet paper. “It was just an excuse to talk to you in private.”

Jo raised an eyebrow out of curiosity. “How clandestine,” she commented with an impish grin. “To what to I owe the honor of such secrecy?”

Karen sighed nervously. “What was it like when you were pregnant with Hope? I mean, how did you realize you were pregnant?”

Trying to bypass the memory of how she got pregnant with Hope and what had happened after she had told The Governor, Jo focused on the memory Karen was inquiring about. “I was nauseous, constantly. I was throwing up a lot. And then the thought just popped into my head and I began counting back to when my last period was and realized I was quite late,” she answered. “There was no pregnancy test I could discreetly take, even if I had been able to find one. I just waited a bit longer to see if I would still get my period, and it didn’t come. That’s how I knew.”

“Did you have weird cravings?”

“No, not really,” Jo shook her head. “I didn’t get to experience that luxury. Having any edible food at all satisfied any craving I might’ve had.”

Karen grimaced, feeling foolish for asking such a thing, as she remembered the situation Jo had been trapped in; locked away in that basement in Woodbury. To think she had shown up to Woodbury during those months and never knew Jo was being hidden away in such conditions. “I’m sorry,” she muttered. “I forgot how it was for you.”

“Yeah, it definitely wasn’t ideal.”

Licking her lips, Karen brought a hand to her stomach. “I haven’t told Tyreese yet,” she blurted.

It took a moment, but Jo began to register what Karen was saying. “Oh…are you?”

Karen nodded. “I haven’t gotten my period in almost two months. At first I thought maybe it was just early menopause. I mean, I’m forty years old. I thought I was past my baby-making days,” she disclosed, biting her bottom lip. “And then I thought, okay, stress and getting sick at the prison, and not eating much while we’ve been on the road contributed to not getting my period. But I’ve been craving salty foods like crazy. And the smells. I know you’ve seen me throwing up lately. The smell of the dead I’ve gotten used to. It doesn’t offend me as much anymore as it did in the beginning. But lately, it just turns my stomach, and last night I found a jar of pickles and I devoured the entire thing in under five minutes, all by myself.”

Offering a supportive smile, Jo reached a hand out and placed it upon Karen’s arm. “You really should tell Tyreese.”

“I know,” Karen nodded in agreement. “I’m just…I’m scared. I mean, I always wanted to be a mom. I just began to accept it was never going to happen for me. But now that it’s really happening, I don’t know how to go about any of it. There’s really no way of getting rid of it, not that I’d want to, but the prospect of having to give birth in this world and bringing a child into it is terrifying.”

Jo snickered. “Hey, I’ve been there, done that. It was not easy and it was not fun, but I would do it all over again because, in the end, I got my daughter out of it. Granted, I lucked out. She was born a month early, but she was healthy. The hardest part was just the fear of The Governor taking her away from me and, in the end, I guess you could say he did.” Reaching out for her crutch, she propped it up under her left arm again so she didn’t have to lean on the tree to her right any longer. “He destroyed the prison. He ruined it for us and, because of it, Rick and I lost Hope. We didn’t know who had taken her or if she was even alive, and it eats at us every day. That pain and that heartbreak, it keeps growing and we’re doing the best we can to be strong for each other and for everyone else. But despite all that, I don’t regret not finding a way to terminate my pregnancy. It was terrifying before she was born, during her birth and after, and it will never stop being terrifying. I will never stop being scared because it keeps me on my toes and it keeps me going, for her, even if she’s not with me where she should be.”

Tears were suddenly stinging both women’s eyes for different reasons. Karen was simply moved by what Jo had said and from her own feelings about her pregnancy, while Jo was trying not to let the ache in her heart get the best of her.

Stepping forward, Karen wrapped her arms around Jo and hugged her tightly. “We’ll find your daughter.”

“I know. I _hope.”_

With a deep sigh, Karen looked through the trees in the direction of the bus. “We should get back. Michonne looks like the type that’ll rally an army to come look for us if we take any longer.”

Jo chuckled, wiping the tears from her eyes as Karen did the same. “We’ll just tell her we were constipated.”

Karen let out a hearty chuckle and nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”

As they both began to walk back toward the road, just before they cleared the tree cover, Jo played Karen’s announcement over in her head and it made her think about her pregnancy with Hope even more. Absentmindedly she placed her right hand, the one not gripping the crutch, to her slightly bloated stomach and tapped her fingers upon it. Stepping more slowly behind Karen, Jo chewed on the inside of her bottom lip as images of her and Rick and all the chances they’d taken, sexually, in the last month, when they hadn’t used protection. She thought about how they’d talked about what would happen if she ever got pregnant again. She thought about how she’d thrown up after being accosted by the same smells that had been bothering Karen recently. More importantly, Jo thought about how she couldn’t remember exactly when she got her period last.

Stepping out onto the road and nodding over to Michonne who nodded back at them, Jo kept her head down as she did the math in her head.

Karen walked up into the bus ahead of her and Michonne stood behind her as she hobbled up the steps with her crutch, but her mind wasn’t on them.

Her mind was on the fact that she remember the last time getting her period as being about two weeks before the sickness hit the prison.

Returning to her seat while still gripping her crutch with both hands, Jo’s face blanched.

If the numbers in her head were correct, her period was a week late.

Jo looked down, removing a hand to place it back upon her stomach as her eyebrows lifted in an expression that was somewhere between dismay and amazement.

“Shit.”


	39. Positive

_"No matter what you're going through, there's a light at the end of the tunnel and it may seem hard to get to it but you can do it and just keep working towards it and you'll find the positive side of things."_ — Demi Lovato

* * *

  
Tyreese and Finn returned first, coming back down the road with their weapons lowered and covered with some fresh blood splatter and other disgusting grime. The former was carrying a canister in his hand and looking tired as he nodded at Merle upon his and Finn’s approach. With the bus closer to them now, Finn ran the rest of the way and darted up inside the bus to check on Jen, who was alright, but sleeping yet again after a brief period where she’d been awake long enough to eat something. When Finn had gone past Jo, he kicked up a breeze that riled her hair and left behind the stench he was covered in. It almost instantly invaded her senses and she didn’t have enough time to grab for her crutches to get outside the bus to throw up. Jo was only able to pull herself up to her feet and hunched forward as she promptly threw up on the top of the stairs, just as both Tyreese and Merle were about to step inside.  
  
Both men grimaced and took steps back before looking up at her. Wiping her mouth, Jo moved over to the driver’s seat and gracelessly dropped down into it as she stared sheepishly back at them.  
  
“Sorry,” she muttered, as Merle pulled a water bottle out of his pocket.  
  
At first she thought he was going to toss it up to her so she could rinse her mouth out from the vomit taste still on her tongue, but instead she watched as he muttered some choice expletives, uncapped the bottle and dumped the water out on the stairs to rinse it off as best as he can.  
  
“You owe me another bottle of water, missy,” he remarked.  
  
Jo nodded and leaned back further in her seat; her stomach still sour. “Yeah, whatever. Put it on my tab.”  
  
“You feeling alright?” Tyreese asked as he carefully stepped up into the bus, eyeing her with concern.  
  
“Just a little bug.”  
  
It wasn’t a lie. The child that was undoubtedly growing in her womb was no bigger than a common house fly at the moment. No one needed the details until she decided they needed them, and until she’d been able to talk to Rick in private about it.  
  
“That diesel?” she inquired about the canister.  
  
Tyreese nodded. “Yeah, got it off a tractor, but it’s only half full. Couldn’t find anything else. Any other car or truck we found was rotted out or missing parts that other people might’ve taken as they came by for their own vehicles.”  
  
“Well, hopefully the others had better luck.”  
  
“Hopefully."  
  
As Tyreese made his way further up into the bus and lumbered down the aisle toward the back where Karen was, Jo brought her hand to her nose and pinched her nostrils shut as not to inhale any more offending scents. When she heard Karen muttering something about staying back with how smelly he was, Jo couldn’t help but smile.  
  
It was nice to know she wouldn’t have to go through a second pregnancy alone, in the sense that Karen was pregnant as well.  
  
This was going to be an interesting seven to eight months.  
  
If Jo was about a month pregnant and Karen about two months, they would be delivering their children a month apart from each other.  
  
She just hoped by the time that happened that they found someplace safe to live because it would be rather difficult to bring two infants into the world and raise them out on the open road. If they all had to hole up in a small, dilapidated house for months, then that was what they’d have to do. Jo also hoped that, by that point, they had found Hope, or at least were close to getting her back.  
  
Bringing a hand to her forehead, Jo rested her elbow on the steering wheel and sighed as pang of guilt struck her from out of the blue; the guilt of having a new child about to occupy her life while she was still trying to look for her first one. She didn’t want to get lax about finding Hope just because there was another child on the way, but she didn’t want to put this new child at risk either. It was something that she and Rick wanted. It’s just that having it now was less than ideal with their current situation. However, there was no guarantee there would ever _be_ an ideal time.  
  
To distract herself from the negative thoughts, Jo opted for wondering which time would’ve been the one that resulted in her getting pregnant.  
  
Sure there had a few occasions since leaving the prison where they’d had unprotected sex, but the way she felt and how puffy her stomach looked this second time around, Jo knew it was safe to assume it happened _at_ the prison, just before the illness hit.  
  
Dropping her hand, she turned her head and stared out the windshield, barely registering Michonne still keeping watch outside. She was thinking about that day, shortly after the end of her last period, when she and Rick had taken a watch in one of the guard towers at night and where they’d ended up getting distracted by each other for a little while. They hadn’t brought any condoms up with them, because they hadn’t planned on having sex up there, and Rick had insisted he’d pulled out in time.  
  
Guess he’d been wrong in that estimation.  
  
About a half hour later, Daryl and Milo returned; not with fuel of any kind or different vehicles, but with plenty of squirrels and one rabbit that Daryl had clearly caught.  
  
“We’ll eat like kings tonight,” the archer quipped as he tossed the slew of dead animals onto the dashboard of the bus as he grinned slightly at Jo.  
  
In response, Jo frowned and turned away.  
  
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked once Milo had slipped past him.  
  
Jo shook her head. “Upset stomach.”  
  
Daryl snorted and, in a low but teasing voice, asked, “What are you, pregnant or something?”  
  
When she shot a look up at him that betrayed the fact that she wanted to keep it to herself, Daryl’s face became serious and he nodded. He seemed to understand that she, indeed, was with child but that she also wanted to keep it quiet.  
  
“Does Rick know?” he whispered.  
  
“Not yet,” she replied back, in the same low voice. “I just realized it a little bit ago.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “Well, congratulations.” He offered her a slightly cheeky smile and then placed his balled up fist against her shoulder in a sort of platonic nudge of affection. “I hope this one takes its time baking.”  
  
With a small chuckle bubbling out from her lips, Jo smiled back at him. “Yeah, that’d be nice. Though, by the time I had Hope my body was so tired and achy, I was ready for her to come out when she did.”  
  
“Yeah, but her timing wasn’t exactly ideal,” he remarked. “You and Rick stuck in the infirmary with walkers clawing at the doors to get in, no Hershel to help, and that damned siren going off.”  
  
“Can’t say it wasn’t memorable.”  
  
“That’s for sure.” Chewing on his bottom lip, Daryl gave her shoulder a second nudge. “Anybody else know?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Alright.”  
  
He didn’t have to say it, but Jo knew he meant he wasn’t going to say anything, not that she assumed he would’ve. Daryl wasn’t exactly the talkative type to begin with, let alone someone who gossiped about anything.  
  
Without another word, he grabbed the squirrels and rabbit off the dashboard and stepped back off the bus to, most likely, skin the animals in preparation for cooking them up. Or maybe he was just going to sling them over his shoulder for a while and take watch. Jo didn’t really know and she was no longer paying attention to his whereabouts as she stood up and hobbled back to her seat.  
  
Once more with her back to the wall and her head against the window, Jo sat with both legs outstretched before her and just waited for Rick and Tara to return.

* * *

  
As sunset began to near, Jo was growing anxious.  
  
Despite the protests against it, Jo grabbed one of her crutches and made her way back outside the bus and walked around to the left side of the bus to stare into the woods. She was no longer content sitting idly by as she waited. She needed to move around, even if she should be keeping her foot elevated and as much weight off her foot as possible.  
  
It was only a sprain, not a break. She’d be fine.  
  
That’s what she told herself and what she believed.  
  
Michonne attempted small talk, but Jo was too distracted by her growing worry and the thoughts of a new baby to pay the other woman much attention, and Michonne must’ve caught on because soon enough she fell into a welcomed silence. Jo maintained her eyes on the woods on the left and Michonne looked straight ahead. Merle was still behind the bus, but now the back emergency door was wide open, with the alarm disabled, as Daryl sat there, skinning his squirrels, carrying on a low conversation with his brother about God knows what.  
  
As her ankle began to get considerably sore again, Jo tried to grin and bear it, hoping it would just pass. Michonne noticed as much and was about to insist Jo head back into the bus to sit down when the sound of multiple engines could be heard rumbling in the near distance.  
  
Whipping their heads around to determine which direction it was coming from, the two women, the Dixon brothers and everyone on the bus found themselves looking behind them on the road at the sight of two sedans rumbling alongside each other. Everyone instinctively grabbed for their weapons just in case, until both vehicles slowed down and then came to a halt.  
  
Daryl hopped down from where he was perched on the floor of the back of the bus and grabbed up his crossbow, immediately pointing it at the driver of the first car. It was too hard to tell because the setting sun was shining right at the windshield, obscuring the view into the car. When the door clicked open, hands went up in surrender, but Merle and Daryl both dropped their weapons almost instantly as their shoulders slumped with relief.  
  
Out of the first car, stepped Rick with a smirk on his face as he lowered his hands.  
  
“What took you so damn long?” Daryl demanded, walking up to Rick and slapping his hand as a greeting as they neared each other.  
  
“We got held up,” Rick replied, gesturing over his shoulder to the other sedan, which Tara was stepping out of.  
  
“Any kind of trouble that might follow?”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Nah. It’s taken care of.”  
  
“What kind of trouble was it?” Merle asked curiously. “Dead or alive?”  
  
“Dead. A lot of dead. Nowhere near as much as we just got done dealing with in Atlanta, but more than enough for just the two of us to try and deal with,” Rick answered. “We took out as many as we could and then we just waited it out in a house just up the road from where we were scavenging these cars. And there’s another car. These two and the other one all have full tanks of gas; pair that with the three full canisters we have on the bus and we can make our way again. The bus served its purpose. It least it got us this far.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “I’ll come with you to get that other car and drive it back here. We’ll load up our shit and get going.”  
  
“I’d love more than anything to keep going right now, but we’re almost out of daylight as it is and traveling at night is too much of a risk,” Rick replied, leaning his hand on the hood of the car he’d driven. “It won’t exactly be comfortable, but we’ll all sleep in the bus tonight and then you and I can go get that third car at first light. That way we’ll have a full day of traveling ahead of us and make better time.”  
  
“Alright.”  
  
“I call dibs on sleeping in the backseat of this other car,” Merle remarked, pointing at the car Tara had driven. “I’m a tall man and I need to stretch my legs.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “That’s up to Tara. Not you,” he said with an impish grin which he flashed to the young brunette.  
  
“Yeah, it’s up to me,” Tara retorted with smug satisfaction, crossing her arms under her ample bosom.  
  
As Rick squinted from the setting sunlight in his eyes, he narrowed his gaze and noticed Jo outside the bus and that she was hobbling toward him. If he wasn’t so concerned for her putting unnecessary weight on her ankle, he would’ve found the way she was walking a bit hilarious. However, not wanting to have her walk any further than she had to, Rick met her halfway and threw an arm around her neck as he pulled her into a tight embrace.  
  
“Told you I’d be back,” he murmured into her ear. Feeling her sigh with content against him, Rick pulled back and practically devoured her lips in a kiss. “I love you.”  
  
“I love you, too, baby.”  
  
As they leaned away from each other, they were smiling; simply happy for each other’s presence. As a show of affection, Jo brought her right hand up to push back some of his curls that were damp from sweat and clinging to the side of his face. His increasingly growing beard somehow seemed more unruly and that amused her greatly and it showed on her face. His cobalt blue eyes flitted between her green ones for what felt like forever, although it was merely seconds, just before stealing one more kiss from her lips.  
  
“I found something for you,” he announced, leading over toward the car he’d driven by the hand; slowly, though, as not to rush her in her physical condition.  
  
“Oh?”  
  
“The house Tara and I were stuck in had this workshop in the garage. The guy who lived there were found dead in the living room; bite mark on his arm, but he must’ve taken his own life shortly after he got bit ‘cause the back of his skull was missing, but that’s beside the point,” Rick rambled slightly. “Point is, he must’ve been some sort of blacksmith by trade or as a hobby ‘cause he had all these swords and homemade light fixtures hanging up all over the place and,” he informed, reaching his arm through the open driver’s side window to retrieve something from the passenger’s seat, “I knew we couldn’t leave there empty-handed. I couldn’t come back here, to you, without bringing you your very own sword to make up for the one you lost back at Terminus.”  
  
Jo’s mouth fell agape when Rick removed a sword sheathed in a homemade leather scabbard and held it up to her. “Are you serious?”  
  
Rick nodded. “Test it out. See how it feels. If you don’t like it, we can easily go back and get you another one.”  
  
“I’m sure this will be fine.” Grabbing the hilt in her right hand, Jo slipped the sword from its scabbard and immediately let it drop to her side. It wasn’t a short sword like she was used to and much heavier, but she liked the feel of having the familiar brand of weapon in her hand again.  
  
“It’s not too heavy, is it?”  
  
“It’s heavier, definitely, but I can get used to it.” Jo raised it up, swung it out at her side away from him, and then swung it downward. She gave a few flicks of her wrist for good measure and began to smile brightly. “I like it.”  
  
“Do you really?”  
  
“I do,” she nodded her confirmation before closing the gap between their bodies and showing her appreciation by reclaiming his mouth with a gentle kiss. “I love it. Thank you.”  
  
Rick smirked, pleased that she was pleased with his find. “You’re welcome,” he replied. “Anything exciting happen while we were gone?”  
  
“No, it was quite boring, actually.” Slipping the sword back into its scabbard, Jo then took it from him and slung it over her right shoulder, which was still tender from the car accidents days before. “Although, we need to talk. Not now, but later. After we’re settled in for the night.”  
  
With a nod, Rick placed a hand on the small of her back. “Alright.”

* * *

  
Before the sun went down, Daryl built up a small fire on the side of the road and began cooking up the squirrels and the rabbit he’d caught for everyone to eat. There weren’t plates or silverware so the group was left to using sticks to hold the meat or hold it in their hands and pick at it with their fingers. It was messy eating, but at least their stomachs were more or less full. And it wasn’t like they weren’t unfamiliar to eating this way.  
  
Well, those from The Commune were probably not used to it so much, but they didn’t really have a choice in the matter.  
  
After the simple meal, the fire was put out and everyone gathered inside the bus except for Merle and Daryl; both brothers occupying the backseats of the cars outside for the night. Blankets were distributed and everyone got as comfortable as they could manage. Tara and Mika didn’t return to occupying the front seat across the aisle from Rick and Jo and instead took up residence in separate seats closer toward everyone else in the middle of the bus, which allowed Rick and Jo some privacy in the front.  
  
With his right leg propped up and his left dangling down onto the floor, Rick leaned with his back to the wall as Jo somehow managed to sit between his legs. A cooler full of supplies had been brought up from the back of the bus for Jo to use as a footrest to keep her left leg elevated as she sat back against Rick’s chest with a blanket draped over her that they were sharing. Both his arms were wrapped around her waist and her arms covered his.  
  
Pressing his lips against the side of her head, Rick whispered, “What did you want to talk about?”  
  
Before Jo could respond, a gleeful yelp burst out of Tyreese that startled everyone on board. Each person sat up and looked over their seats as best as they could to see the large black man standing up and looking down at Karen with the biggest smile anyone had ever seen on his face.  
  
“Are you joking with me right now?” he was asking his girlfriend.  
  
“No,” she shook her head with an amused laugh.  
  
“Care to share what the commotion’s all about?” Rick called out, having not bothered to sit up. He was just too comfortable and content with how he was sitting with Jo in his arms.  
  
“Can I say?” Tyreese asked his woman permission first. Rick or Jo couldn’t see, but Karen had nodded back, which allowed Tyreese to turn and look around at everyone else. “I know it’s gonna be tricky, the way we’re living right now, but Karen’s having my baby. I’m gonna be a father,” he boasted with such pride in his voice.  
  
That was enough to get Rick to crane his neck upward to steal a look in Tyreese’s direction. “Congratulations, Ty…and Karen.”  
  
The others on the bus began to comment similarly, except for Sam who was still too saddened by Ana’s death to show any enthusiasm for the expecting couple. Tyreese didn’t seem to notice or at least he didn’t care. He was too over the moon to focus on anything other than his own happiness at the moment.  
  
With a small chuckle and a slight grin appearing upon his lips, Rick returned his head into its previous position; with his lips pressed against the side of her head, against her blonde tresses. “Well, that was surprising.”  
  
“Not really,” Jo muttered. “Remember how Karen was throwing up back at Dick’s Sporting Goods store, and then at that house? It was morning sickness, not just the smell of death and decay.”  
  
“Well, you would know, having been there and done that,” he remarked, completely oblivious to the fact that she, too, was pregnant again.  
  
“Actually, I only know because she told me she was pregnant earlier when she and I went into the woods to go to take a piss.”  
  
Rick snickered. “Even in the apocalypse, women still gossip when they go to the bathroom,” he teased. After a few moments of silence between them, and as silence seemed to fill the bus again, he lowered his voice as he spoke again. “So, what was it you were going to say before Tyreese’s announcement?”  
  
Jo bit her bottom lip.  
  
She wondered if she told Rick now, if he’d jump up and want to announce her pregnancy the same as Tyreese. If he did just that, she knew she’d feel bad about stealing Tyreese and Karen’s thunder. Instead, she chose that keeping hush about it for a little while longer would be okay. The other couple deserved their moment in the sun to be happy about something special to them.  
  
“It’s nothing that can’t wait until tomorrow,” she finally replied, giving his hands resting on her stomach a firm squeeze; somewhat satisfied that he was hugging their child in a way.  
  
“You sure?”  
  
Jo nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure.” Leaning to the side and then turning her head, she looked up at him and offered a relaxed smile. “It’s been a long day. I’m tired, and I know you’re tired, too. What we need to talk about will be better discussed in the light of a new day.”  
  
“Kinda making me nervous.”  
  
“Well, it _is_ a bit nerve-wracking, but I promise it’s nothing bad.”  
  
“If you say so.”  
  
“I _do_ say so,” Jo replied with a smirked. After a few more moments of silence, she shifted her weight around against his chest and began to allow her eyelids to droop. “Goodnight.”  
  
“Goodnight.”

* * *

  
When first light began to make its way over the horizon and slowly find its way into the windows surrounding the bus, Jo was already awake and had been for nearly a half hour. A bad dream had woken her; once again about The Governor. She hated that he could find a way to occasionally terrorize her even after he was dead and gone. She assumed the only reason he’d come to mind this time was because of this new pregnancy currently occupying her thoughts, so her dreams drudged up her first pregnancy when he had her locked away.  
  
Well, technically that last pregnancy had been her second because there had been that miscarriage she’d suffered years before when Oscar was alive and the world was as it was. Had that pregnancy come to term, the child would’ve been about five or six now; maybe older.  
  
Jo couldn’t remember how long it had really been anymore. Time was so hard to keep track of these days.  
  
Lying there, slouched back against Rick’s chest, staring out the window next to the bus seat across from them, Jo absentmindedly twirled her wedding ring around her finger until she soon took note of the gesture. Slowly, her eyes dropped down to her hands and the right corner of her mouth twitched upward as if about to smile. She watched how the morning light seemed to dance off the three tiny diamonds imbedded in the simple silver band and the nightmare that had been clouding her mind since waking up was soon replaced by the memory of marrying Rick on the side of the road that morning before they reached Terminus.  
  
Despite having consummated their marriage that night against that tree in the woods, the day had ended terribly with what they’d experienced at Terminus and the loss of their friend Carol. However, it had started on a wonderful note; full of love and hope. Jo wanted—no— _needed_ to cling to those things as much as possible.  
  
Letting out a slight sigh, she felt Rick stir behind her. His face turned toward the side of her and, unable to help herself, Jo let out a giggle and tensed; shying away from him a little bit.  
  
“What’s wrong?” he mumbled in low, raspy voice due not having spoken in hours, before clearing his throat and emitting out a couple small coughs.  
  
“Nothing,” she replied, a smile taking up residence on her face that he couldn’t see. “Your beard tickled me.”  
  
“Oh, sorry.”  
  
“Don’t be. I like the beard.” Reaching a hand up and behind her slightly, Jo rested it along the side of his face and began to scratch at his beard like someone scratching their pet animal.  
  
Leaning into the gesture, Rick smirked. “That feels good.”  
  
“If I keep doing it, will your leg start to shake like a dog’s would?”  
  
Pressing his lips close to her ear, Rick whispered, “Woof,” and then placed a kiss to her earlobe.  
  
Another giggle breached her own lips as she sat up and flexed her shoulders backward to crack her back, and then she tilted her head from side to side until she could feel her neck crack. Content, she twisted around at the waist to properly look back at Rick as she brought a hand to his chest. “Morning,” she greeted.  
  
“Morning.”  
  
“Sleep okay?”  
  
“I had you in my arms, didn’t I?” he questioned rhetorically with an impish smile.  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “But were you comfortable?”  
  
“I had you in my arms,” he repeated, holding her gaze. “That’s all that matters.”  
  
With a withering shake of her head, Jo began to scoot forward on the seat toward the aisle. She reached out for one of her crutches and took her time in pulling herself up to her feet; careful not to fall over the cooler between their seat and the one across from them that she had been using throughout the night to keep her left ankle elevated.  
  
“Where you going?”  
  
“Morning piss,” she answered bluntly. “You gonna come with me so I’m not alone in those scary woods while I’m a gimp?”  
  
Rick snickered. “Yeah.”  
  
Sitting up straight, he repeated her process of cracking his joints here and there to relieve that pressure that had built up in his joints overnight. When all was said and done, he was on his feet, tossing the blanket that had been draped over them over the back of their seat and then looking toward the others asleep on the bus or beginning to stir awake as well. Standing up, Rick picked the cooler up and set it down on the seat across from theirs to make sure it was out of the way for anyone else who needed to go to the bathroom. The roll of toilet paper Karen had grabbed for Jo the night before, and a few others had used the night before, sat on the dashboard and Rick grabbed it up and then slipped around Jo to head down the stairs first so he could hold out a hand to her and help ease her down.  
  
Even though it was only going on two days with her ankle sprain, Jo was already showing signs of improvement. If they’d been able to have ice, the healing process might’ve been a little easier. But her ankle was wrapped tight with that Ace bandage inside her boot, she’d been given mild pain reliever from the First Aid kit and her foot had been kept elevate as much as possible, and when she had to walk around it, she put little to no weight on it. She could be right as rain within a few days at this rate.  
  
Once she stood side by side with her, Rick took her right hand in his left and walked slowly as she hobbled along with the crutch under her left arm. Gingerly, they made their way into the thick cover of the trees and overgrowth until they were at a decent distance away from the bus to give them privacy for their morning constitution. Rick went first, and then Jo, and all the while Jo wondered if she should tell him right then and there about the pregnancy, but soon enough decided against it. She didn’t want to break the news to him while they were urinating. It wasn’t exactly ideal.  
  
Something as special as this pregnancy deserved a more special moment. She wanted it to be that day, but she also wanted it to be while they were alone. It was something they should discuss together, privately, before they let anyone else in on.  
  
Except for Daryl, who already knew and had promised Jo to keep mum on; understanding it wasn’t his place to tell.  
  
They returned to the bus shortly after to find the Dixon brothers approaching them and with Merle making some lewd comment about how they were probably coming back from a good fucking in the woods. Rick didn’t reply verbally, but his eyes quite nearly glared at the older Dixon as he held up the roll of toilet paper.  
  
“Good to know you two clean up after yourselves,” Merle teased further.  
  
Jo rolled her eyes as she began the annoying task of ascending back into the bus, with Rick behind her as a spotter of sorts. Once he had seen to her seated comfortably again, he informed Michonne, who had woken and made her way toward the front of the bus, that he and Daryl were about to head out. She asked if he wanted her to do, and he said to just keep watch again; to take the front and Morgan, who had also woken up, to take the back.  
  
With a kiss goodbye and another promise that he would safely return to Jo, Rick took his leave of the bus and headed for the car he’d returned in the evening before while Daryl climbed into its passenger seat. The others, that began waking up, were tasked with gathering up all the supplies and evenly distributing them into three piles for the three cars they would soon have to continue their travels in, and then there was discussion about who would drive with whom.  
  
The second car that had been left behind was packed with its share of supplies in the trunk so there would be plenty of room for sitting, because it would be tight. There were three cars, which would’ve been comfortable enough if there were fifteen of them; making it five to a car. It would’ve allowed two in the front seat and three in the back of all vehicles. However, there were seventeen of them in total, which meant two of the three cars would have an extra person in the front seat with them.  
  
Jo, resuming her unspoken role of “first lady”, was soon standing outside on both crutches while everyone else was filing off the bus to get things organized for the other two cars that would be returning to them soon. She began to divvy up the seating arrangements. Rick would drive one car, which she would obviously be in, and they would take Mika in the front seat with them, since she was small, while Sophia, Piper and Tara took up space in the backseat. She needed to keep her girls with her, and she also knew Sophia and Piper had become friends and that Tara felt a need to be close to Mika. That driving arrangement made the most sense to her. In the second car, Tyreese would drive with Karen in the front seat with him. Finn, Jen and Nicole would take the backseat. With Karen’s pregnancy and Jen’s weakened state, it made the most sense to keep the group’s only medic with them in case they got separated. Also, Finn wouldn’t want to travel separately from his girlfriend. That left the last car, which Daryl would likely drive, and Merle would take shotgun for. Michonne, Milo, Sam and Morgan would figure out where they’d fit in where. Jo would leave that up to them to decide.  
  
While leaning against the back of the bus, Jo let her eyes wander over toward Nicole, watching as the redheaded nurse helped Finn get Jen into the backseat and she couldn’t help having negative thoughts about her brother’s girlfriend.  
  
Not that she disliked the other blonde. She thought the younger woman was rather pleasant and she made her brother happy, and if her brother was happy, then she was too. It was simply all about the woman’s condition. She had heard that Merle planned on making her some sort of weapon prosthetic to go over her stump, but wondered when it would ever get done, and how. Until then, Jen was weak and unable to fully protect herself; much like Maggie had been after losing three quarters of her left arm.  
  
Jo simply had a feeling in the pit of her stomach that Jen would either become a liability. Her inability to fully contribute to defending herself or the others, Jo believed, would lead to her demise, or the demise of someone else.  
  
It was just a matter of time.  
  
Refocusing her attention on Nicole and not Jen, Jo cleared her throat. “Hey, Nicole?”  
  
The redhead turned around and sought out who had called out to her. When her eyes settled on Jo, Nicole straightened her posture and placed her hands on her hips. “Yeah?”  
  
“Can I talk to you for a minute?”  
  
Nicole nodded and stepped over. “Yeah, sure.”  
  
Pushing up of the back of the bus, Jo began to step away and hobbled away from the bus altogether to put some distance between the others and the two of them as Nicole followed. When she was sure they would be out of earshot, she leaned close.  
  
“What’s up?” Nicole pressed.  
  
“I need to tell you something in confidence,” Jo began. “Daryl is the only other person who knows and he only found out on accident yesterday but he’s kept it to himself. I, uh…the last time I got my period was probably about a month and a half ago, so I think I’m about a week or two late. I’ve felt nauseous the last couple of days, smells that I’m normally used to upset my stomach, and I thought I was starting to feel bloated because I was due for my period, but I don’t think that’s the case. This is how my body felt when I realized I was pregnant with my daughter. I think I’m pregnant again, but I want to know for sure. Not that I _am_ pregnant, but _how_.”  
  
Nicole listened carefully and when Jo was done speaking, she chuckled a bit. “How? Well, when a man and a woman like each other very much, the man puts his—”  
  
“Jesus Christ, I’m being serious.”  
  
“I don’t know exactly what you want me to tell you. You’ve been pregnant before, you know how it works.”  
  
Jo sighed, exasperated. “I just mean, I don’t understand how, after everything my body’s been put through over the last month, that I haven’t already lost this child. The stress, the injuries…”  
  
“Sometimes there are no answers.” Nicole shrugged. “Sometimes things just happen. There’s no explaining how or why. Perhaps you haven’t lost the child because your body is fighting harder for it. Maybe there’s a higher power at work here. Maybe this child is meant for something great and needs to be born.”  
  
“Maybe.”  
  
“Let me ask you something.”  
  
“Shoot.”  
  
“Do you want this child?”  
  
“I do,” Jo answered, without missing a beat.  
  
Nicole smiled. “Then that’s all that matters. It’s happening and you want it to happen.”  
  
“Do you…”  
  
“Do I what?”  
  
“Do you know if that First Aid kit has a pregnancy test in it by any chance?”  
  
Emitting another chuckle, Nicole nodded. “There were two the night before last, when I found that First Aid kit to use on Jen. Yesterday morning, when we were packing up, I noticed one of them was missing. I figured maybe it got misplaced when everyone was digging through it for bandages and the like, and then Tyreese made that announcement last night about Karen being pregnant and it all fell into place. Karen must’ve taken the test back at the church,” she remarked. “Even though I was raised a good little Irish Catholic girl in this country’s Bible belt, I was never particularly religious, myself.”  
  
“I hear ya there.”  
  
“But, I swear: you surviving that blast with seconds to spare and now there just so happening to be a second pregnancy test for you — who, by all means, should’ve logistically miscarried by now — is plenty enough reason for me to believe some sort of God is looking out for you, for all of us.”  
  
“Or some kind of Devil,” Jo quipped.  
  
Nicole shrugged. “Either way.” Throwing a look toward the others, she nodded her head toward the woods. “I’ll go grab the test, and I’ll make sure I’m discreet, and if the others ask where we’re going to the bathroom. It wouldn’t be a lie.”  
  
Jo made a face. “I already went to the bathroom earlier. I don’t think I could go again right now.”  
  
“Alright, well, once we’re on the road and during our first pit stop, then we’ll have you take the test.” Off Jo’s nod, she asked, “Does Rick already know?”  
  
“No,” Jo shook her head. “I was going to tell him regardless of whether there was a test to take or not, but now I think handing him the test as proof might be a nice way to surprise him with the news when him and I can talk in private.”  
  
“Okay, well, just let me know when you’re ready.”  
  
“I will. Thank you.”  
  
“Don’t mention it.”

* * *

  
About twenty minutes later, give or take Rick’s car and the third car with Daryl in it came rumbling up the road from the same direction they’d showed up the evening before. Rick, as usual, was compelled to greet Jo first and foremost with a hug and a kiss, as if sealing his promise to return safely to her. She then informed him of how the seating arrangements in all three vehicles would go and Rick could only snicker in amusement in how she took control in his absence.  
  
“My queen,” he muttered, which brought a laugh to her lips as he placed a kiss against her ear.  
  
“My king,” she countered with a wink as he smiled back at her before stepping away to help load up the trunks with the remaining supplies. A moment later, she consciously slid a hand over her stomach. Whispering to herself, she added, “My prince or princess.”  
  
The last task that was undertaken once all three cars were loaded up was to syphon the gas out of the bus, using the empty canisters they had filled it up with the day before, shortly after making it into South Carolina. Each car already had full tanks, because that’s how Rick and Tara had found them, but now they also had a full canister each in the trunks. The two extras syphoned back from the bus were set inside Rick’s trunk to be used.  
  
With everyone situated in their respective cars, the car Daryl was behind the wheel of took lead in their motorcade of sorts. Rick’s car came next, followed by the car Tyreese was driving. Each maneuvered carefully around the bus which was stuck in the middle of the road and that no one bothered to look behind to glimpse at one last time.  
  
It was just a bus and it had served a purpose to get them out of Atlanta, even if it was a short-lived purpose.  
  
Soon enough all three cars were traveling upwards of forty miles an hour, northeast on the 413 until the road bent more east to become the 185, and then become the 76 after they passed by the town of Honea Path.  
  
They had no maps to guide them, only road signs and blind faith.  
  
Nearly four hours and two detours later, they crossed into North Carolina, driving by a rather small, green road sign indicating as much. Another two hours later, gas was dangerously low and they were all forced to stop to refuel. They weren’t exactly sure where they were, but judging by the road signs they’d recently passed directing them toward Greensboro, they knew they were at least headed in the correct direction.  
  
Everyone filed out of their vehicles to stretch and take a few piss breaks. They didn’t have to stop to eat because that could be done in the cars. When most everyone had begun to return toward the cars, while waiting on the cars to finish with the refueling, Nicole approached Jo and whispered she had the pregnancy test on her if she was ready.  
  
Jo looked around and then nodded; the two of them slipping off into the woods. They were the last ones to go to the bathroom and that’s all anyone assumed they were doing. No suspicions to the contrary were otherwise raised. With Nicole on lookout, Jo removed the test from the box and then pulled down her pants to pee on the stick. Like Karen before her, Jo was thankful that Nicole had turned her back to give her some privacy. She gave the stick a slight shake after she was done and set it down while she wiped and pulled her pants back up.  
  
Standing with the test and handing the toilet paper roll over, Jo stared at the test with anxious eyes until she heard Nicole clear her throat at her.  
  
“Give it here,” Nicole muttered. “A watched pot doesn’t boil.”  
  
After some hesitation, Jo gave the nurse the test and grabbed for her crutch to stick under her left arm again. Nicole wasn’t looking at the test, which made Jo more anxious.  
  
“On the off chance it’s negative, will you say anything to Rick anyway?”  
  
“If I’m not pregnant, no, I won’t say anything,” Jo responded. “No point in getting his hopes up.”  
  
“He wants more children?”  
  
“This would be our first actual child together. He and I have discussed that we both wanted one, but we were hoping it would be after we found our daughter Hope, or at least determined her fate one way or the other.” Jo sighed. “It’s hard to move forward with a second child without knowing where our first one is.”  
  
“Well, that’s why we’re headed to Washington, isn’t it? To find your daughter. There was that sign telling you your friend had her and they were headed that way, right?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“I have seen any other signs. Have you?”  
  
Jo shook her head. “It doesn’t necessarily mean there aren’t any, though. Maybe we’re not on the right road, but headed in the right direction.”  
  
Nicole grinned. “That’s the spirit.” Casting her bright blue eyes downward at the test in her hand, she let out a slight chuckle. “Congratulations, by the way. Your daughter Hope, wherever she is, is about to be a big sister.”  
  
Jo’s attention went straight to the pregnancy test as Nicole passed it over. Taking it into her hand, she looked down at the pink plus sign that clearly indicated she was positively pregnant.  
  
Her breath catching in her throat, the fact that she was pregnant finally felt completely real and hit her like a ton of bricks. “Oh my God.”  
  
“Well, now that we know for sure, it looks like I’ll be pulling double duty in the midwife department.”  
  
“Have you ever delivered a baby before?”  
  
“I was an ER nurse. I’ve seen and done it all,” Nicole assured. “As long as I’ve still got breath in my body, you and Karen are in good hands.”

* * *

  
The cars refueled and everyone sandwiched back inside, the convoy continued onward north, passing Asheboro and, a little over an hour later, they came to another stop, just south of Burlington, North Carolina in the town of Rock Creek when the road became blocked by a sizable herd coming toward them. Each car was forced to quickly make a few three point turns and head back the way they’d just come from, retracing their steps to find the first turn off and somehow find their way around, not knowing how large the herd was spread out.  
  
Rick was grumbling to himself as Daryl’s car in front came to another stop not ten minutes later. Their new route was also blocked by the herd.  
  
“They must’ve all come from Burlington,” Jo commented.  
  
“Looks like it.”  
  
Nearly another hour of constant detours and aggravation later, all three vehicles made it past the herd that almost seemed to have no end to its size by driving up through a town by the name of Sedalia which was halfway between Burlington and Greensboro.  
  
Rick looked down at the watch on his wrist and frowned.  
  
Jo noticed the gesture. Reaching across Mika, who sat between them, she placed a hand on his thigh to grab his attention in a calming way. “What time is it?”  
  
“Just after five,” he replied. “We should stop soon, though. We’re at half a tank, which means so is everyone else and there’s only two more canisters left between all three vehicles. We stop now, we have a few hours left of daylight to scout out a safe place to stay for the night and hopefully find some more gas.”  
  
“Okay,” Jo nodded, remembering the signal they’d used when they were first headed toward Atlanta.  
  
Rolling her window down, she stuck her arm out and waved. She knew Karen, who was seated in the passenger seat of Tyreese’s car behind them would see the gesture and tell Tyreese. The car in front of them was another story. If Daryl or the others weren’t glancing backward with any of the mirrors, they wouldn’t notice. Rick took it upon himself to flash his headlights.  
  
Even though it was still light out, the glare of the lights would catch in the mirrors, and he didn’t want to use the horn, as not to attract walkers or the possibility of unfriendly types that might also be nearby. So, he flashed the headlights three times and then brought the car to a slowing halt. If the lights didn’t grab Daryl’s attention, the fact that the two cars behind him were no longer following would. Turning the ignition off, Rick sat back and waited, taking a moment to look in the backseat at Tara and the two teenage girls who were stirring awake after having fallen asleep during the drive from boredom. His eyes then came back toward the front of the car, looking first down at Mika who was leaning sleepily against Jo, and then looked up at Jo.  
  
The both of them caught each other’s eye and he offered somewhat of a smile. “We’re making good time,” he commented. “Hopefully whatever place we find for the night has multiple beds. You and the girls deserve something comfortable to sleep in.”  
  
“Karen and Jen, too,” Jo added. “They need to take it easier in their conditions.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
Looking forward, they both noticed Daryl’s car had finally come to a stop about a fifth of a mile up the road for him and then lurched slightly as it was put into reverse. When the front car joined the others, Rick hopped out, having the girls stay put for a moment as Tyreese got out of his car, but remained stationary beside it. Daryl followed suit, looking back and seeming to understand why they’d all stopped, unlike his big brother who was spewing a few expletives to indicate his impatience.  
  
Rick held up a hand. “We got only a few hours of daylight left and I don’t want to waste anymore gas until we can find some more. We need to secure a place to sleep for the night, too. I don’t think any of us have had proper rest in a few days and we can’t be running ragged. We got Jen still weak. Her healing is going slow. Now we have Karen who’s pregnant, and I don’t want to put her body through any undue stress.” He narrowed his gaze at Merle who seemed unfazed and somewhat unsympathetic by the women’s conditions. “We’re making good time. We can afford to stop now for the night.”  
  
“Fine,” Merle grumbled as Michonne piled out of the car, having been stuck between both Dixon brothers in the front seat.  
  
“We’ll split up into small groups; see what we can find that’s close by.” Rick looked around between the people spilling out of both Daryl’s car in front of him and Tyreese’s behind him. “Finn, Milo and Morgan, we passed a house a few minutes ago that had fencing around the property. That could be a real good place to start looking at. I think there was a barn, too, which could mean vehicles inside, which would mean gas to syphon. You three check there.”  
  
“I remember seeing that, too,” Milo remarked. “And there was a rundown building just after that, on the opposite side of the road, but there was double wide and a truck about fifty yards behind it we can try as well.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Alright. Check that, too, then.”  
  
“We just passed a few houses up this way,” Daryl informed, pointing ahead of them on the road. “There was a regular house with a double wide parked right in front of it. Detached garage, few cars scattered around near it. It warrants a look.”  
  
“Okay, I’ll head there with you and Merle. The rest of us can stay here, keep watch over the others.”  
  
Daryl cleared his throat, catching Jo’s eye through the windshield. “Nah, Rick, you stay here with your girls. You don’t need to go off every time. Michonne can come with us instead. Right?”  
  
Michonne shrugged and made a face that suggested she was game. “Sure.”  
  
Rick chewed at the inside of his bottom lip, watching as those about to head out in opposite directions gathered up their weapons and bid temporary farewell to those they were closest to. Placing his right hand on the roof of the car and his left hand on the top of the open door, Rick shifted his weight around and peered inside toward Jo who was looking downward.  
  
Daryl was right: he should stay behind.  
  
Just because he was the de facto leader of their group didn’t mean he had to be the one constantly going off to lead scouting or scavenging trips away from his loved ones. There were plenty able bodies that he could take turns with. He realized it was unfair to leave his wife and his girls behind every time. If Jo’s ankle was fine, he knew she would’ve been able to join him, so leaving her side wouldn’t have been an issue. However, considering her current state, he could imagine how anxious she might feel, wondering if he’d come back, especially after how he’d almost lost her for good.  
  
With merely a nod over toward Daryl, Rick acquiesced. He watched as Michonne and the Dixon brothers began walking up the road toward the house with the double wide in question and then let his eyes follow Milo, Finn and Morgan as they walked past with their own weapons to head in the direction they’d just come from. Before heading out, however, Finn walked up to Rick’s car and stuck his hand through the passenger window to give his sister’s shoulder a squeeze.  
  
“Keep an eye out on Jen for me?” he asked, although it was more of a statement really.  
  
Rick looked across the roof of the car at his brother-in-law and nodded. “We will. And you three be safe. Don’t be unnecessarily heroic.”  
  
Finn snickered. “That won’t be a problem. I left my Superman costume back at The Commune.”  
  
With a chuckle and a roll of his eyes, Rick just nodded in response. “Yeah, okay there, Clark Kent.”  
  
As both groups walked off, Tyreese came over to Rick and pulled him aside to talk about something or another. Jo couldn’t tell what exactly. Sophia had leaned forward and was asking her what was going on, now that she was fully awake and a little confused by why they’d stopped. After filling her adoptive daughter in, Jo opened her door up, needing to stretch her legs. Mika slipped in the process, having still been leaning against her and then sat up straight, looking around before crawling over the front seat to join the other females, and was happily greeted by Tara who let the girl come sit on her lap.  
  
Grabbing her crutches, Jo positioned them under her arms and began the time-consuming task of walking slowly on only her right foot while keeping her left raised off the ground as she made her way toward Tyreese’s car with the intent of checking on Jen personally. She also wanted to see how Karen was doing. She knew her own stomach was still feeling sour, so she could only assume the older female was feeling more or less the same way. Maybe they could find some crackers among their food supplies to eat to soak up that nausea.  
  
While Jo was in the process of hobbling along the side of the road toward Tyreese’s car, Sophia was staring out the window and noticed something slip out of Jo’s back pocket that looked like it could be important. Opening her back passenger door up, the teenager climbed out, leaving the door open as she crouched down to pick up what had been dropped.  
  
Staring down at it, Sophia’s eyes widened and looked over at to her adoptive mother with a bright, toothy smile. “Mom,” she called out, officially addressed Jo as such for the first time. “You’re pregnant, too?”  
  
Jo whipped her head around to find Sophia holding up her positive pregnancy test. She tried reaching behind her to feel her pocket and then to the ground and up at the teen’s hands. Her heartbeat instantly began to speed up and her mouth went dry, realizing what would come next. Flitting her eyes over toward Rick, she discovered him standing there beside Tyreese, looking a little confused by the interaction between his wife and adoptive daughter.  
  
“I…” Jo began.  
  
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Sophia continued, still smiling as she walked up to Jo and hugged her.  
  
Jo was a little stiff in receiving the embrace and took the test from Sophia when the girl handed it over. “I was waiting—”  
  
The shuffle of feet registered in Jo’s ears as she noticed Rick approaching her out the corner of her eye before she turned her head over toward him.  
  
“You’re pregnant?” he asked her, cocking his head slightly to the left. The look on his face was a mix of happiness, but also hurt. “Why didn’t you tell me? How long have you known?”  
  
“I figured it out yesterday, but I only just took the test this afternoon when we made that stop to refuel,” Jo replied. “I wanted to tell you last night.”  
  
“Why didn’t you?” His gaze was narrowed on her now, as if he was accusing her of betraying him. “We talked about this. I thought this was something we both wanted.”  
  
“I _do_ want it. I want a bigger family with you, and I _was_ going to tell you last night, but then Tyreese announced that Karen was pregnant and I wasn’t going to steal their thunder. I wanted to tell you in private first once I knew for certain, and we haven’t exactly had alone time. I was hoping tonight I could’ve let you know.”  
  
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Sophia blurted. “I figured he already knew. I didn’t mean to blow your secret.”  
  
“It wasn’t really secret,” Jo assured. “It was just something I was keeping under wraps for the time being.” Bringing her gaze from the teen back to her husband, she looked him in the eye. “I was going to give you this test and surprise you.”  
  
Rick broke eye contact with Jo to look down at the pregnancy test she placed in his hands. In the center of the white stick was a little window with a positive sign in pink. As he began to chew the inside of his bottom lip again, he was unaware that tears were lining his eyes or that his chin was quivering.  
  
He wasn’t sad, he wasn’t angry, and he wasn’t at all upset with Jo for keeping the information to herself for the short amount of time that she’d known she was pregnant.  
  
Rick was happy.  
  
Rick was ecstatic.  
  
Rick was feeling that burst of joy deep in the heart of him that breathed fresh air into his mind, body and soul.  
  
“You’re really pregnant?” he asked, still staring at the test.  
  
“I am,” she nodded.  
  
“How far along?”  
  
“Maybe a month.”  
  
“A month?” he repeated. “That would mean it happened—”  
  
“—at the prison,” she finished his sentence. “Pretty nice parting gift we got to take away from that place, huh? Considering everything we lost there…”  
  
Rick’s lips turned upward in a shaky smile. “I’m gonna be a dad again?”  
  
Jo nodded, as she removed her crutches from under her arms and passed them over to Sophia to hold onto. Reaching her hands up, she wrapped her arms around Rick’s neck and leaned her face against his. “Yes,” she replied, knowing that although he loved Hope more than life itself and he considered the girl to be his child despite what genetics said, this child starting to grow inside her would feel more special for him because it was of his own flesh and blood and that bond that would come of it was something he’d been missing since the death of his son. “You’re gonna be a dad again.”  
  
“And you’re sure? This test is really positive and it’s not a mistake or just a joke.”  
  
“I’m positive it’s positive.”  
  
With a shuddering chuckle, Rick wrapped his arms tightly around Jo’s back and hoisted her up off her feet. Turning his face toward her neck, he kiss her just under her ear and smiled. “I’m gonna be a dad again!” he cried out happily, turning around to look over at Tyreese while pulling Jo with him in the process. Upon setting her gently back down, he noted that she, too, now had tears of happiness in her eyes. Bringing a hand up to cup the side of her face, Rick pointed the pregnancy test toward Tyreese and smiled at his friend. “We’re gonna be dads together.”  
  
Tyreese was nodding happily for the couple. “Yeah, we are.” Gesturing between himself and Rick, he added, “We needed this. This is fuel we need to keep us fighting. When we’re down and we think we got nothing to go on for, we know for certain we do. It’s not our world we need to fight for. It’s our children’s.”  
  
Rick nodded in agreement. “For all of them,” he remarked, casting an eye back to Jo as he dropped his hand from her face to her stomach as he stared at her with pride. “For each and every one of us.”


	40. Descent

_“The world's not a very comfortable place if you have a nightmare to face.”_ — Tommy Lee Jones

* * *

  
Despite all the horrible things that had happened to the group since losing the prison, one of the things they had lucked out in so far was being able to find places with actual beds to sleep in at night. Just up the road about half a mile from where they’d stopped was an old white farmhouse that Rick mentioned reminding him of Hershel’s house. It wasn’t as large as Hershel’s, but it would be roomy enough for one night. Plus, it was close to the road for when it was time to set out the next morning. After breaking off into a few pairs to inspect the property of any walkers or other possible dangers, of which there were thankfully none, they began to pull some of their supplies into the house once that, too, was cleared of any possible threats.  
  
While the outside of the home looked decent, with the exception of some disrepair from years left unattended and just the overall age of the home, the inside was another story. The entire interior looked as if the last person to have lived there was an elderly couple in the 1970s. All modern appliances were missing except for an old, floor model television set in the living room, not that any of that mattered with the lack of electricity in the world. It was dusty, there was water damage and some windows facing the back of the property were broken. There were boxes and cleaning tools around as if someone had attempted to clean the place up in the hopes of selling, but then either gave up or was forced to when the world fell apart. Old paintings hung haphazardly off the wall or not at all, instead fallen onto the floor which was either old, stained carpet or cracked and peeling linoleum. One of the dusty sofas shoved into a corner was cluttered with a few random objects that seemed rather amusing; there were two Styrofoam coolers stacked on top of each other, a broken humidifier, a single pale green pillowcase and a sombrero.  
  
“Someone had one last party in here,” Jo muttered as she hobbled into the room with only one crutch, mere paces behind Rick and Morgan who were casing that room in particular. She stepped between them and grabbed up the sombrero, giving it a shake of all the dust that had accumulated on it over the years. Turning around to face both men, she plopped the oversized Mexican hat atop her head and smirked. “ _Yo quiero_ Taco Bell.”  
  
Rick smacked his lips together and rolled his eyes at her before turning away to give her the benefit of seeing him smile at her. “This place is dirty as all hell, but it’ll work for tonight.”  
  
“Anything’s better than outside or cramped in those cars,” Morgan added. “Storm clouds are rolling in. We’ll see rain soon.”  
  
“We should find some buckets, clean ‘em up as best as we can and then leave them outside to collect the rain water to refill our bottles,” Jo suggested, taking the sombrero off and tossing it back down onto the dusty sofa.  
  
Rick nodded. “I think I saw a well outside near the barn. We might give that a check.”  
  
“I’ll do it,” she offered.  
  
“No.” The word came out sounding harsher than Rick had intended and he looked over his shoulder and made a face signifying his lame apology. “You rest. You’re still healing from multiple injuries and you’re pregnant now.”  
  
Flashing a small smile, Jo walked up to him, placing a hand just above his ass and stood on tiptoe to place a kiss on his nose. “Yes, daddy.” With a wink, Jo hobbled back out of the room just as Daryl slipped in after her.  
  
The archer gave Rick a nod as Sophia, Piper and Mika could be heard running up the stairs to check out the second floor. Their laughter was a much welcomed sound for everyone. And, since there was no threat of walkers nearby at the moment, there was no reason to chastise the girls for making too much of a ruckus. Everyone else was filing into the house as well, finding places where they would set up to sleep for the night.  
  
Rick, distracted by Jo’s retreating form and the knowledge that she was pregnant with his child, was only half paying attention to Daryl who had begun to mention something about the barn.  
  
“Sorry, what?” Rick questioned, snapping out of his daydream.  
  
“I know that barn is locked, but we should open it up to check it out in case it’s a repeat of Hershel’s farm. Even if there’s one walker stuck in there, we don’t want it slipping out during the night and finding its way in here while we’re asleep.”  
  
Rick agreed with a nod. “Anyone not driving tomorrow can take some watch tonight, with the exception of the kids, the injured and the pregnant, that is.”  
  
“We should also let Sophia try driving someday soon,” Daryl remarked. “She’s old enough to start learning; Piper, too, if she doesn’t know already.”  
  
“Maybe we should worry about that after we reach DC,” Morgan gave his two cents.  
  
“What if something happens to us, we get separated and we need one of them to drive for us, or to get themselves away? They gotta know how,” Daryl scoffed. “Playing with Barbie dolls and running upstairs giggling from time to time is okay, but they can’t be kids like they once were anymore. Time to put away childish things and pull their weight.”  
  
Rick furrowed his brow. “Hey, there’s plenty of us to pull that weight,” he spoke, stepping closer to his friend. “We can let the girls have their youth while they can.”  
  
Daryl emitted a gruff sigh and dropped his crossbow off his shoulder to set down at his side. “Fine.”  
  
“Hey.” Rick lifted a hand and placed it on Daryl’s shoulder, leaning in to whisper, “You okay?”  
  
Daryl nodded, but also shrugged. “Just tired. Been a long couple of days. Sorry, I didn’t—”  
  
“S’okay,” Rick assured and gave a nod of his own. “I’m looking forward to being able to properly stretch out to sleep tonight. Sitting upright on that apartment building’s porch and then last night in the bus wasn’t very comfortable in hindsight.”  
  
“Yeah,” Daryl grunted. “This coming from the guy who’d rather sandwich himself onto a twin mattress with Jo at the prison rather than bring back a full-size mattress to use.”  
  
“That was different,” Rick muttered, staring down at the ground.  
  
“‘Cause at least you were stretched out?”  
  
Rick shook his head and glanced upward at Daryl, but without making eye contact. “No, ‘cause we were home.”  
  
“We’ll get there again,” Morgan muttered, feeling the need to say something. “Where it ends up being, Lord knows. But we’ll get there.”

* * *

  
As night fell and the rain clouds rolled in, most everyone was gathered in the living room of the derelict farmhouse, having brought every mattress or couch into the space to use. With there not being enough of those options to go around, however, several settled on just spreading out sleeping bags or blankets. Being confined to one room to sleep wasn’t a safety issue, really. It was more out of the need for collective body heat. The house was drafty as all hell and the storm beginning to brew outside blew cold winds in through the gaps under the doors, or holes in the windows and walls. No one bothered lighting any candles to see once it got too dark because the draft would’ve snuffed the flames out as soon as they were lit. Battery-operated camping lanterns would’ve been ideal, if they’d had any, and they opted for not using the flashlights they had on hand in order to conserve their batteries. The flashes of lighting from outside were enough to light the way if they needed to get up and move around for any reason, of which there was very little.  
  
Daryl was gonna let Merle drive the first car the following morning, so Daryl didn’t mind taking one of the first watches. He reasoned he could catch up on sleep once they were on the road again in the morning. Tara offered to join him, safe enough from the rain under the cover of the wraparound porch’s roof.  
  
Everyone else hunkered down and curled up to try and sleep despite the howling of the wind, the crashing of thunder and the rain smacking incessantly against the windows and outside walls. There was nary a sound from inside the house, aside from the occasional clearing of a throat, cough or hushed voices as a select few still awake whispered back and forth to each other.  
  
Unsurprisingly, one of the old, dusty twin mattresses, which were currently covered by blankets in the absence of bedsheets, was occupied by Rick and Jo; cuddled together as big spoon and little spoon, respectively. Lying on their right sides, they rested their heads upon their own right arms whereas Rick’s left was draped over Jo’s hip so that he could place it over her virtually flat stomach. Both had fallen asleep almost as soon as they lay down, despite the storm raging on, having learned to find sleep where they could over the last year and a half in this new world.  
  
For Rick, sleep was uneventful. He was just too tired for his brain to process anything while unconsciousness encapsulated him. Jo, however, was caught up in a terrible nightmare that felt as if had come out of nowhere.  
  
At first, her body jerked like one would when struck with that falling sensation, and then came a few inaudible whimpers caught in her throat. The more she began to jerk and whimper beside him, the quicker Rick was to stir awake and sit up to see that she was okay.  
  
Peering through the darkness, he moved his hand from her stomach to her shoulder and gave her a gentle shake. “Jo,” he muttered, leaning close to her ear as he spoke her name. “You’re dreaming.”  
  
With an abrupt jolt and her eyes still closed, Jo threw her left hand upward and as her knuckles connected with Rick’s jaw, it was his gruff yelp that finally woke her up. Jo’s eyes fluttered open and she turned to look over her shoulder to see Rick covering his mouth with his own left hand and staring back down at her.  
  
“Oh God, I’m sorry,” she grumbled. Turning to lie on her back as he shifted to give her room to do so, pulled her right arm out from underneath her and reached out for his face. “Did I hit you?”  
  
Rick nodded but tried shrugging it off like it was nothing. “I’ll live.”  
  
When he pulled his hand away, a slight flash of lightning allowed Jo to see a small glistening of dark liquid across his bottom lip. Realizing it was blood, Jo put two and two together that her ring at cut his lip in the process of her accidentally hitting him. She knitted her brow together with guilt playing upon her features as she ran her thumb over his mouth to wipe to small dribble of blood away and wipe it on her pants.  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s okay,” he insisted, sticking his tongue out to lick at the slight wound. “You were dreaming.”  
  
With a sigh, Jo leaned back on the mattress and stared through the darkness up at the moldy ceiling. “I was having a nightmare.”  
  
“Yeah?” Rick sank back down to lie on his side beside her, propping his elbow on the mattress and resting the side of his head in his hand. “Wanna tell me about it?”  
  
Jo opened her mouth to speak and then closed it. With a shake of her head, she turned to face away from him just as the front door creaked open, closed, and the sound of boots gently crossing the room followed. Squinting to make out who it was, Jo saw it was Tara, coming off a watch and finding a spot to sleep for the remainder of the night. Before the younger woman got too comfortable, she tapped Michonne on the shoulder, waking the dreadlocked woman up to take over keeping watch outside with Daryl who had yet to come inside and pass the torch, so to speak.  
  
Pushing herself up to sit on the edge of the mattress with her legs outstretched on the floor, Jo placed her hands to her stomach and looked downward, trying to ignore the nightmare still lingering in her mind. Upon feeling Rick’s hand move to touch upon the small of her back, she looked over her shoulder at him; her eyes finally adjusting to the darkness and able to see he was looking up at her with concern.  
  
“I’m gonna take watch instead,” she muttered. “If I go back to sleep, I feel like that nightmare will just continue where it left off.”  
  
“You sure you don’t want to tell me about it. I heard once that if you tell someone about your dream, it won’t come true, so maybe you should tell me about your nightmare so it won't become a reality.”  
  
“It’s highly unlikely it would,” Jo shrugged.  
  
“Still, it could be therapeutic.”  
  
“I’m fine. Really. It was just a stupid dream.” Turning toward Michonne and watching the other woman work at retying the laces of her boots she had taken off while sleeping, Jo pulled herself up and reached out to tap Michonne on the shoulder. “Go back to sleep. I’ll take watch.”  
  
“Nah, that’s okay. You should sleep.”  
  
“I don’t want to sleep right now. Seriously, just go back to sleep. I got this.”  
  
Michonne cast her dark eyes across toward Rick who was lying there, glancing between both women. Off the nod he gave her, Michonne shrugged. “Alright,” she caved. “But come get me when you get tired.”  
  
“I will.”  
  
“Jo,” Rick called out in a loud whisper.  
  
She hesitated and then turned, expecting him to convince her to stay put and go back to sleep again. To her surprise, he was sitting back up again and offering her the blanket they’d been using to cover the mattress with.  
  
“Take this,” he offered, “so that wind and rain don’t give you a chill.”  
  
With an appreciative smile, Jo took the blanket from him and then puckered her lips at him and making a kiss noise. Rick responded by pretending to catch it in his hand before sinking back to lie down upon the mattress.  
  
“Be careful out there,” he added as she picked up her gun, stuck into her back pocket and moved to exit the room.  
  
“Daryl’s out there. I’ll be fine,” she assured.  
  
Tugging the blanket around her shoulders, Jo wrapped herself up and then limped out into the small foyer, foregoing either of her crutches. Upon pulling the creaky door open, she was immediately blasted with a strong wind that nearly knocked her back. Slipping outside as quickly and as painlessly for her left ankle as possible, Jo shut the door behind her and moved along the porch. As she stuck her head around the corner to the side of the house where the porch wrapped around, she was momentarily startled by a figure moving toward her, but a flash of lightning let her know it was only Daryl.  
  
“I thought Michonne taking watch with me next,” he muttered, flicking the cigarette he’d clearly been smoking over the side of the porch as smoke billowed from his lips.  
  
“I’m sorry to disappoint.”  
  
Daryl snickered. “You’re not. Just thought you’d be asleep from that baby draining your energy or whatever.”  
  
“I’m pregnant, not a battery operated porcelain doll,” Jo remarked, stepping back and sinking down to sit on an old rocking chair that had seen better days.  
  
“I s’pose not.”  
  
As the rain pelted the porch roof overhead, the sound was almost deafening and made Jo feel like she had to shout so Daryl could hear her, but so far he seemed to understand every word she’d said already. The rumbling of the storm clouds signaled that some powerful cracks of thunder were soon coming once again, along with a few more flashes of lightning. Despite the wildness of it all, there was something peaceful in the storm. It was surprisingly calming, to be honest.  
  
Stepping closer to the railing, Daryl gripped it firmly and gave it a shake to test its sturdiness before deciding it would hold his weight as he leaned against it. Sliding back toward the column, he shifted so that he could sit down on the railing while propping one of his bent legs up onto the railing as well.  
  
“You remember when I was pregnant with Hope at the prison? Well, the tail end of my pregnancy, that is,” Jo commented, breaking the silence that had fallen over them. “I wasn’t some wilting flower then. Right now, I’ve gotta be a month to a month and a half pregnant already and the shit my body has been through…” She trailed for a moment, turning to stare out toward where their three cars were parked together. “I’ve run myself ragged, been exposed to a deadly sickness, got knocked unconscious by The Governor, carried Maggie’s dead body for a few miles, dug her grave and buried her in it, gone scavenging alone while Rick healed after the prison, finished off a bottle of bourbon whiskey with him, survived Terminus, been in a car accident, fought with Raffy, jumped out of a second story window and sprained my ankle moments before that hotel blew up…”  
  
Daryl nodded as he stuck his thumbnail between his teeth and lazily bit at it.  
  
“In all practicality, I shouldn’t be pregnant. I should’ve lost this baby ten times over,” she continued. “I don’t know if it’s God, if he or she exists, or if I’m just that fucking resilient. Either way, I’m a fighter. After everything I’ve been through, ain’t nothing keeping me down.”  
  
“Damn fucking straight,” Daryl agreed, casting a smirk her way.  
  
“I’m just…tired. Not so much physically, and not because I’m pregnant. Just…tired of it all. I just want my daughter back. I want this world to stop taking people from us. I want to stop running for our lives, moving from one place to the next. I want some place to call home and to not have to look over my shoulder every day for what’s gonna try and kill me next.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
As silence between them began to take root again, Jo looked over at him. “I’m surprised you’re not smoking. Did you run out? Was the one you got rid of your last one?”  
  
Daryl shook his head. “Nah, just choosing not to smoke around you.”  
  
“Such a gentleman,” Jo smiled a bit.  
  
Daryl shrugged. “Not really. I almost continued to smoke it anyway.”  
  
“What stopped you?”  
  
“Carol.” The curious silence he received from Jo forced him to elaborate. “I heard her in my head, yelling at me like some kid up to no good, telling me I should know better and not put you at any more risk.”  
  
Jo let a small chuckle escape her lips. “I can also see her slapping the back of your head as she said it.”  
  
“Wouldn’t put it past her.”  
  
“I know she was special to you, a real good friend. None of us have really talked about what happened to the others; the ones we lost at the prison and after,” Jo remarked. “I miss her, and I know you gotta.”  
  
“I do.” Daryl folded his arms across his propped up leg and looked out toward the front of the property as the rolling thunder boomed and a flash of lightning lit up both their faces for a few seconds. “I wish I could go back and trade places with her.”  
  
“I wanna say that everything happens for a reason, but I can’t see any good reason why she had to die.”  
  
“She was giving Sophia a chance to live.”  
  
“No, I know _that_. It just shouldn’t have had to come to that. If none of us had gone to Terminus, she’d still be alive.”  
  
“Or she could’ve been killed back at the hotel by walkers or when it exploded it she’d made it that far with us. Or she could’ve gotten bitten at any point since.” Daryl sighed heavily. “I want to change the past, but I can’t and I hate it.”  
  
“Life’s a bitch and then you die.”  
  
“And you don’t even get to stay dead anymore.”  
  
Jo leaned back into the rocking chair and began to rock in it, wrapping herself tighter in the blanket at the wind worked against the warmth she’d built up. As her mind wandered, thinking about the comment he’d just made, Jo bit her lips together and forced back some tears that threatened to fall. She inhaled deeply using her nose only and looked down at her lap when she felt Daryl suddenly looking over at her.  
  
“You should go inside. It’s gotta be warmer in there.”  
  
“It is, but I’m fine,” she assured.  
  
“You don’t look fine.”  
  
“I was just thinking about Lori; about what happened. We all scattered as soon as The Governor did what he did to her. We left her body, her…her head. She would’ve turned. Her head, by itself…”  
  
“Don’t think about that.”  
  
“I can’t not.”  
  
“It’s not her anymore, anyway. She’s gone. Lori, Carol…they’re gone.”  
  
“At least Carol got to make sure she wouldn’t come back.” Jo closed her eyes, trying to wish away the image of seeing Lori’s head severed from her neck. She tried to forget the feeling of Lori’s warm blood spraying her face as they had been knelt down so close beside one another. She tried instead remember Lori smiling earlier that day as they loaded those dead walkers onto the trailer that was hitched up to the jeep; just happy to be out of C Block and having something more to do than be quarantined away from the sickness. “That asshole,” Jo spat.  
  
“Carol?” Daryl questioned, confused by who she was referring to.  
  
“No, The Governor,” she replied. “He took so much from us. Even in death, he’s an asshole.”  
  
“Yeah, he is,” the archer agreed.  
  
“I…” Jo began, but trailed somewhat, causing Daryl to look back over at her again. “The reason I came out here…I had a nightmare. I wouldn’t tell Rick about it. He asked me to, but I couldn’t. I felt like it would break his heart, because it broke mine.”  
  
“It was just a nightmare, though.”  
  
“It felt so real.”  
  
“Don’t let it eat you up. It’ll do you no good. Won’t do that baby inside ya any good either.”  
  
“Yeah, I know, I just…”  
  
“Wanna tell _me_ about it?” Daryl suggested. “You can get it out without worrying Rick about it, at least until you decide to.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I mean, I know it won’t come true, not necessarily, but it’s possible some version of it could.”  
  
“Tell me, and I’ll be the judge of that.”  
  
Licking at her lips, Jo squinted as more lightning lit up their faces again. Before she went to speak, a bolt of lightning struck the pear orchard across the street, causing Jo to nearly jump out of her skin. Even Daryl wasn’t immune to the startling burst from Mother Nature. Moving off from the railing, he walked over toward the wall beside where Jo sat in the rocking chair and slid down to sit upon the rickety, wooden floor just in case lightning decided to strike closer.  
  
“I dreamt I was walking along a road by myself,” Jo began. “I was looking for Hope, but I was very pregnant; almost ready to pop. And then I could sense there were people there with me and I turned around expecting to see Rick or anyone else from our group but, instead, it was this girl. She had long, blonde hair like mine, kinda looked me. I thought maybe I was looking at myself in a mirror or having one of those out of body experience types of dreams. The more I looked at her I could feel this _anger_ , this _rage_ coming from her like waves of heat coming off summer roads. She stared back at me with such hate, it felt like her eyes were laser beams and I was about to be eviscerated. I asked her if she saw my daughter; if she’d seen a little girl with a man named Shane…and…”  
  
“Well, don’t stop there,” Daryl muttered, trying to keep things light.  
  
“She said she _was_ my daughter. I didn’t understand what she meant. Then she said she hated me for losing her, for forgetting about her and having another baby to replace her. She said I could never love her because I would only ever see her real father when I looked at her.”  
  
“It was Hope; the girl in your dream?”  
  
Jo nodded sadly. “And she wasn’t alone.”  
  
“Who was there?”  
  
“ _Him_ ,” she replied with venom in her voice. Saying his name would always be akin to swallowing a spoonful of battery acid so, for the moment, Jo refused to utter it.  
  
Daryl was keen enough to understand who she meant and didn’t urge her to elaborate any further.  
  
“He was standing there beside her, smiling smugly at me. He even had both his eyes,” Jo continued to recount her nightmare. “This is the part I know couldn’t come true, because Hope was telling me her real father, not Rick, had found her. She told me her real father loved her more and raised her in his image and that she was happy to grow up without me. Then she said she wanted to give me something before she left me forever.”  
  
“What was it?”  
  
“My sword, the one I lost at Terminus; the one he’d taken off me back at Woodbury...twice.”  
  
“She gave it back to you?”  
  
“She gave it back to me alright,” Jo quipped, tears burning at her eyes. “By way of my very pregnant stomach.” Lifting a hand to her face, Jo wiped the moisture away, urging herself not to cry over the nightmare’s memory, and then tucked herself tightly back into the blanket wrapped around her shoulders. “She ran my sword through me and laughed, and he laughed with her. She said I’d never be happy again; that I should’ve died giving birth to her in that cell he kept me in and saved everyone the trouble.”  
  
“Damn,” Daryl muttered.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“I guess I can see why you wouldn’t wanna tell Rick about it.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“You still should, though.”  
  
Jo sighed heavily. “Yeah, I know. I just couldn’t do it immediately after waking up from something like that. And finding out I’m pregnant again put him in such a good mood today. I didn’t want to put a shadow over that with some stupid nightmare I had.”  
  
“It’s not stupid.”  
  
“I know the part with The Governor being there was unrealistic. I saw him die. I _killed_ him. I cut off his head. He can never physically take Hope from me, ever. But the reality of us never finding her and her growing up without me is a very real possibility. Her growing up and never knowing me or why I got separated from her, that she could grow up hating me because of it…that breaks my heart. I mean, I’d rather she grew up without me than not at all. I just…I dunno…”  
  
“Well, that ain’t gonna happen. We’re on the road to DC. We’re gonna find her,” Daryl assured very adamantly. “You didn’t go through hell and high water to bring her into this world for nothing.”  
  
Jo stared out at the continuing storm before them, and nodded. “This storm kind of feels like literal hell and high water,” she quipped. “If the rain doesn’t let up soon, we might needs boats come morning instead of those cars.”  
  
“We’ll be okay. Ground’ll be muddy, but it ain’t like we ain’t used to getting dirty.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
After another few moments of silence fell over the pair, Daryl spoke up. “You think maybe you only had that nightmare ‘cause of finding out you’re pregnant again? Maybe it’s just your mind working through some anxiety.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I suppose. Makes sense, I guess.”  
  
“You really should tell Rick about it, when you’re ready to. I’m a good soundboard most of the time, but Rick’s who you need to really talk with. He could listen to you talking about different shades of nail polish for hours on end and find it interesting, simply ‘cause it’d be you talking about it.”  
  
“Why the hell would I be talking about nail polish with him, or anyone for that matter?” Jo asked with a laugh.  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “I dunno. It was an example.”  
  
Another chuckle found its way out of Jo as a slight revelation hit her. “I just realized that I think this is the longest you and I have spoken to one another since we met.”  
  
“Must be the storm.”  
  
“Maybe.”  
  
“I used to be able to talk like this with Carol,” he admitted, picking at his thumbnail with his teeth again.  
  
Leaning forward, Jo pushed herself up to her feet. She turned and stepped closer to Daryl, and then placed her hand on top of his head, giving his greasy hair a bit of a ruffle. “I’ll leave you alone, then, and you can talk with her again.”  
  
“Nah. I don’t mind you staying,” he insisted. “I might not talk much and I might be something of a loner, but I don’t always like being alone.”  
  
“Okay.” Jo resumed sitting in the rocking chair and shifted the blanket upon her shoulders. “Do you want to keep talking or just sit here in silence, enjoying the storm?”  
  
“Silence.”  
  
“Sounds good to me.”  
  
Both leaned back, staring forward across the road at the pear orchard, watching as the rain continued to pour down in torrents. The thunder continued to rumble and roll and the lightning continued to flash. It felt like there was no end in sight to the storm.  
  
Just as they found themselves growing comfortable with the steady, albeit boisterous, sounds, a deafening crack of thunder directly overhead and a terribly bright flash of lightning made them jump. The hairs on their arms and the backs of their necks seemed to stand on end. They could feel and smell the electrical charge in the air just as a single, solitary bolt of lightning struck one of the larger branches from the old oak trees nearest the house.  
  
Sparks shot out from the spot that was hit, followed by a muted cracking sound as the branch fell and then crashed down upon one of their tree cars. The slight shattering of glass echoed upon the wind, causing both Jo and Daryl to stand up and look toward the vehicles and then at each other.  
  
“Well, shit,” Daryl mumbled.

* * *

  
“ _Fucking_ Christ on a _fucking_ cracker.”  
  
Everyone turned and looked at Merle with either ridicule for his choice of words or with little surprise. There was no in-between, really. Most everyone in the group was used to his blunt ways by now.  
  
It was the following morning and the entire group was outside, assessing the damage caused by the storm that had find come to an end in the early hours of the morning. Now, the sun was out and shining, and the only signs that a storm ever transpired were the fallen branches scattered around the farmhouse’s property and on the road, or the soft, muddy ground underfoot. The temperature had risen back to normal and any water puddles on the road had since evaporated.  
  
For the most part, everything was fine. A few downed branches in the road could be dragged off to allow the group’s caravan to continue once they got moving.  
  
However, that was easier said than done now that they were down a vehicle.  
  
The car that had been parked closest to the large, oak tree had been impaled by a large tree branch. The windshield was shattered and the branch had somehow lodged itself so badly through the steering wheel that it had literally ripped the wheel right off the steering column. The weight of the branch falling had also caused the hood of the car to concave. There would be no starting the car and driving it anymore.  
  
It was a tight enough squeeze with the three vehicles and as many people as they had, that it wouldn’t be feasible to sandwich everyone into only two now.  
  
“Well, now what?” Nicole asked, placing her hands on her hips. “Do we find a new, third car or just gather up as much supplies that we can carry and start walking?”  
  
“What if we removed the lids to the trunks of the other two and a few of us could sit inside there?” Milo suggested.  
  
“Where would our supplies go? We can’t not have supplies,” Karen added her two cents.  
  
“Well, then, we can squeeze in by sitting on each other’s laps.”  
  
“That’s hardly safe,” Nicole muttered.  
  
“We live in a world where the dead are walking around trying to _eat_ us,” Tara contradicted with a raise of her eyebrow. “Doubling up in cars his hardly comparable.”  
  
“Well, there’s a difference between being in a dangerous situation and _creating_ one.”  
  
“Is no one gonna suggest the obvious solution of a few of us going off on a scouting mission to find a new, third car? Hell, maybe even a fourth.” Finn stepped forward and looked around at each face whereas Rick seemed uncharacteristically consigning himself to the wings. “We didn’t go far in our search for more fuel last night, and once we got here that storm rolled in. We should take a few hours and see what we can find. I don’t care if it’s the most, rundown, beatdown jalopy this planet has ever seen. If it runs and we got gas, it’ll do. Jen’s nowhere near one hundred percent and I’m not letting her walk until I think she’s closer to at least seventy-five percent better.”  
  
“Where do you wager she’s at now?” Merle wondered, a shit-eating grin beginning to pull the corners of his mouth upward. “Sixty-nine?”  
  
Daryl rolled his eyes and grunted mild annoyance at his big brother. “C’mon, man. Shut up.”  
  
“What? Am I offending your delicate sensibilities, little brother?”  
  
In such a flurry, it seemed everyone was suddenly adding to the conversation, and not for the better. The storm had not only riled up some pretty strong winds the night before, but also most everyone’s tempers that began to boil over upon seeing the destruction to the third car. The stress from everything that had happened over the last month for the prison group, and the destruction of the hotel for the Commune group, and their shared and respective losses, and not knowing what laid ahead for them, was not helping matters any. The nitpicking was a buildup of stress and anxiety and fear, and it had reached its apex. Not even the good news of Karen and Jo’s pregnancies seemed to be able to tip the scale back to positive thinking. Everyone was getting angry and negative with each other until finally Rick could no longer stand idly by while everyone hashed it out like children arguing over toys.  
  
“Alright everyone; shut the hell up, _now_ ,” he growled, stalking forward. Stepping up to the wrecked car, he turned and faced the group, casting his eyes across the lot of them. “We’re wasting time bickering so here’s how it’s gonna go. Finn, you take a small group with you and look for more cars and fuel. Four people should suffice. When you get back, if you come back empty-handed, then we leave the other two cars behind and we walk.”  
  
Rick was met with a succession of complaints, mostly from the Commune folks. Pursing his lips, he looked down and held his hand up to signal for them to stop talking. Jo couldn’t help but find that simple gesture to silence everyone without a look or a word to be quite attractive. The authority Rick exuded made her proud and smile.  
  
That was her king.  
  
She wondered how she could let such a nightmare as she had the night before bog her down and keep her from just opening up to him about it from the get go, especially since they told each other everything.  
  
Jo resigned herself to telling him later, once they had all this sorted out.  
  
Finn scoffed, glaring at his brother-in-law. “You can’t expect Jen to walk all day long when we don’t know exactly where it is we’re going.”  
  
“She lost a hand, not a leg,” Michonne piped up. As much of a dick she had come to see Merle could be, she pointed at the mostly bald redneck and added, “Merle lost his hand. I hardly doubt he was carted around in a vehicle afterward.”  
  
“He’s also built like a brick shithouse compared to Jen.”  
  
“I cut my own hand off and cauterized the stub. I didn’t have the luxury of people around to help me like Jen does,” Merle countered, eyeing Rick pointedly. “Doesn’t matter how much taller or how much more I weigh than her, I could’ve died of exhaustion and blood loss just the same. But I rested here and there, and I found food and water, and I didn’t stop moving.”  
  
“Finn, baby, I’m fine,” Jen insisted. “I can walk.”  
  
“See? She’s fine,” Merle repeated, pointing at his fellow amputee with a smile.  
  
As Finn turned to whisper his concerns to his girlfriend, Rick cleared his throat and brought focus back to the group. “As I said, if we don’t find any more vehicles, we walk. If we all piled up into the two cars we have left, even _if_ we could all fit, it would put extra strain on them. It would take more gas to get them going with that extra weight and we’d run out faster than normal. And with no extra fuel on hand, we’d end up abandoning the cars and walking anyway, sooner rather than later. No, what we’re gonna do is cut down on any supplies that aren’t an absolute necessity. Anything we can carry, we carry. Water, food, ammunition.”  
  
“But these are two, perfectly good cars right here, and you just want us to leave them?” Nicole questioned.  
  
“I am,” Rick nodded.  
  
“That’s reckless.”  
  
“It really ain’t,” he insisted, tilting his head slightly and narrowing his eyes at the nurse. “What if another group comes by this way, a _family_ ; people who are just as down on their luck as us, maybe even worse off? They come by here and they see these two cars, with a little bit of gas left in them, just enough to get them somewhere else, anywhere else but here. Imagine how happy they’d be.” Rick scanned the group as they listened to what he was saying. “I want to bring my girls up in a better world than the one we’re in now. It’s gotta start somewhere. Why not here, right now?”  
  
“Rick’s right,” Jo spoke up, her arms folded across her chest. “Trying to pile into these other two cars like clowns in the circus won’t work. Either we all travel comfortably by car, or not at all. We’ll leave these two behind for someone else to come upon. Maybe the reason we found them to begin with is because someone did the same thing.”  
  
Rick caught his wife’s eye and winked at her. “So, that’s what we’re gonna do,” he commented to all. “Finn, pick who you wanna bring with you. Take no more than two hours. If you haven’t found anything by then, come back. If we have to walk a few days before finding enough cars for all of us to travel in, then that’s when we’ll stop walking.”  
  
“Let’s hope you find some cars and fuel, then,” Nicole grumbled, moving away to head up to the farmhouse’s porch.  
  
Rick looked after her and then brought his gaze over to Jo who was watching Finn begin to gather his scouting group members. Milo was an obvious choice. Both men were best friends and virtually inseparable. Merle offered to go, muttering something about not wanting to sit around with his only hand up his ass like some little woman. Ignoring his sexist comment, Michonne stepped up to join as well. She tossed her katana in its scabbard onto her back as the other three men grabbed a couple of bottles of water to share among themselves, along with making sure they were properly armed in the event of running into any sort of unfriendly types; be they dead or not.  
  
Jo limped over to her brother and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek after Jen had done the same. “Be careful,” she urged, seeing a glimmer of the little boy he once was, playing in his bedroom with his Matchbox cars.  
  
“Careful’s my middle name,” Finn joked, stepping back from his big sister.  
  
“No, it’s not. It’s Louis.”  
  
“Shh, you’ll ruin my street cred.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “Then I hardly think 'Careful' is a very street-worthy middle name.”  
  
“Touché.”  
  
As the foursome went off, Rick approached Jo, placing a hand on her shoulder and then kissing her forehead. He saw the faint look of worry flash over her face as she watched her brother walk away and knew she was nervous of something happening and him not returning.  
  
“He’ll be okay.”  
  
“I know,” Jo nodded. “Though, I think with finding him and being around him again, and seeing him kill walkers or just being armed in a take charge kind of way in general, it makes me nervous. I can’t help but think about him as this three year old little boy, following me around the house, or watching _Barney and Friends_. He was always like this baby doll to me. I mean, there’s eight years between us. I was like a little mother to him; carrying him around on my hip, helping to teach him words—”  
  
“Good ones or bad ones?” Rick teased.  
  
Jo chuckled. “Good ones, of course.”  
  
“Of course.” After smiling a bit, he dropped his hand down from her shoulder and let it slide down around to her lower back. Leaning forward, Rick brushed his beard against her jawline as he went to kiss the space where her neck met shoulder. “You doing okay after last night?”  
  
“You mean my nightmare?”  
  
“Yeah,” he nodded as he lifted his head back up. “I was so tired from the last couple of days, I never heard you come back to bed. I didn’t even feel the mattress move. This morning I just woke up and there you were, just where I like you.”  
  
The look on his face was a bit impish, causing Jo to roll her eyes and try her best not to allow him to get a grin out of her, which was a rather difficult task. “I stayed out here for about two hours. Daryl and I got to watch that bolt of lightning fuck that car up. Scared the shit out of us if I’m being honest.”  
  
“Daryl? Scared?”  
  
“Well, maybe not scared, but he jumped to his feet real quick and seemed startled enough; kinda like a cat when it hunches its back and is about to hiss at you.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Remind me to tease him about him being a scaredy-cat later.”  
  
“Well, when you end up with one of the bolts from his crossbow sticking through your chest, don’t come complaining to me about it.”  
  
A single, quick chuckle escaped Rick’s lips as he watched the others heading back inside the farmhouse and begin to bring out the supplies they’d brought in with them the evening before. Until they all knew whether or not they’d have the luxury of traveling by car as soon as Finn’s group came back, no one was going to remove the rest of the supplies from their current cars’ trunks. They also weren’t going to add the supplies removed from the farmhouse back into the trunks. It was really going to be just a lot of waiting around for the next two or so hours, but they would make their time useful.  
  
With sunlight being more abundant now than it had been when they’d firs arrived the evening before, Morgan and Tyreese decided to check the barn for any form weaponry they could add to their stock: machetes, hatchets and sickles would suffice nicely. Karen was reorganizing the First Aid kit while Karen was carefully emptying water into their empty bottles from the buckets they’d set outside to collect rain water on Jo’s suggestion. Tara, noting that the area was thankfully clear of walkers as far as the eye could see, offered to take Sophia, Piper and Mika across the street to the pear orchard. They would collect as many pears as they could and fill their backpacks with them. Sam, surprisingly, spoke up, saying he’d like to join them. Gathering fruit apparently reminded him of Ana. As for Daryl, he went off into the woods to see about catching some more squirrels or whatever he could manage for their next meal.  
  
Rick and Jo, on the other hand, opted to sit on the porch and just make the most of the downtime. They watched as the girls walked across the street with Sam and Tara, and how Jen sat down in one of the intact cars, closing her eyes in some sort of catnap. The entire time they sat there, side by side on the front steps, not once did Rick try bringing up Jo’s nightmare. He figured if she ever wanted to tell him, she would. Neither of them spoke, either. Instead, Jo rested her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes, taking a page out of Jen’s book.

* * *

  
No more than a half hour later, Tara returned with Sophia, Piper and Mika with backpacks bursting at the seams, which brought some chuckling out of Rick, causing his shoulders to shake and accidentally wake Jo up from her short nap.  
  
“Those bags are looking heavy,” he commented. “You girls gonna be able to carry all that?”  
  
Tara snickered. “Clearly you underestimate a woman’s strength.”  
  
“A woman’s, no. But Mika looks like she’s gonna tip right over,” Rick teased as he gestured his youngest adoptive daughter over.  
  
The young girl waddled toward him, carrying her backpack with both hands by the vinyl loop at the top. “I got a lot,” she announced proudly.  
  
“Lemme see.” Beckoning Mika closer, he took the bag from her and set it down on the porch step between his feet and unzipped the bag to peer inside. “Can I have one?”  
  
“It’s for all of us,” she replied as confirmation.  
  
Giving her a wink, Rick removed a pear and handed it to her and then kept one for himself as he nudged Jo to take one as well. Wiping the sleep from her eyes, Jo smiled at Mika and then reached her hand into the bag to claim a pear for herself. The others that were close enough began to come over and grab a pear as well, and in doing so, made the bag much lighter for the girl to carrying.  
  
“Where’s Sam?” Jo asked, having yet to take a bite of the fruit in her hand.  
  
Tara looked over her shoulder and back across the street at the orchard. “I dunno,” she shrugged. “He was with us a couple of minutes ago. I called out and said me and the girls were done and heading back.” Looking back toward Rick and Jo, Tara added, “He’s still really broken up about Ana. He probably just wants some time alone to mourn her or something.”  
  
“Yeah, but we don’t really know what’s in those woods beyond the orchard. He should know better than hang back by himself. I don’t even remember him taking a weapon with him.”  
  
“No, he had a gun with him in his back pocket,” Tara assured. “I’ve never seen him use it before, though, so I don’t know how good a shot he’d be if there were any walkers.”  
  
Jo sighed and turned to look up at Rick. “We need to go get him.”  
  
Setting her pear down on the porch, telling herself she’d eat it later, she pushed herself up to her feet and chose to forego either of her crutches. Reaching for where she had her sheathed sword propped up with the rest of the supplies on the porch, Jo threw it on upon her back and also checked the gun she had in her own back pocket.  
  
Rick stood up as well and placed a hand on her arm. “You don’t have to go. I got it.”  
  
“No,” Jo parried. “My foot feels fine enough and I’m not an invalid. If you’re thinking of treating me like one during the entire course of this pregnancy, you have another thing coming, Mr. Grimes.”  
  
Sparring off with her with daring gazes, Rick quickly caved; his shoulders slumping to acknowledge defeat. “Fine. Just…take it easy.” He then removed his Colt from its holster, checked where he was at ammunition-wise, and then returned it back in its place. “I’m coming with you, though.”  
  
Jo smirked but shook her head.  
  
“Like hell I’m letting you outta my sight,” he added with a knowing look.  
  
“Wouldn’t have it any other way.”  
  
Letting the others, who hadn’t really been paying attention, know where they were going and for everyone else to stay put, Rick and Jo started off with each other down from the farmhouse’s front yard, to the street. Out of habit, they looked both ways, but not for cars: for walkers. With the coast being clear, they moved along at a more leisurely pace for Jo’s benefit. Once on the other side of the road, they were soon slipping between the rows of pear trees, crouching down to look for a pair of legs belonging — _hopefully_ — only to Sam.  
  
“Sam!” Rick called out. “You alright? Why don’t you head back to the house now?”  
  
“Sam!” Jo echoed. The fact that the towheaded young man wasn’t replying was worrying to her. She turned; her own fair hair flopping over her shoulder in her attempt to look in Rick’s direction as she called out to Sam once more, to no avail. “I don’t like that he’s not responding.”  
  
“He’s been almost catatonic since he lost Ana. I can understand how he’s feeling. It’s the same way I felt when I thought I’d lost you,” Rick remarked, shooting a look Jo’s way.  
  
“Yeah, but you didn’t,” she smiled. “Like I said: you can’t get rid of me that easy.”  
  
“As is if I’d want to.”  
  
“Sam!” Jo called out again, letting their loving banter take a backseat and get back to business. “C’mon, stop fuckin’ around and answer us, okay?”  
  
As they drew closer to the edge of the woods, Rick held out his arm in front of Jo’s chest to stop her from continuing any further forward. He brought a finger up to his lips and then pointed forward. Jo followed his gaze and noticed the same movement that had caught his attention.  
  
Taking a step closer to Jo, Rick leaned his face down and removed his holster. “In case it’s not Sam or not Sam _anymore_ , let’s stop calling out his name so we don’t attract any unwanted attention,” he spoke in a more hushed tone.  
  
Jo nodded, reaching her right hand up and over her right shoulder to unsheathe her sword. This would be the first time she’d get to use it since Rick brought it back for her. In reality, though, she hoped she wouldn’t have to use it. The weight of the sword she was still getting used to, and with her right shoulder still somewhat sore from the car accident earlier in the week, swinging the blade properly should she need to would be a challenge she was ready to face.  
  
Side by side, Rick and Jo slipped through the initial layer of trees at the forest’s edge. With so much leaf coverage from the thick canopy above, it was slightly darker inside the woods than out in the orchard where the trees were considerably shorter in height and more spaced out. They could still see easily all the same, though, as they peered around for a glimpse of Sam or whoever the figure was.  
  
Biting down on his bottom lip, Rick removed his machete from the loop on the left side of his gun belt and tapped a tree with it to rustle up some noise. If the figure was anything other than Sam, it would come more into the open so Rick could dispatch with it.  
  
And, sure as shit, a walker appeared seconds later, closer to Jo than they’d anticipated. As it dragged its dead body toward them both, with arms stretching out before it and its distended stomach signifying it recently fed, Jo glanced quickly at Rick out of concern.  
  
“Let’s not jump to conclusions that it’s Sam,” Rick muttered, somehow able to read Jo’s mind as she wondered if Sam was what the walker had just recently fed on.  
  
“That was my first thought,” she replied as she raised her sword.  
  
Rick, quicker with his movements than her, because of the limp she still walked with due to her ankle, crossed in front of Jo and sliced the walker’s head in half with his machete. As its body crumpled to the ground in a dead heap, Rick looked back at his wife and touched his free hand upon her shoulder to lead her on as he stepped around the body at their feet. Pointing in the direction the walker had been moving away from, Rick exhaled a breath and nodded.  
  
“If it was Sam, what’s left of him is in that direction,” he commented. “I think we should check that way first to be sure.”  
  
“Fingers crossed it wasn’t.”  
  
It would be a terrible shame if Sam had been attacked and devoured by that walker. Despite how distant he’d become since losing Ana only a couple days prior, and despite only knowing him a couple of weeks, Sam was a great guy with such a positive outlook on life even in the world they now lived. He wasn’t much of a fighter, sure, and wasn’t a great shot either from what little they’d seen in him defending himself in those moments that called for it, but his presence was very welcome. Until recently, he had always been there with a smile, even if it was only a sad smile. He still smiled.  
  
After only a couple of minutes of walking among the trees, Rick and Jo eventually approached a very bloody carcass on the forest floor; blood and remaining entrails spilled out onto dead leaves and soil soggy from the previous night’s downpour.  
  
“Well, that answers that,” Rick remarked, staring down at the ripped apart deer lying dead on the ground. Flies were buzzing around and the stench was pretty disgusting. “It’s probably been here a day or so and that walker had been eating it for a while.”  
  
“How did it catch it though?” Jo wondered. “A deer is faster than a walker.”  
  
“Maybe it was sick and just dropped dead. Too hard to tell if someone shot it what with it torn up the way it is.”  
  
“Well, at least it wasn’t Sam.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Let’s hope he hasn’t shared the same fate as this deer or at the hands of some other walker, though.”  
  
“Okay, Negative Nancy.”  
  
Looking at his wife, Rick merely shrugged. “It’s not being negative. It’s being realistic.”  
  
“Same thing if you asked me,” Jo retorted as they began walking away, and deeper into the woods. “What if we can’t find him? Do we go back and get the others, send out a search party?”  
  
“Maybe we missed him and he’s already headed back.”  
  
“And if he hasn’t?”  
  
Rick hesitated in answering, keeping his gaze forward as he stepped over an old, rotted out tree trunk lying on the ground. He held his left hand out toward Jo to offer her some assistance in stepping over it. “We won’t leave him behind,” Rick finally replied. “We won’t get back on the road until we find him.”  
  
“We’ll need to put a time limit on it though.”  
  
“Yeah,” he agreed. “If we can’t find him by nightfall, we’ll stay the night again in that farmhouse and move on tomorrow morning. I like Sam and all, but I can’t take time away from getting out there and finding Hope. She’s our priority, when it comes down to it. Not him.”  
  
“I agree.”  
  
“I mean, Sam chose to wander off on his own. He’s not an idiot. He knows the risks. But every moment we spend looking for him is a moment we take away from looking for our daughter and I’m gonna give him a piece of my mind about it if we find him alive.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Get in line.”  
  
Shooting her a look, Rick smirked.  
  
After a solid ten minutes of walking deeper into the woods, Rick was starting to get a little hot under the collar. His patience was quickly wearing thin and was moments away from throwing his hands up and deciding not to spend the rest of the day looking for Sam just as they spotted a figure up ahead, crouched down at the base of a tree trunk, crying.  
  
“Sam?” Jo called out.  
  
Lifting his head, a teary-eyed Sam looked up at the couple approaching him and began wiping his face with the back of his hand. “Wh-what’s up?” he mumbled nervously in response, as if he’d just been caught masturbating.  
  
“What’s _up_?” Rick repeated, ready to read the towhead the riot act. “You wandered off deep into these woods without telling anybody where you were going. We had to come in here to come find you. _That’s_ what’s up.”  
  
“Sorry. I just needed to be alone.”  
  
“You could be alone, closer to the farmhouse instead of an almost half hour walk into these damned woods.”  
  
Sam shrugged, pulling himself up to his feet. “I didn’t pay attention to how long I was walking. I probably would’ve kept on going but I had to stop.”  
  
“And why’s that?” Jo asked.  
  
“Uh, the abrupt drop.” Pointing toward a couple of feet behind him, Sam gestured to steep slope of a ravine.  
  
“Why didn’t you tell Tara where you were going? You asked her if you could tag along while the girls were picking pears. You didn’t think let any of them know? You just started walking without giving a shit that we might be worried about you?”  
  
Sam uncharacteristically snorted at Jo in a rather derisive manner. With a roll of his eyes, he remarked, “Oh, come on. You guys don’t really care what happens to me. All that matters to you is finding your daughter, and I get that, I do. But it doesn’t seem to matter who else gets hurt or killed along the way.”  
  
“What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?” Rick demanded, tilting his head slightly to the left as anger began to percolate within him.  
  
“It might be unfair of me to say it, but it’s your fault Ana’s dead,” Sam blurted. He seemed a bit frayed at the edges, as if he was about to have a breakdown; one he’d been holding in since Rick found him escaping that hotel window with Tyreese and Karen.  
  
“How do you figure?”  
  
“Ana and I were doing okay by ourselves. We wouldn’t have been caught up in that firefight at the prison or culled like cattle into that railcar at Terminus. We wouldn’t have ended up in Atlanta and caught in that hotel when it got swarmed by thousands of skin-eaters.”  
  
Rick rubbed his nose with the backside of his index finger and shook his head. Glancing over at Jo, he knew she could tell he was doing his best to rein in his temper; chewing back on some harsh words he was aching to spew. “All that? That’s bullshit, and you know it,” Rick growled, leaning forward. “You two didn’t have to come back to the prison with us. We told you there was a sickness going on, and you still wanted to come with us. Hell, I didn’t even want you to come back with us. Jo is the one that saw something in ya. If it wasn’t for Jo, your arm would still be dislocated. As for the attack at the prison, we didn’t know that was gonna happen. Terminus? You and Ana got there before we did, and if it wasn’t for us, you’d be getting digested by some cannibals by now. And, as for the hotel, Ana dying is not on us. Do _not_ put that on us. She was _your_ girlfriend. You knew she moved slower because of her leg. She was your responsibility. Mine was to keep my daughters safe. Do _not_ put that blame on us.”  
  
Sam did his best to look defiantly back at Rick, but the younger man wasn’t really the defiant type. He seemed to get nervous and jerky the more he was put in his place by the alpha male before him. “I’m sorry,” Sam apologized. “I’m sorry, okay!” he added; his voice raising a bit. “I’m just grieving and I haven’t felt a loss like this in a long time. Ana was my world. She was my person. And now she’s gone. You weren’t much better when you thought Jo was dead. You were swearing up a storm and kicking at doors and furniture in that apartment building, ready to launch a one-man search party for her before the hotel blew. And then you were as catatonic as a skin-eater.”  
  
Jo cast an eye over to Rick, noting how he looked down and chewed on his bottom lip while recalling one of the worst days of his life. “We’ve all lost people, Sam,” she spoke up. “Rick lost his son. I lost a husband, my parents. We’ve both lost close friends; most of them at the prison from that sickness or the attack. We don’t even know if our daughter is alive or dead, but we’re moving forward to find out either way. The only reason we’re not falling apart is because we’re sticking together. Not just me and him; all of us. You don’t see us wandering off into some woods. Being alone really ain’t an option if you wanna stay alive.”  
  
Sam sighed. “I guess.”  
  
“No ‘I guess,’” Jo reproved. “That’s how it is, plain and simple.”  
  
Folding his arms across his chest, Sam nodded. “I’m sorry. I know you lost more people than I did, but that doesn’t mean my grief is any less significant.”  
  
“We ain’t saying it is,” Rick commented. “Just...don’t go off into the woods to mourn like this again. Next time we’ll just leave ya, understand?”  
  
Sam nodded again. “Yeah.”  
  
As the three of them looked among each other, there was a rustle of leaves and a few cracks of twigs coming from a few feet away. Turning their heads in the direction behind where Rick and Jo were standing, the trio became face to face with a considerable amount of walkers ambling their way. They weren’t sure where the walkers had come from, but their heated voices had probably carried on the wind throughout the woods and attracted the unwanted attention they were now receiving.  
  
“Shit,” Rick muttered, raising his machete up.  
  
Before any of the walkers could get close enough, a single gunshot suddenly echoed through the air, startling both Rick and Jo as they turned back to glimpse Sam holding up the gun he had on him. Whichever walker the younger man had been aiming at, hadn’t been struck because each still kept coming closer.  
  
Upon a second gunshot ringing out, Rick backed up toward Sam and pushed the gun downward. “Stop firing. Your aim is shit and the sound is just gonna draw them,” he admonished. “I know you got a knife on you, so use it.”  
  
Rick and Jo both prepared to defend themselves, raising their respective blades while Sam fumbled to shove his gun back into his pants pocket and withdraw his knife.  
  
Turning to look behind them for a moment, Jo noted how close to the ravine’s steep edge they were getting. “Shove them off.”  
  
“What?” Rick questioned, not catching on right away.  
  
“Keep them at arm’s length and shove them over the edge,” she replied, pointing to the ravine with her sword.  
  
Rick looked his wife in the eye and nodded. Bracing himself, he let the walkers come to him and when one got close enough, he grabbed at its shoulders or arm before it grabbed at him and he propelled it over the edge to tumble down the steep slope like a sack of potatoes. Jo mirrored the gesture, as did Sam with some trepidation. They were lucky in being able to keep themselves from getting swarmed by too many walkers at a time and from getting bit in the process. As the last couple of walkers meandered hungrily toward them, Sam’s footing slipped in the soft, muddy soil underfoot. In trying to toss his last walker over the edge, Sam lost his balance. He was able to thrust the walker forward to tumble down the slope, but in doing so he fell backward.  
  
Before he could plunge to his inevitable death, either by the fall or by being ripped apart and devoured by the riled up walkers standing at the base of the slope about twenty feet down, Jo instinctively reached out her hand in an attempt to prevent such an event from taking place. She missed his hand by centimeters, unfortunately, but Sam was able to reach quick enough and grabbed onto whatever he could first, and that happened to be Jo’s pant leg. Trying to propel his body forward, Sam slid down the slope, which was just as muddy from the rain, on his stomach but he didn’t reach the bottom because his grip on Jo’s leg prevented him from doing so. The abrupt tug on her already weakened ankle, however, didn’t help either of them, as Jo’s leg gave out from underneath her and Sam’s weight pulled her down to her knees and then to frantically slip over the edge. Sam cried out in fear upon inching closer to the walkers down below that were reaching up toward him, even if they were still a ways off from grabbing him.  
  
Rick, tossing the very last walker over the edge, spun around and his eyes darted immediately to Jo as she scrambled to grab onto something to pull her up. The soil was too soft and slick and she was losing traction. She couldn’t even use her legs to try and climb upward because of Sam dangling off her left leg like a parasite. Her cry in pain, because Sam was holding on so tightly near her sore ankle, spurred Rick forward and he crouched forward and reached for her hands in sheer panic.  
  
“Grab on!” he shouted, leaning forward to grab for her hands.  
  
In a swift gesture, Jo stretched on arm upward, practically clawing at Rick to properly grasp his hand. Her hands being slick with mud made it difficult but not impossible. Wrapping one hand around her wrist, Rick attempted to reach for the other hand while also starting to pull her upward. The only trouble was Sam’s weight hanging off her forced Rick to have to push down into the softened earth.  
  
“Don’t let go,” Jo pleaded, looking up at him in fear.  
  
“I won’t,” he promised, gritting his teeth as he struggled to pull her and Sam up.  
  
Ragged, unsteady breaths escaped his mouth and his brow knitted tightly. The fear of losing his hold on Jo was clouding his thoughts; knowing that if she slipped out of his grip, she would plummet to the base of the ravine and the walkers below would descend upon her and Sam, and Rick wasn’t prepared to lose her for real and watch her get ripped to shreds and devoured before his very eyes.  
  
Try as he might, though, Rick couldn’t pull her up. Not because he didn’t have the strength or adrenaline rush to assist in his efforts, but because the ground under his feet had given way. Wet soil was kicked out, plastering down over Jo’s face, who spat and sputtered it out of her mouth as Rick’s feet dug down too much in his attempt to pull her and Sam up. As the ground underneath him caved, Rick slipped down over the crumbling edge of the ravine, causing Jo and Sam to slip closer down toward the walkers. All three emitted shouts of panic and would’ve fallen all the way down completely if Rick hadn’t been able to grab onto a tree root sticking out.  
  
“Rick,” Jo panted.  
  
Looking down at his wife, his panicked blue eyes locked onto her terrified green ones.  
  
“Don’t let go…don’t let go.”


	41. Sorry

_“_ _How am I the lucky one?_  
_I do not deserve_  
_To wait around forever_  
_When you were there first_  
_First you get hurt_  
_Then you feel sorry_ _”_  
— Cold War Kids

* * *

  
Rick was struggling to find the strength he needed. His arms were burning in pain from maintaining his grip on Jo’s hand, which was starting to slip from a mix of the mud caked on their hands and the perspiration building up between them.  
  
“Try to reach up and grab onto my waist,” he advised through gritted teeth. “I need both hands to hold this root.”  
  
Her free hand which had been gripping onto his pant legs is what she used to grab on tighter to his actual leg in her attempt to stretch her arm upward and grab onto his belt. Rick assisted her as best as he could; guiding her hand where he needed it to go. When she was able to hook her fingers into one of the belt looks, Rick removed his hand from hers and extended that arm across his chest and took better hold of the tree root.  
  
As Sam floundered, adjusting his grip on Jo’s legs, a pained whimper billowed out of her lips as she tipped her head against Rick’s thighs and tried to block out how bad the sharp pain jolting upward from her left ankle felt.  
  
“Sam, is there anything you can grab onto that _isn’t_ my bad sprained ankle?” she practically barked.  
  
“I’m s-sorry,” Sam stuttered nervously.  
  
In an effort to relieve some of his weight from her, he tried reaching out with one hand onto the slick slope of the ravine; hoping he’d find a root of his own or could somehow find a way to pull himself up. That endeavor fell short as his grip faltered and his only option to remain in one place and not fall into the clutches of walkers was to grab back onto Jo’s legs with full strength again.  
  
“Ah, fuck!” Jo exclaimed.  
  
“I’m sorry, sorry…I’m so sorry.”  
  
Rick tilted his chin down, seeing if he could get a decent glimpse at the younger man. His Colt was holstered at his side, but he’d dropped his machete in the scuffle above, and part of him considered finding a way to grab the gun, pull it out and shoot Sam in the head to remove the extra weight off of Jo so the two of them stood a better chance of surviving. At this rate, none of them would if they couldn’t get back up over the edge to where they were before.  
  
All the walkers below, that hadn’t pulled themselves up from the fall before, were now doing just that. Several had rolled into the stream which could be no more than a few inches deep. They sloshed water around as they staggered forward toward the slope, and it was only a matter of time before they found a way to climb over each other and successfully grab at Sam’s feet. If they managed that, they could pull him down and Rick knew Sam would likely panic and try to grab on tighter to Jo in a last ditch effort to stay put, only to force Jo’s grip on Rick to release and have her fall down the slope and into the decaying hands below.  
  
Rick was so tempted to shoot Sam; to sacrifice him to save him and Jo, but he was too much of a good guy at heart, even if he didn’t always view himself as such. He couldn’t just kill someone in cold blood like that, especially one of their own.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Sam continued to mutter over and over. “I didn’t mean for this to happen.”  
  
“It’s not your fault,” Jo assured.  
  
“Well,” Rick interjected, “it kinda is.”  
  
“Not the time, babe.” Biting down on her bottom lip and doing everything she could to ignore the pain in her ankle, Jo looked down as best she could toward Sam. “Shit happens. Don’t blame yourself for this. You had no way of knowing something like this would happen. You were grieving, you wanted to get away, find some peace and quiet. This is just an unfortunate accident.”  
  
“Accident or not: it’s my fault,” Sam insisted. “I’m sorry.”  
  
“Stop apologizing before I kick you in the face and rid you of my legs,” Jo idly threatened.  
  
“Sor—okay.”  
  
Rick was clenching his jaw in stress as his mind began to scream at him over the fact that his grip on the root was starting to hurt his fingers and that he couldn’t muster the strength to use the root to pull all three of them up.  
  
_If there were only two of us dangling here I might_ , the devil on his shoulder remarked.  
  
As a new thought entered his head, Rick turned his attention to his wife. “Jo, I have an idea, but it might hurt or and get a bit uncomfortable.”  
  
“I’m all ears.”  
  
“Sam?” Rick called down.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Can you try and pull yourself up Jo’s body? Climb up her body _without_ doing anything that could cause her to lose her grip on me and fall?”  
  
“I—I guess. I could try.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Okay, good. If you can climb up Jo, then you can do the same to me and get back up over the edge. Without your weight hanging off her, I should be able to pull Jo up, and you can grab her and do the rest. Then, you both pull me up.”  
  
Tipping her head back to look up at her husband, she caught his eye and nodded. She silently agreed that this was likely their best and only option for survival at this point.  
  
“Alright then,” Rick muttered. “Give it a shot.”  
  
Licking his lips in concentration, but tasting the soil that had fallen on his face the same as Jo’s when Rick had lost his footing on the edge, Sam released his grip on Jo’s right leg quick enough to reach upward. His fingers gracelessly fumbled over her ass and fought to find something to grip onto, settling on the back pocket her jeans. Once that hold was secure enough, Sam released his grip from her left ankle and tried reaching for her left back pocket. He almost had his fingers curled around into the pocket just as a small rock came loose from the soil above, fell past Rick’s shoulders, bounced off Jo’s and hit Sam right between the eyes. It was enough to stun him for a moment, which was long enough to lose his grip.  
  
As the wave of panic in washed over Sam, he tried to frantically reach for the left pocket again while all his weight was allocated to her right pocket. He gripped the right tighter as a result, until he could attempt to reach back upward but, with that full weight on material that was already weak from being worn for so long, the stitching on the pocket quickly began to come undone. The ripping sound seemed to echo off the trees to rival the sounds of the snarling walkers below and as the pocket ripped right off, Sam’s grip went also.  
  
His last result was to desperately latch back onto Jo’s ankles as not to plummet to an inevitable death. The abrupt tug at her lower limbs caused a sort of ripple effect. Not only did it pain her once again, it forced her grip on Rick’s belt loops to waiver, and subsequently Rick’s grip on the root to loosen.  
  
But it didn’t just end there.  
  
The movement had caused the root itself to give, snapping somewhat, but not breaking in half, which was their only saving grace at the moment.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Sam blubbered.  
  
Jo ignored him and instead peered up at Rick, finding he was already looking down at her with next to no hope in his eyes for their survival. No attempts to at trying to pull them all up on his own had worked and the soil on the ravine’s slope was too soft to grab onto with either hand or foot. The rainfall the night before had been to torrential. If this had happened the day before, the trio would’ve stood a considerably better chance at making it out alive.  
  
Sam raised his eyes, noting the look of love, fear and dejection passing between the couple, and his guilt grew.  
  
“I’m gonna get you two killed. I’m sorry,” the towhead remarked, shaking his head as he silently chastised himself.  
  
“Sam, I said not to bla—” Jo began to say before he cut her off.  
  
“I do. And I refuse to be the reason why your daughter Hope grows up without you,” he continued. “You two have too many people who need you. You have children. None of them can get as far as we did with you if you’re no longer around. You’re the glue in the group and I’m honored you let me and Ana join you when you did. We probably would’ve died a lot sooner. You gave us a chance. I just wish we could’ve gotten to DC with everyone.”  
“Sam,” Jo muttered, sensing where he was going with what he was saying. “Don’t.”  
  
“Rick,” the younger man called up, ignoring Jo’s kindly plea. “Ana was the only love of my life I’ve ever had and ever will and this world just doesn’t seem worth living in anymore without her. She was the sun in my sky and everything’s dark now. So, please…you know what you need to do. I saw you eye your gun before. I know what crossed your mind, and I’m saying it’s okay. Do what needs to be done so the two of you can survive for your friends and family.”  
  
“You _are_ family,” Jo insisted.  
  
“Nah, I’m just an interloper,” Sam shook his head. “Rick, please.”  
  
Letting out a pained sigh, Rick nodded. He took the risk in releasing his right hand from the loosened root and reached for the Colt holstered on his hip. Ensuring the safety was off, Rick aimed the barrel at Sam’s forehead and closed his eyes for a moment.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Rick commented. “I hope you get to see Ana again.”  
  
Sam smiled a sad smile. “So do I.”  
  
As Jo leaned her face forward against Rick’s thigh as not to watch the younger man’s impending demise, Rick released a steadying breath, placed his index finger over the trigger and—  
  
_BANG!_  
  
The loud and sudden gunshot echoed throughout the woods like ripples water; the sound ringing in Jo’s ears as the gun had been close to the side of her head.  
  
Rick, who had kept his eyes trained on Sam, watched at the back of the younger man’s head burst and sprayed the walker’s below with blood, chunks of brain matter and shards of broken skull bone. Sam’s blue eyes were instantly lifeless and his grip on Jo’s legs released without hesitation as his body fell backward, down upon the walkers, with his limbs spread out in every direction as if he was a concert goer who was surfing the crowd.  
  
Slowly, Sam’s body sank within the cluster of corpses that began to hunch over him as their rotting hands clawed and ripped at his exposed flesh; all the while tears began to sting at both Rick and Jo’s eyes over what had just transpired.  
  
Unable to allow themselves to squander their energies on grieving, Rick holstered the Colt and used the lack of weight hanging off Jo to their advantage. Holding as tightly as he could onto the weakened root, Rick wrapped his right hand around Jo’s arm and tried to pull her up his body, but she had to meet him halfway where effort was concerned.  
  
Jo stretched one arm up and gripped his bicep. Secure in her hold, she slid her body up against his and reached her other arm upward to clamp her hand down upon his shoulder.  
  
“That’s it,” Rick urged, locking eyes with her while her feet dug at the soil on either side of him in an effort to gain some sort of traction.  
  
As she moved her hand from his shoulder to around the back of his neck, Jo tried to smile with relief over how much easier this was without Sam, as horrible as it was to admit. The relief was short-lived, though, when their movements caused the root to give way and snap completely in half.  
  
With eyes widening with terror, Rick shot his hands upward in a mad dash as he fumbled to somehow grip onto what was left of the root, which wasn’t much to hold onto at all.  
  
“Shit, shit, _shit_ ,” he grumbled, his eyes darting all over.  
  
Jo’s arm went tight around his neck and she pressed her face to his chest as she brought her hand off his bicep to rest upon his shoulder instead.  
  
“What if his death was for nothing?” she questioned into his soiled shirt. “What if we die anyway?”  
  
Rick didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t find any words to comfort either of them.  
  
His bottom lip quivered slightly as he stared out at the trees, committing the sight of them to memory in case this was the last scenery he’d ever see.  
  
“It’s gonna be okay,” was all he could manage, even if he didn’t believe it.

 

* * *

  
Sauntering out of the woods behind the farmhouse with his crossbow over one shoulder and a string of squirrels dangling from the opposite hand, Daryl approached everyone gathered outside around the three cars or on the wraparound porch. His eyes scanned the faces, taking a silent headcount out of habit to make sure everyone was okay.  
  
His initial instinct was to seek out Sophia as a sort of favor to Carol and because he cared for the teen in his own right. When he was satisfied to see she was sitting on the trunk of one of the intact cars with Piper, Daryl felt satisfied to move his gaze along.  
  
Mika was seated in the grass, playing a rousing game of slap-hands with Tara, Nicole was redressing the bandage on Jen’s stump inside the same car the teen girls were sitting on, Karen and Tyreese were sitting side by side on the porch steps, and Morgan was cleaning his gun.  
  
Finn, Merle, Michonne and Milo were still gone; off on their scouting mission to find another car, or possibly two, along with some fuel.  
  
There were a few that were missing, though.  
  
“Where’s Rick, and Jo?” Daryl inquired, setting the squirrels down over the closed trunk of one of the other cars.  
  
“They went to go bring Sam back,” Tyreese replied.  
  
Daryl turned his head toward the large black man and narrowed his gaze. “Where did  _Sam_ go?”  
  
“We went pear-picking across the street; me and the girls,” Tara chimed in. “Sam wanted to come with us, but then he must’ve wandered off, so Rick and Jo went to get him.”  
  
“No one knows exactly where he went?”  
  
Tara shrugged. “No. Probably the woods, though.”  
  
“There were a couple gunshots earlier, and then one more a little while later,” Sophia offered up.  
  
“What the fuck? And no one thought to go find out if Rick and Jo were okay? Y’all just stayed here with your thumbs up your asses?”  
  
“We couldn’t be sure which direction the shots came from,” Morgan commented. “The sounds seemed to come from everywhere, echoing off the trees. We weren’t sure if it was them, or you, or the others returning back from looking for cars, or even if it was other people. Rick asked us to stay here, to keep an eye on things; that they’d bring Sam back.  
  
“Rick says a lot of things that ain’t always in his best interest; Jo, too. That’s why they’re so damned good together. They’re as stubborn as a pair of mules and don’t always think of themselves first when they should.” Removing his crossbow off his shoulder, Daryl shifted it around in front of him. “How long they been gone?”  
  
The others looked around at each other before coming up with an agreed upon time frame.  
  
“Thirty minutes, maybe more?” Karen offered.  
  
Daryl grunted out of irritation and began to stalk forward away from the farmhouse. “If anyone gives a shit, I’m going to look for them and make sure they ain’t fucking _dead_ ,” he spat. “Tell Merle where I went if he gets back before I do.”  
  
Tyreese stood up, reaching for the hatchet he’d found in the barn not long after Jo and Rick had gone off together. “I’ll come with you.”  
  
Even though he wanted to spit out some sarcastic comment about ‘better late than never’, Daryl decided against it and responded with the more characteristically laconic, “Whatever.”  
  
Giving Karen a kiss, his assured her that he’d be right back, and she responded with telling him to be careful. Daryl wasn’t waiting around, though, so Tyreese had to quicken his pace to catch up; joining the archer and natural tracker in the middle of the deserted country road.  
  
“You know those gunshots could’ve been Rick and Jo defending themselves against walkers,” Daryl bit out, trying not to let his worry about his friends become too obvious. He wasn’t exactly one to share his feelings. “They could’ve been caught unawares, got bit, and now they’re dead and dying in some ditch all in the name of going after fucking Slim Shady.”  
  
“I’m sure they’re fine,” Tyreese insisted. “I’m sure a walk into the woods and a few gunshots hasn’t seen the last of them, especially after all we’ve survived up to this point…”  
  
“If they aren’t fine, I’m holding your personally accountable,” Daryl asserted, throwing a stern look at the larger man beside him.

 

* * *

  
Closing his eyes tight, Rick felt like the veins in his arms and neck were going to burst from the strain of keeping him and Jo suspended off the broken tree root. She kept her arms wrapped around his neck with her face buried into his chest, not wanting to look down at the walkers that were either feasting on Sam’s fresh corpse or were distracted by the dangling couple overhead, thus trying in vain to reach for them. It wouldn’t be in vain for long, however, if Rick and Jo couldn’t manage a way to get back up over the edge to safety.  
  
Letting his blue eyes flicker back open, Rick dipped his head down and placed a kiss into Jo’s hair before casting his gaze across the stream below. “You know, if I can swing you over a couple of feet, you can slide down the rest of the way, just far enough away from the walkers. I’ll use my gun and shoot the rest as many as I can, then slide down and keep them back from me with my machete—”  
  
Jo lifted her head and narrowed her eyes at him. “You don’t have your machete. You dropped it up there the same as I did with my sword and gun.”  
  
“Shit. Well, I can still use my gun. I’ll kick at the rest to hold ‘em at bay.”  
  
“You could’ve used your gun to shoot as many as possible by now.”  
  
“It’s been kinda hard to do in our current situation.”  
  
Jo gritted her teeth, pressing the side of her face against his chest again but this time stealing a glance down at Sam’s shredded body. It looked as if every one of his internal organs had been pulled out so they could be ingested by the undead. The sight of it gave rise to the urge to vomit. Her stomach soured and the contents of it churned.  
  
Something about Sam’s death wasn’t sitting right with her. Sure, she’d witnessed plenty of people get killed and get ripped apart the same as was happening to Sam now, but it was different.  
  
“You didn’t seem to have a problem using your gun to shoot Sam.”  
  
“That was before the root snapped and I had less to hold onto. And what’s that supposed to mean, anyway?”  
  
“You were going to shoot him regardless, weren’t you? You were going to shoot and kill Sam to save us. He knew it; he just made it easier by asking you to do it.”  
  
Rick squinted, trying to make heads or tails of what she was getting at. “You think I wanted to kill him? I didn’t.”  
  
“But you were gonna.”  
  
“I did think about it, but I chose not to.”  
  
“He was one of us, Rick; even if he wasn’t with us as long as some of the others.”  
  
“That’s why I didn’t want to do it, why I had to find another way, and I did. It just…the other way didn’t work out and…and he asked me to shoot him. He was right. His death gave us a fighting chance of surviving. Even if the lack of his weight didn’t help, the walkers attacking his body could be the distraction we needed.”  
  
“Not enough of one.”  
  
“Jo,” Rick sighed. “I love you so much it hurts more than my arms trying to hold onto this damned root, so if these are our last forsaken moments, I don’t want to spend them bickering with you over what had to be done.”  
  
“I’m not trying to bic—”  
  
Before she could finish her sentence, the root Rick was holding onto began to crack again under his unrelenting grip.  
  
“Shit. Alright, this is it,” he muttered, trying rock their bodies from side to side. “We’re out of options, babe. I’m swinging you over and you gotta let go of me. I know it’ll probably hurt because of your ankle, but when you slide down, scramble away as quick as you can. I’ll be right behind you.”  
  
Jo looked nervously up at Rick and craned her head back enough that he was able to meet her halfway and kiss her. “I don’t want to let go,” she mumbled against his lips.  
  
The root cracked some more, causing them both to lurch downward a bit more. A short gasp of anxiety escaped from them both. All Rick could do now for them was somehow manage to rock their bodies from side to side in order to give her a wide enough berth to slip down the muddy slope as far enough from the cluster of walkers below as he could. It was gonna be incredibly difficult, but not necessarily impossible; just mostly so.  
  
“I love you, Jo,” he said, biting back on the fear that he might be sending her to her death if she can’t get away from the walkers as quick as needed. She was unarmed after all, what with both her weapons on the ground overhead. “Just run as soon as you get to the bottom. I don’t care how much it hurts. You run.”  
  
“Rick!” a raspy voice called out. “Rick, Jo; where are ya?”  
  
Rick’s eyes went wide as he tipped his face upward, registering who he and Jo had just heard. “Daryl!”  
  
“Over here!” Jo added. “Over the edge!”  
  
“There’s her sword,” they heard a second, deeper voice comment.  
  
“Ty?” Rick questioned.  
  
Instead of answering, both Daryl and Tyreese’s heads poked out over the top and their hands instinctively reached out for Rick’s.  
  
“What happened?” Tyreese asked; gripping Rick’s left hand and forearm as Daryl did the same with the right; all the while Jo maintained her grip around Rick’s neck. “Are you hurt?”  
  
“Just get us up, will ya?” Rick pleaded.  
  
With two grown men at the task, pulling Rick and Jo up over the edge and back onto the safety of solid ground was relatively easy. Tyreese could probably tow a truck with his bare hands if he needed to. Rick and Jo were small change in comparison.  
  
Lying on their sides, facing each other, Jo tightened her arms around Rick’s neck; her relief that they’d survived that ordeal seeming to get the better of her, causing tears to run down her face. Rick, finding comfort in their situation as well, moved his arms around Jo’s back and even tossed a leg over hers as he embraced her and kissed her forehead.  
  
“Thank you,” he muttered to both men.  
  
Tyreese was knelt down on one knee and the other propped up, looking the couple over to see if there were any visible injuries or bite marks, while Daryl sank back onto the ground and rested his forearms across his own knees with limp hands hanging between them.  
  
“The fuck happened?” Daryl repeated Tyreese’s earlier question.  
  
After a moment, Rick pulled back slightly from Jo and let his head drop back onto the muddy ground. His view of Daryl and Tyreese was askew as he was looking at them upside down. Doing so gave him a sensation of vertigo so he cast his blue eyes toward the canopy of trees overhead; watching how the sunlight danced between the leaves.  
  
“We came in here looking for Sam. He had gone off alone to deal with mourning Ana. When we caught up to him, he got angry at us, blamed us for Ana being dead; that if we’d never brought them back to the prison, maybe she’d still be alive today. His voice got louder and drew out all those walkers below.”  
  
“There were gunshots,” Tyreese commented.  
  
“That was Sam. We got him to stop. He was a piss poor shot anyway; didn’t hit one walker.”  
  
“Don’t speak ill of the dead,” Jo mumbled as she unwrapped herself from him and rolled to her side where she began to pick herself up.  
  
“I’m just telling them what happened,” Rick replied, catching her eye briefly. He, too, sat up and began to stand, so Tyreese and Daryl followed suit. “We pushed the walkers over the edge, instead of wasting ammunition with our guns. It worked fine till one of the walkers got a good grip on Sam and pulled him over the edge. Jo tried to grab for him and stop him from falling, but then she slipped over, too. Then I grabbed her hand and tried pulling them both up, but the ground was too soft and over I went. We were just dangling there with those walkers below getting back up trying to reach for us. I was able to grab onto a root. It kept breaking though.”  
  
“We tried having Sam crawl up over me and then up over Rick,” Jo interjected, bending down to pick up her gun and her sword; the latter of which she returned to its scabbard still strapped around her back. “It almost worked, but he grabbed onto my pants pocket and it ripped. Sam lost his grip and slide back down, grabbing onto my ankles.”  
  
Daryl neared the edge carefully and looked properly down at the writhing bodies below. “Is that Sam down there, or what’s left of him?” The archer looked between the couple and noted a tense look between them both just before Rick nodded.  
  
“He made the choice to sacrifice himself so we could stand a chance at survival.”  
  
“What—did he just let go?” Tyreese wondered, stepping close to the edge to steal a glimpse as well, only to step back with a deeply solemn frown.  
  
Another look passed between the newlyweds.  
  
“Yeah,” Jo lied. “He just let go.”  
  
Casting her eyes downward, Jo began to limp away; not waiting on the men to start the trek back the way they came.  
  
She didn’t want to linger in the woods any longer.  
  
“Hey, stop,” Tyreese called to her. Sauntering up beside her, he reached an arm around him and patted his own back. “Don’t put any more weight on that ankle. Get on up. I’ll give you a piggyback ride back.”  
  
“No, it’s okay. I can—”  
  
“No, you can’t and I wasn’t asking.”  
  
Jo and Tyreese stared each other down, but in the end she smirked and caved. As she took a couple steps to move around behind him, Jo reached her arms up and clamped her hands down on his thick, broad shoulders. Rick was there in an instant, cupping her ass in his hands, but only to help give her a boost so she didn’t have to add weight to her ankle in order to hop up. Tyreese was quick to grab onto her legs, which she wrapped firmly around his middle, before giving her a slight jolt upward to adjust her weight on his back to prevent her from sliding down off him.  
  
“Thank you,” she muttered, into Tyreese’s ear, giving the side of his head a gently nudge with her own.  
  
“It ain’t nothing,” he assured.  
  
Daryl adjusted his crossbow back over his shoulder and then took a few steps back to pick up an abandoned gun. Tyreese had already begun to walk ahead with Jo, but Rick hung back, casting a glance down at the gun Daryl held.  
  
“That was Sam’s,” Rick informed in a low voice, as he slid his regained machete back into its loop on the left side of his gun belt. “He dropped it before he fell over the edge.”  
  
Chewing the inside of his cheek, Daryl nodded. “Listen, Rick, I know what happened here was unfortunate and I know you and Jo did everything you could, but the others back at the farmhouse said there was another single gunshot they heard not that long ago.”  
  
Rick looked down at the ground and began to rub his sore wrists. “Yeah,” he confirmed, nodding his head.  
  
“Sam didn’t just let go, did he?”  
  
Pursing his lips, Rick shifted his weight around and looked over his shoulder, back toward the edge of the ravine. His hesitation in answering his friend was in itself an answer.  
  
“I’m not judging you,” Daryl insisted. “I’ve seen you do crazier things to keep Jo safe. This ain’t the last time you’ll be faced with tough decisions to make.”  
  
“I didn’t want to do it. I really didn’t,” Rick replied. “Jo’s upset about it. I mean, I know she understands why it was done. I just don’t know why she’s upset with me that I did it.” Taking a step closer, Rick leaned his face closer to Daryl’s. “Sam asked me to shoot him, after I had already decided I wasn’t going to; after I decided I couldn’t because he was one of us. He made the choice for me, and I took that window of opportunity.”  
  
Daryl raised a hand and patted Rick on the shoulder sympathetically. “Hey, you don’t gotta explain it to me. I don’t blame ya for it. I would’ve done the same if it was between some newbie to our group and my wife. The decision is pretty clear.”  
  
“Yeah, well, it’s easier said than done.” Rick stepped back and brushed some dirt from his chest. “It doesn’t make me any less sorry that I did it.”  
  
With a nod, Daryl let his hand slide down off Rick’s shoulder and drop down to his side. Neither said anything further on the matter as they began walking to catch up with Tyreese and Jo; that is, until they reached the pear orchard and could spy the farmhouse in the distance.  
  
“Jo lied when Tyreese asked if Sam let go,” Daryl remarked quietly to Rick. “Why?”  
  
“She probably doesn’t want the truth that I shot him to save our own asses to get back to the others,” muttered Rick as he sauntered alongside the archer. “It gives Sam a more heroic end and doesn’t paint me as some sort of villain.”  
  
“You ain’t the villain of this story, Rick.”  
  
“I sure as hell feel like it sometimes.”

 

* * *

  
Walking back to the farmhouse was silent after that between the foursome. As soon as they stepped clear of the pear trees and got closer to the edge of the road, the others started seeing them approach. If they were standing, they stood up, and they all seemed to take steps forward to greet Rick and Jo upon their return. Tyreese continued to carry Jo the entire way until they got to the car Sophia and Piper had been sitting on earlier and let Jo slide down his back to sit there on top of the trunk instead.  
  
“Oh my God, are you alright?” Karen asked, noting the mud all over both Rick and Jo.  
  
Jo waved her off and nodded. “I think my ankle has been re-sprained, if that’s a thing, but I’ll live.”  
  
Nicole was there at Jo’s side in seconds with the First Aid kit. “Any cuts or open wounds?”  
  
“Just your average scrape,” she answered. “Seriously, I’m fine. I didn’t break anything, I’m not bit and I didn’t hurt my stomach at all so I’m pretty damn sure my pregnancy will continue as scheduled.”  
  
“What about you, Rick?”  
  
Rick shook his head. “I’m fine. Just sore arms and hands.”  
  
“Did you find Sam?” Tara asked.  
  
“We did. But, uh, he didn’t make it. Walkers began stepping out from the trees, so we tossed them over into a ravine, but we all slipped and fell over the edge as well. Sam was at the bottom, grabbing on to Jo’s ankles, that’s why her left one feels worse than before. I was only holding out of a root sticking out of the side of the ravine, and it broke. I couldn’t hold all three of us, so Sam let go. Sam made the ultimate sacrifice to give Jo and me a chance to survive.” Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he looked over at his wife and saw she was looking down as she gripped the edge of the trunk. He then added, “We were lucky Daryl and Tyreese got to us in time.”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips and shook his head as he looked at the solemn, mournful faces of the others. “Yeah, _damn_ lucky.”  
  
He was still pissed no one else had followed up on the sounds of those gunshots.  
  
As Nicole worked to pull off Jo’s left boot and tightened the Ace bandage around her ankle, Rick sauntered over toward the girls and placed hands on either of their shoulders, and finding comfort in how visibly relieved they looked knowing he and Jo were okay. Once her boot was back on, Jo slid down off the trunk with Nicole and Tyreese’s assistance and began to hop on her right foot over toward the front steps, but Tara stopped her.  
  
“Don’t,” the younger female muttered, holding her hands up. “You need to sit and rest your ankle.”  
  
“I was just going to get my crutches,” Jo replied. “And I’ve done enough hanging around for one day. Sprained ankle or not, I need to be in motion right now.”  
  
“Alright.” Tara took a few steps over toward the porch and grabbed both crutches; returning them to Jo. “Just take it easy, though.”  
  
Propping the crutches under her arms, Jo curled her hands around the hand bars and began to hobble toward the road.  
  
“Jo,” Rick called out, as he moved to step behind her. Placing a hand upon her elbow, he got her to turn and face him as she stopped. “Where are you going?”  
  
“I just need to take a walk.”  
  
Shaking his head, Rick scoffed at that. “Yeah, so did Sam.”  
  
“Then come chaperone me.”  
  
Pulling his bottom lip inward, he studied her face and how sad and angry she looked, and he couldn’t really tell if the anger was due to him or not. Casting a glance over at Daryl, he gave the archer a nod that seem to convey the fact that he and Jo clearly needed a moment to sort through what happened. Without missing a beat, he stepped in time beside Jo as she began to hobble with her crutches down away from the farmhouse’s front yard and onto the charcoal grey pavement. He looked back once over his shoulder to ensure everyone else at the farmhouse seemed okay before looking forward, listening to the way the rubber stoppers on the bottoms of the crutches made scuffing sounds each time they touched down to the ground in between the steps Jo took.  
  
“If you’re angry at me for shooting Sam, I wish you’d just come out and say it,” Rick spoke up after a moment. “I didn’t _want_ to shoot him. I really didn’t. I want you to know that.” When Jo didn’t respond, Rick sighed, quickened his pace and cut her off so she would stop walking. “Will you say something to me?”  
  
“I’m not angry with you,” Jo bit out, staring at the ground. “I’m just angry.”  
  
“Sure as hell feels like you’re angry with me.”  
  
“I’m not, but if you keep on like that, then I _will_ be.”  
  
Rick smirked, nodding his head as he looked over toward the orchard. “Alright, fine, you aren’t angry at me, but you ain’t exactly _happy_ with me. You think I could’ve pulled some better idea to save all three of us out of my ass somehow. Well, my good idea led to Sam falling back down and choosing to die. I might have thought about shooting him before, to save us, but he _asked_ me to do it. He _wanted_ me to do it. He knew it would give us a chance. I knew it, and you knew it, too.”  
  
“It doesn’t mean I like that it happened.”  
  
“And I _do_?”  
  
“No, I didn’t say that.”  
  
“Well, it feels like it.”  
  
“Well, then, I’m sorry you feel that way. I’m not trying to make you feel like the bad guy here,” Jo remarked. “It’s just that Sam was part of our group. We’ve never had to personally sacrifice anyone from our group before to save our own asses. That’s not who we are. That’s never been who we are.”  
  
“I know,” Rick agreed.  
  
“We’ve seen our own die countless time, no matter how long they’d been with us, but it was always at the hands of outsiders; alive or undead. Or, in Carol’s case, she took her own life to save Sophia, but that wasn’t done by our hand either. Even my mother sacrificed herself for us. But not at our own hand. This is the first time we’ve been in this position and I hate how it feels.”  
  
“I do, too.”  
  
“And we’ve taken lives, and it should feel scary that those deaths don’t bother us. They don’t, though, and I’m fairly certain we’ll become more desensitized to those deaths as we go along. But one of our own.”  
  
“Well, actually, we _have_ taken lives of our own, though.”  
  
Jo sensed who, specifically, he meant, and nodded. “Maybe so, but those lives were over anyway. They were bit or fatally injured. There was no way to save them and killing them was out of mercy.”  
  
Rick shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Well, if you think about it, Sam was in the same boat,” he commented. “We couldn’t pull him up. He was gonna die no matter what, but by shooting him, he didn’t have to die in agony, watching as walkers ripped him apart and ate him alive. And he wasn’t happy. He loved Ana and he said it himself that this life wasn’t worth it without her. So, yes, I shot one of our own, who literally asked for it, and yes, I would’ve done it on my own even if he hadn’t asked, because when it comes to push and shove: I choose you. If I have to make a choice between saving one person and you’re one of the options: I choose you, _every_ time.”  
  
“What if it’s between me and one of the kids; between me and Sophia, me or Mika, or even me and Hope, if we find her?”  
  
“Well, obviously, I’d choose the kids, as heartbreaking as it’d be. And what time I have left on this planet would be a very lonely existence without you.” Rick stepped forward and raised his hands up to place them on either side of Jo’s face. “We don’t get to choose our kids, and we will always put them first before ourselves, I know that and I won’t ever regret that. But I also didn’t choose to love you. There was just no other way around it. You were there, and it was unavoidable.”  
  
“Are you ever sorry you found me?” Jo asked, watching as his face frowned as such a question. “Say I died in Woodbury and never escaped. Sophia would’ve probably been fine there, too. The Governor would’ve never made his way to the prison, he would’ve never attacked. Hershel, Zach, Oscar, Axel, T-Dog, Lori…they wouldn’t have died because of him. The prison would still be standing; you wouldn’t be on the road like this wandering aimlessly for a child fathered by such a horrible man.”  
  
“I’ll never be sorry for finding you. Every day I thank a God I doubt exists for putting you into my life,” he replied. “You were my second chance to feel something other than pain and sadness. And Hope is still as much my daughter as she was the day you asked me to be her father. I don’t care that The Governor helped create her. She was never his. She’s always been ours, and we’re gonna find her, no matter how long it takes to do so, and we’re gonna find someplace to call our own again so we can stop feeling sorry for ourselves.”  
  
Jo emitted a content sigh as she leaned toward Rick and pressed her forehead against his. “I hope it happens like that for us.”  
  
“It will,” Rick nodded adamantly, brushing his nose against her nose. “We’re due for something good to happen again.”  
  
“It’s like a damned roller coaster every day for us.”  
  
Rick sighed and leaned back, dropping his hands to her shoulders and playing absentmindedly with her blonde hair which was caked with some mud. “Yeah, I know,” Rick nodded. “Things were fine at the prison, then the sickness spread. The sickness seemed to be tapering off, and then The Governor attacked. You and I worked drunkenly worked out our anger and grief at that house after the attack, which, went really well all things considered.”  
  
Jo looked Rick in the eye and noted the slight twinkle in his baby blues as she recalled that evening. “Yeah,” she snickered. “And then Daryl and Sophia showed up the next morning. Even if they didn’t have Hope with them, it was like the icing on the cake; that we weren’t alone.”  
  
“Then those Claimers entered the picture, and they attacked us and I did what I had to do.”  
  
“And then we got married, but we lost Carol at Terminus,” Jo continued going over the good and bad with him. “We found the sign from Shane, saying he had Hope, and we lucked out finding all those cars and trucks at that dealership, and the supplies at Dick’s.”  
  
“But then we got hit by a car, your shoulder got dislocated. However, you found your brother and got to finally meet your mother. We also enjoyed that bath together.”  
  
Jo chuckled. Of course he was remembering the times they’d had sex as part of the good moments. Well, Jo supposed she couldn’t disagree they had been fantastic moments. Her face fell, though, recalling the moments that transpired after. “Then Raffy happened, and I killed him. The hotel was overrun by walkers the next morning and my mother sacrificed herself blowing the hotel up.”  
  
“And I thought you were dead, and that was one of the worst nights of my life, but then you weren’t, and we got out of Atlanta,” Rick added, placing his hands to her waist and brushing his thumbs across her stomach. “Most importantly: you’re pregnant.”  
  
With a small smile, Jo nodded, leaning her head closer to his again. “And now we lost Sam,” she said with a sigh. “You’re right. Something good needs to happen next for us.”  
  
“I think it will. I don’t know when, but it’s got to. It’s the way of the world, right? You can’t have the good without the bad, and you can’t appreciate the good until you’ve suffered through the bad.”  
  
“I just wish we didn’t have to suffer so much. I feel like the bad keeps outweighing the good.”  
  
Rick responded by dragging his right hand up to the side of her face and casually worked his fingers through her hair as he cradled her head with his hand just before bringing her lips against his. It was a soft, languid kiss he stole from her and her body seemed to less tense due to the gesture.  
  
“I love you, Jo,” Rick whispered into her mouth. “I’m sorry for the shit you’ve been put through. You deserve the world and I wish I could give it to you.”  
  
As a chuckle escaped her lips, Jo leaned back and looked Rick in the eye. “I’m about to say something really corny, but very true, right now.”  
  
Rick narrowed his eyes and smirked, preparing for whatever she had to say. “Try me.”  
  
“You want to give me the world, but you _are_ my world; you…and our girls.”  
  
Slowly, his smirk turned warmer and became a proper smile. “I don’t think that sounds corny,” he insisted. “You’re my world, too.” Leaning back in, Rick maintained his right hand where it was cradling the back of her head while he snaked his left arm around her waist and pulled her flush against his body in order to kiss her more fully.  
  
“Hey! Get a room, why don’tcha!”  
  
Rick and Jo broke apart as slowly as possible; giving zero shits about who saw them making out. They were married, after all. They were within their right to be as affectionate with each other as they wanted.  
  
Just up the road, not a hundred feet away, Finn was leading his group back. When the husband and wife duo turned to look at the approaching foursome, their curiosity was peaked at the sight of Milo and Michonne pushing wheelchairs.  
  
“What’s that?” Jo inquired.  
  
“Your chariot awaits, sis,” Finn laughed.  
  
“You expect me to be carted around in one of those?”  
  
“It’ll be faster to push you in one than have you hobbling around on those crutches.”  
  
Rick looked at Jo and shrugged. “It’s not a bad idea,” he agreed.  
  
“Et tu, Brutus?” she quipped.  
  
“Who’s the second one for? Jen?” Rick asked.  
  
“Yeah,” Finn nodded. “She might have two working legs, but I know you’re not blind to the fact that she’s not doing well, and if you try to fight me on catering to my girlfriend, I’ll make my sister a widow for a second time.”  
  
Rick threw his hands up in the air. “Hey, you’ll hear no complaints from me,” he insisted. “I think the wheelchairs are good ideas.”  
  
“We found vehicles, but there was no gas in them,” Merle spoke up. “They were just abandoned on the road with some dead walkers inside ‘em. Looks like people just gave up and died. Weren’t no bite marks or gunshot wounds. They just…died.”  
  
“Speaking of which,” Rick began. “We had a situation a little while ago. With Sam.”  
  
Jo frowned, and nodded. “He went off into the woods just beyond the orchard over there,” Jo gestured with her head. “We went after him, found him near a ravine. Walkers came out of the proverbial woodwork. All three of us fell over the edge, hanging onto one another.”  
  
“We’d tossed the walkers over the edge. They’d fallen into the stream below, but they were reaching for us as we were hanging there. Sam was closest to the bottom, holding onto Jo’s ankles, which is why she’s on the crutches again. The strain of him holding on aggravated her sprain. He sensed that, and that we were screwed. There was no way all three of us would make it. The ground was too slick and muddy from the storm last night. We couldn’t get any traction and pull ourselves back up.”  
  
“Sam sacrificed himself. He let go,” Jo commented, omitting the part about the mercy shot Rick made. “He gave his life for Rick and me, and it made it a little bit easier for us to hold on.”  
  
“How’d you get back up?” Milo wondered, leaning his weight forward onto the wheelchair he was pushing.  
  
“Daryl and Tyreese found us and pulled us up,” Rick answered.  
  
The foursome accepted the somber news, but weren’t too affected by it. Finn, Michonne and Milo had only met Sam at The Commune, and then there was Merle, who had known Sam about a week longer but just didn’t seem to give much of a shit in typical Merle fashion.  
  
“Well, now he’s with his girlfriend again,” the older Dixon brother remarked. “One less mouth to feed.”  
  
Everyone looked at Merle, frowning at his crass comment, but they couldn’t say they were too surprised by it.  
  
“Well, why don’t you try this out,” Finn said, changing the subject as he pushed his wheelchair forward toward Jo.  
  
As he pulled it up behind her, Jo handed her crutches off to Rick and then pulled her sword, sheathed in its scabbard off her back. Slowly, she sank down into the chair, propped her feet up onto the footrests and then draped the sword and scabbard across the armrests.  
  
“Comfy?” Rick asked.  
  
Jo nodded, shifting around a bit. “Yeah. I think I could get used to this after all.”  
  
The others snickered and smiled as Finn handed off the honor of pushing Jo in the wheelchair off to Rick, who then handed the crutches to Finn to carry as the six of them made their way back to the farmhouse. Upon their approach the others seemed to understand all at once, when they saw no cars and only two wheelchairs what they would all be doing.  
  
Rick pushed Jo up the slight incline to the farmhouse’s property, along the gravel-filled driveway and then stood upright as he looked upon the faces of everyone staring back at him.  
  
“As you might have noticed, Finn’s group didn’t find any vehicles to bring back,” he began. “They did find these two wheelchairs for Jo and Jen to use. So, the rest of us will be walking from here on out, though, that’s not to say we won’t eventually find vehicles with enough fuel in them to use. Just, for the time being, we’re on foot. Now, we need to figure out what’s a necessity to bring with us, and what we can do without and leave behind. Water, food and ammunition first and foremost. Anything after that depends on how much we can carry on our backs.” Gripping the handles on Jo’s wheelchair a bit tighter, Rick continued. “Let’s get this all taken care of as soon as possible. I want us the make the most of the day before we need to find shelter again.”  
  
Without having to tell anyone to get to it, the group dispersed and began to pull their supplies out of the trunks of the three cars and sort through what they had sitting on the porch. Rick could tell everyone had already mentally prepared themselves with the prospect of walking, but that didn’t mean they were too happy about it. Hell, Rick wasn’t particularly excited about it either. Walking would be tiring and they’d need to drink water more frequently, which meant they’d probably run out quicker. Not to mention it would take longer to travel, which set them back; not that there was a time frame on when they had to get to DC. He just hated being separated from Hope and Shane any longer than he had to and he knew Jo felt the same.  
  
Stepping around the front of Jo’s wheelchair, he crouched down between her legs and placed his hands atop her knees. Staring up at her, Rick offered a warm smile and moved his hands along the sides of her thighs before coming to rest at her waist.  
  
“I’m still sorry about earlier. I know it wasn’t ideal,” he apologized. “And I’m sorry you’re in pain like this again. I know your ankle was just starting to feel a little better.”  
  
Jo looked back at him, covering his hands with hers as she shrugged. “Shit happens, right?”  
  
Sniffing in slightly amusement, Rick nodded. “Yeah. Shit happens.”


	42. Respite

_“Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for.”_ — Maya Angelou

* * *

  
As the sun blazed high in the midday sky, the heat index rose, which made walking more of a drag. Literally. Each member of Team Family had been walking along back roads for five whole days. It was an arduous process, what with having to stop before nightfall to find and clear out a place to stay for the night and take breaks here and there to rest, but they had eventually made it out of North Carolina and entered into Virginia, of which they were traveling east along the southern end of the state.  
  
Jo was doing much better again with her ankle. She no longer needed the wheelchair, which Rick had pushed her in for only two days before she opted for the crutches again. She was down to only one crutch now, what with being able to put much more weight on her left ankle. Jen, on the other hand, frequented her wheelchair more often than not. Whereas everyone else was practically golden from being out in the sun all day, every day, Jen looked pallid. Her face was gaunt, dark circles plagued her eyes and she got more tired than anyone more quickly; even Jo and Karen who were dealing with pregnancies. However, Jen was able to keep going; probably out of sheer force of will and not wanting to a hassle for the others, or to put worry into Finn’s heart.  
  
On a few occasions, usually at night, when they were snuggled together in some corner of a room in some house or business where the group had hunkered down, Rick and Jo would look over at Jen and share a similar expression on their faces. They were both more or less thinking the same thing. They didn’t know if Nicole already knew, being that she had been an ER nurse in the old world, or that she was overlooking what was happening, but Rick and Jo had surmised Jen had some sort of infection. She had her bandages cleaned once a day by Nicole, and was taking some Tylenol for the pain, but their supply was running out, which was part of the reason they stayed in abandoned homes and not just anywhere.  
  
They needed to replenish their supplies frequently. What with fifteen of them traveling together, it was that much harder to evenly spread out the food and water between them all, especially with Jo and Karen eating for two. The priorities were the children, Jo and Karen because of their pregnancies, and Jen because of her wound.  
  
Rick and Jo had seen that wound when it was getting cleaned and redressed. It didn’t look pretty at all and once or twice, the sight of it churned Jo’s stomach and made her hobble as fast as possible for someplace to throw up. Karen’s morning sickness seemed to be tapering off a bit, but not Jo’s. Hers was just as consistent as it had been a week ago.  
  
What was worse was throwing up when she barely had anything in her stomach to begin with. In those moments it was just acidy, stomach bile that burned her throat as it came up, bringing tears to her eyes. The hunching forward and heavy made her chest ache and was thankful one someone shared their bottle of water with her. It didn’t matter how warm the water was, it was soothing regardless.  
  
Traveling along Route 1, they had come upon town called South Hill. Walking together, spread out across the road, slowly like their very own walker herd; just ambling along from one place to the next.  
  
“Can I make a suggestion?” Nicole asked; her voice cutting into the silence that had fallen over most of them since early in the morning when they’d begun walking again.  
  
Rick looked over his shoulder at the redheaded nurse pushing Nicole in the wheelchair. He had to frown, knowing Jen had spent most of the day in the chair and it was barely past noon. “What would that be?”  
  
“That we find some place to rest longer than just a night. We’ve been going nonstop since the Commune. Maybe we can find something else soon; a big house with enough beds for all of us. Maybe we can spend two nights to just…rest. What’s one extra day _not_ on the road?”  
  
Rick held her gaze and then turned to look first at Daryl, his right hand man, who was literally also standing on his right. Both men shared a look of agreement, but before Rick made any decision, he needed to gauge his wife for what she thought they should do. Though he was the de facto leader of the group, even a king had to consult his queen once in a while. Turning to his left, Rick locked eyes with Jo and raised an eyebrow at her as a silent conversation passed between them. She tilted her head slightly to the right and then nodded; the latter gesture Rick reciprocated. Turning back toward Nicole, Rick also looked upon the other faces staring back at him.  
  
“Yeah, okay. We’ll keep an eye out for something,” he replied. Adjusting the backpack on his shoulders, Rick slipped his left hand into Jo’s right, seeing as it was the hand closest to him and wasn’t the one maintaining the single crutch she was using.  
  
Since their conversation after Sam died, they easily fell back into the usual calmness that seemed to flow between them. It was very rare to be angry with each other or upset enough about something that it ruffled the other’s feathers. When it came down to it, no matter how much bad had happened, the good was what mattered and what kept them going and, if they were the only two left in the end, they could find happiness in that as well. There was just too much love there between them going to do anything but keep them going. While they had both been married before to those they considered their first loves, they didn’t have to verbally acknowledge that they were each other’s true loves, as cheesy as it might sound.  
  
Continuing along Route 1, the group occasionally passed vehicles, just as they had plenty of times in the last five days. But, just like the rest, each car, truck or van had been abandoned due to lack of fuel, which was more common of a find the closer they got to abandoned subdivisions or towns like the one they were approaching. Sometimes they found cars with enough fuel, but it always seemed to be when there were not enough for everyone to travel in. And, since leaving that farmhouse in North Carolina, they’d stuck with the motto of “all or none.” Either they all traveled easily together in vehicles or no one would.  
  
The nearer they got to the town limits, the more frequently they found walkers milling aimlessly about. Team Family was walking at such a slow pace, though, that the walkers barely registered anything out of the normal. That’s not to say the group didn’t start to get followed, but it didn’t seem as if it was because the walkers knew they were alive. Like most walkers, they followed moment. And that’s how herds came to be, like dominoes in a way. The group didn’t let their guard down for a moment, of course; walking at the same, slow pace and not talking. If any walkers got to close for comfort, someone in the group would take a turn to take down whichever walker was nearest to them with their melee weapons. With low ammunition, their melee weapons were ideal.  
  
The overall town was ghostly, as most every place they’d gone through. Broken windows to business were commonplace, the occasional corpse lying on the sidewalk in such a state that it was hard to determine if it had died and turned, or been killed and now it was so rotted, and there were other signs of vandalism from those looting at the beginning of the outbreak and from those that had looted in the months that followed when passing through, same as Team Family. Some graffiti along several business and cars began to become more noticeable the further toward town they went. It wasn’t the typical graffiti one would normally see either. It was like a calling card left behind by a criminal to toy with the police. Different variations of the same message were scattered all around South Hill.  
  
“What does ‘wolves not far’ mean?” Mika asked, walking closely to Tara. “Are their wolves in Virginia?”  
  
“I don’t think it has anything to do with actual wolves,” Piper commented, sharing a curious look with Sophia.  
  
“It was probably just some sort of gang thing, or stupid teenage boys having some fun,” Tara insisted, reaching out and giving Mika’s hand an assuring squeeze.  
  
“It’s kinda ominous,” Jen remarked, which was a rarity in itself. The other blonde rarely spoke anymore, but that was mostly due to her just being tired and the entire group keeping quiet for the sake of not drawing attention from walkers. “Like a warning or something.”  
  
“Do you think it’s some sort of gang graffiti from before or _after_?” Sophia wondered aloud, letting her hand hover over the gun Jo had given to her before the hotel blew up and that she still had yet to fire. Even though she frequently used a crowbar as her main weapon in the last few days, she felt safer knowing the gun was there to use in a last resort type of situation.  
  
“Looks new,” Merle answered bluntly.  
  
A wave of tenseness fell over the group, which Rick latched onto quickly. Looking back at everyone, and then lastly Daryl and Jo, he narrowed his gaze ahead of them. “Just everyone keep your wits about ya and your eyes open. Don’t let your guard down.”  
  
Mika let out a small whimper as she stepped forward away from Tara only to grab onto Sophia’s hand. The two adopted sisters looked at each other and the older of the two smiled a reassuring smile as they all continued forward.  
  
As soon as they passed through the heart of town, the wolf messages seemed to be less frequent, and they began to come upon plenty of homes, but they were small or too close together for Rick’s liking; shooting down anyone’s suggestions to stay in one of those homes. He wanted something away; something with good sight lines, somewhere where Daryl and Merle could go off hunting and with the less chance of walkers being around. When the group passed a simple, one story motel, Rick was reluctant to give the go ahead to search and clear it. Unfortunately for the others, it just wouldn’t be suitable. There were walkers trapped in a few of the rooms, one or two rooms looked to be the scenes of murder-suicides for people who took the easy way out early on during the outbreak, and it was just overall disgusting. The final straw was both Karen and Jo rushing away to throw up from the smells assaulting their nasal cavities.  
  
Even when they began to pass homes that were becoming larger in size and more spread out, Rick wasn’t content. In reality, he just wasn’t ready to stop walking. He wanted to cover as much ground as possible in order to get to DC as soon as they could. As the neighborhood they approached began to thin out more, Rick stopped and so did the others. It had taken two hours to get to where they were from where they’d been outside South Hill when Nicole had first broached the subject of finding shelter sooner than usual, and Rick finally saw something that he felt comfortable with. To their left was a dead end residential road with only four houses on it; three on one side, one on the other.  
  
This neighborhood looked to be one that had been in the process of being built up when the world went to shit. And, as a matter of fact, in the distance, Rick could see a house with the foundation laid and the framework up, and that was it. The place that felt ideal to him for them to all hole up in for a day or two was the large, yellow house at the end of the road that had some woods on the other side of it. It had a raised foundation and it was a two-story, so there would definitely be good sight lines in all directions.  
  
“There,” Rick spoke, pointing at the house.  
  
Pretty much content with anywhere by this point, the group accepted Rick’s choice and followed behind him, Jo and Daryl down the road. With their weapons raised and prepared to use at a moment’s notice, they all began to approach the house, hanging back only when Rick and Daryl ascended the front steps with Milo and Michonne in tow for the initial sweep to make sure it was safe.  
  
Rick balled up a fist and banged on the front door as Daryl took a few steps backward and banged on the glass of the front picture window, and then they waited to see if any lurkers came out of the shadows toward the sound. When nothing happened after a minute or two, they banged again, just to play it safe. But, again: nothing. Trying the door knob, Rick gave it a turn and was pleased to find it unlocked as he slowly pushed the door open and then immediately raised his Colt which he had slid out of its holster. He stepped inside the house first, turning quickly to the right and scanning it for movement of the threatening variety. A second later, Daryl slipped inside with his crossbow raised, taking the left. The further inside they moved, in slipped Michonne and Milo; flanking the former two. The latter two remained downstairs; checking every nook and cranny while Rick and Daryl continued on to the upper room, taking them one at a time.  
  
There were four bedrooms in total; the master had a queen-sized bed and the other three each had full-sized beds. The living room downstairs had a tacky, red leather couch and a tan-colored, over-sized chair with a matching ottoman that could both be used by people to sleep on. There was also a bonus room over the garage that was set up as a sort of media room that had a couch that doubled as a pull-out bed. If need be, blankets and extra pillows could be tossed into the bathtubs to provide extra sleeping spaces.  
  
Rick looked around the one bedroom he was in, taking in the décor and how it had been set up for a young boy, possibly a preteen and he could only think about Carl in that moment. He lowered his gun to his side and stepped further into the room, picking up random items and looking them over; youth league baseball trophies, superhero action figures, framed photographs, books. His eyes settled to the bed and Rick tried remembering what it had been like to tuck his son into bed at night when he wasn’t working a late shift and was home in the evening, back before he’d been shot and the world fell apart. He remembered ruffling his son’s brown hair, telling him the same story about the same two-bit criminal he’d arrested once upon a time that Carl had always enjoyed hearing. He remembered what it was like to kiss his son goodnight on the forehead, knowing he’d see him in the morning when he woke up, and just before he went off to school.  
  
Rick longed for those days. He wished that his last memory of his son wasn’t of him lying in a bed like the one Rick was looking at now, having died and come back; looking at the glazed over eyes that had once been blue like his, a mouth chomping at air and hands outstretched. Rick tried shaking the memory from his face; hating when the sight of Carl’s blood splashed the pillow under his head when Rick shot him. It was about eighteen months ago, but some days it felt like yesterday.  
  
Closing his eyes, Rick gripped the footboard to the bed, trying to clear his mind and focus on the present and the future.  
  
“I’m gonna give the others the okay to come inside,” Daryl commented, cutting into Rick’s thoughts as he stepped inside the bedroom.  
  
Rick nodded, snapping out of his daydream, and looked back at his friend. “Jo and I will stay in here. Everyone else can figure out where they want to sleep.”  
  
Daryl gave the room a quick once-over and seemed to sense why Rick had chosen the boy’s room in particular, but chose the respectful option of not verbalizing it. “Alright,” was all he said.  
  
The others were soon given the go ahead to come inside the house and make themselves at home. Rick came sauntering down the stairs with that bowlegged gait of his as he eyed the group and joined them; reaching out his hand and letting his fingers graze Jo’s, happy to see she had made it up the front steps just fine with the crutch under her left arm.  
  
As everyone began to drop their bags and weapons here and there, Rick watched with a slight smirk at how they began to wander around and check things out for themselves or just took a seat to take a load off. “There’s four bedrooms upstairs,” Rick began. “Each of ‘em has big enough beds to fit two adults. The boy’s room I’ll take with Jo. Tyreese, you’re a big guy; I figure you and Karen can take the master. It has a queen-sized bed. Finn and Jen can take one of the two girls’ rooms, and I was thinking the girls — Sophia, Mika and Piper — could share the other room. Beyond that, there’s a bonus room upstairs with a couch that pulls out into a bed. Down here, in the living room, there’s the couch and that chair and ottoman combination. I’m sure there are extra pillows and blankets in closets somewhere to make up an area of floor for those who don’t luck out with beds.”  
  
“We’re gonna be here at least two nights,” Jo spoke, “We can all take turns if need be, so everyone gets a chance in a comfy bed.”  
  
“There’s other houses,” Milo remarked, sitting down on the armrest of the red leather couch. “Some of us can go next door. I mean, these houses are more spread out, but it’s not like they’re a mile away from each other. If we need anything, we can throw open a window and shout.”  
  
Finn agreed with his friend to an extent, but looking over at Rick, and seeing how the idea didn’t quite sit well with his brother-in-law, he had to interject, “If that graffiti really _is_ fresh, there might be an unsavory group of people still around and not too far away. For the sake of the collective, we’re better off in one house, together.”  
  
Rick caught the younger man’s eye and gave him a nod of thanks. “Finn’s right. We stay together. When we do go off away from the house, which we _will_ do to find supplies, no one goes alone. You go as a small group or at least take a partner.”  
  
“The house across the road has a pool,” Sophia commented, changing the subject somewhat.  
  
“I don’t think swimming is a luxury right now, unfortunately,” Karen quipped with her arms folded under her bosom.  
  
“No, I don’t mean swimming. I mean, it’s full of water. It might be a bit dirty, but we can skim the debris, if there is any. We can use it to bathe in. None of us have bathed since the hotel,” the teen explained. “We’re kinda funky.”  
  
A few laughs echoed throughout the room; everyone nodding in agreement.  
  
“There’s bound to be shampoos or soaps in here or the other houses,” Michonne continued with Sophia’s train of thought. “We can save the scavenging for tomorrow. Tonight we should clean up, have something to eat and just rest.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah, alright. I think I might’ve seen a bottle or two of shampoo in the bathrooms here. No doubt there ain’t any running water so the pool idea’s a pretty good one, Sophia. Good job on that,” he winked at his adoptive daughter, who smiled with pride in herself. “Couples can go together, then girls and guys separately. Make sure there’s always at least one person on watch. You don’t wanna get caught off guard by a group of walkers or some bad guys with your bare ass hanging out.”  
  
“Might I suggest to the couples not to have sex in the pool,” Milo teased. “Save that shit for the bedroom. The rest of us don’t wanna be bathing in your spunk.”  
  
Without warning, Milo was met with a hand to the back of his head by Jen, of all people.  
  
“Dude, there’s kids here,” she admonished.  
  
Milo rubbed his head and smacked his lips. “Seriously?” he questioned, briefly looking around the room at everyone. “The girls have seen people being ripped apart and eaten and you’re worried about them hearing about the birds and the bees? Sex is a natural, good thing.”  
  
“Maybe we change the subject?” Morgan suggested, shaking his head as he removed his weapons and set them upon the table in the kitchen. “Maybe find something more age appropriate.”  
  
Again, Milo smacked his lips. “I seem to recall being shown a sex education video in school when I was Mika’s age. So, yeah, I’d think it’s safe to say talkin’ about it is age appropriate. Don’t be a prude.”  
  
“As much as we appreciate your candor, Milo, but if anyone’s gonna have the talk with our girls, it’ll be Jo and I,” Rick spoke, gesturing between Jo and him.  
  
“Hey, alright; fair’s fair,” Milo replied, throwing his hands up in defeat.  
  
Turning to look at his wife with a subtle roll of his eyes, Rick placed his hand on Jo’s shoulder, brushing some blonde strands of hair off of it and then looking back toward the group. “How about we all get set up for the night with sleeping arrangements and then we’ll work out what we’re doing for a meal tonight.”  
  
“Little brother and I can head into those woods just there,” Merle remarked, gesturing toward the trees lining the dead end of the street, just outside the window. “We’ll rustle up some grub.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Whatever you can get.”  
  
“Tara, Nicole and I can take the girls to that pool across the road to get cleaned up,” Michonne offered. “When we get back, whoever wants to go next can head over.”  
  
“Check the dressers and closets for clean clothes,” Jo suggested. “What’s the point in bathing if you’re just gonna put dirty clothes back on, right?”  
  
Michonne nodded and gestured to the two teens and Mika. “Go on upstairs. See if you girls can find something that fits; nothing too loose that could get caught on anything down the line.”  
  
Sophia led the way up the stairs, with Piper and Mika tailing behind. Michonne, Tara and Nicole followed after, heading to the master bedroom, since that was the most likely place to find clothes suited to an adult woman. Morgan remained in the kitchen, where he was soon joined by Karen, in pursuit of finding some canned goods while Tyreese promptly sank down onto the red, leather couch and let out a deep sigh.  
  
“Damn, this is a nice couch,” he practically cooed.  
  
Milo got up off the armrest and strutted over toward a door off the kitchen. “Looks like a basement entrance. Anyone check down here yet?”  
  
“No,” Rick admitted.  
  
“I’ll give it a look then.”  
  
“Take someone with you.”  
  
Milo cast a look at the grizzly group leader. “Yes, mother,” he joked, glancing over his shoulder at Finn. “Yo, Jen; can I borrow our boy for about fifteen minutes to go on an adventure into the dark abyss?”  
  
“Is that what you boys are calling it these days?” the younger blonde teased with a wry smile.  
  
Milo chuckled heartily, grabbing up his hunting knife and pulling a flashlight out of his backpack and clicking it on as he opened the basement door. “Dear me, she’s onto us, Finny.”  
  
Finn simply rolled his eyes and gave his friend a shove. “Shut up.”  
  
As the two young men descended down the stairs with only a single flashlight to light their way and big ol’ knives for protection, Daryl gathered his crossbow back up and followed his brother outside after giving Rick a nod of the head, and Jo wandered over to Jen, who she could more or less consider her sister-in-law. Her fellow blonde was seated in the tan chair so Jo sank down onto the ottoman, with the help of her crutch, looking up at Jen with a small smile.  
  
“How you holding up?” Jo asked.  
  
Jen shrugged. “I’m okay, all things considered.”  
  
“How bad’s the pain?”  
  
“More tolerable than it was a week ago. I think the nerve endings have finally died off toward the end,” Jen answered, nodding toward her stump. “The Tylenol that Nicole’s been giving me has helped a little, but it ain’t exactly Oxy.”  
  
“I don’t know that I’ve said it to you yet, but I’m sorry I had to cut your hand off. I just wanted to give you a chance, and I could tell how much my brother loves you. I didn’t want to have to lose both our mother and you in one day.”  
  
Jen shrugged again, and smiled a little. “He was brokenhearted that day, anyway, ‘cause he thought you’d died instead. And he wasn’t the only one.”  
  
Jo noticed Jen’s gaze moving and followed it to find she was looking at Rick, who was crouched down, checking the chamber of his Colt Python and adding two bullets to it that he’d had tucked away in a back pocket. Momentarily biting her bottom lip, Jo felt warmth reach her face as she nodded.  
  
“I couldn’t leave him behind,” she replied in a slightly hushed voice. “I couldn’t leave any of them behind. Not without a fight.”  
  
“I feel like that’s all we do, all day, every day; fighting just to stay alive. Not even physically, either. Mentally.” Jen sighed and leaned back into the tan chair. “I’m tired. I’m glad we’re getting this chance to rest.”  
  
Jo frowned and nodded again. “I know it’s rough. Every day we get closer to DC, to finding my daughter. Even if we don’t find her right away once we get there, we can set up somewhere secure, or make it secure. A few of us can go out on scouting missions to find any signs of Hope and our friend Shane. The sign we found said they were going this way, and I have no way of knowing if they even reached DC yet, but I gotta believe they have. Or, at least, they’re still on the road like us. Maybe we’ll cross paths on the way. I just can’t stop looking, and _I_ can’t rest until I find my girl.”  
  
“I understand that. I know what it’s like longing to find someone you’d been separated from in this world, and I’ll keep going with all of y’all as long as my legs don’t give out from underneath me,” Jen remarked.  
  
Tilting her head, Jo narrowed her gaze. “Who did _you_ lose?”  
  
“My sister, Katie. She was going to school up in Boston, studying marine biology. I like to pretend sometimes that she managed to get on some sort of boat and made it to an island with a bunch of people, and that she’s surviving there, living a rotter-free existence. Maybe, at this very minute, she’s sitting on a beach, drinking from a coconut with her feet buried in the sand, thinking of me and wondering if I’m alive,” Jen informed with sadness in her voice. “I wouldn’t care if I never saw her again, if I could just know she was alive and well somewhere.”  
  
“What about your parents?”  
  
“They separated when we were young. Dad moved away and started a new family. Forgot about us. Our mom raised me and Katie alone, but she died a month into the outbreak. Rotters got her when we were trying to get to a car.”  
  
“Did you see it happen?”  
  
Jen nodded. “I wanted to look away, but it was like a car wreck, y’know? You just can’t take your eyes away, no matter how much you wanna.”  
  
“I’m sorry to hear,” Jo tried expressing her condolences. Everyone had their tales of woe. Everyone had lost someone. No one was exempt anymore. “This life is pretty shitty most of the time. We just gotta hold on to the ones we love that we still have with us and just pray, I guess, that the day we lose them is a long time from now, or that they can outlive us.”  
  
“I would be just as sad dying before Finn as I would be if I died after him. I wouldn’t want to be the cause of his heart breaking,” Jen confessed. “Wouldn’t it be lovely to die at the same moment? Ideally, yes, years from now. Maybe after having a few kids and watching them grow up in a safe environment; a community with other people, other kids. I mean, we all turn when we die, no matter what. But how lovely would it be to go out together, guns-a-blazing, side by side.”  
  
Jo studied the way Jen was looking down at her stump now and chewing the inside of her bottom lip. She wanted to say something comforting because it looked like the younger blonde had a lot on her mind, but the sound of footsteps racing down the stairs distracted her.  
  
Turning away, Jo looked toward the hallway that led out of the living room as Mika appeared first, holding some clothes in one arm and a small, unopened cardboard box containing a bar of soap inside. Sophia and Tara appeared next, followed by Piper, Michonne and Nicole, respectively; all five of them with some clothes in their arms while Nicole held onto a bottle of Herbal Essences.  
  
“You girls all set?” Jo asked her adoptive daughters. As they nodded, she gestured them forward to her, she set her crutch aside and then gently latched onto their wrists. “Be careful out there. Be alert at all times. Mind Tara, Michonne and Nicole. Don’t take too long cleaning up, either. We have a lot more of us that need to get a chance to clean up, too.”  
  
Sophia and Mika nodded obediently and, as they stepped away, throwing a smile toward Rick, Michonne took lead in ensuring the girls would okay and in ushering them outside with Tara and Nicole in tow. Rick couldn’t help but smirk as he sauntered over toward Jo, looking after the six females exiting the house through the front door. Returning his Colt into its holster, he casually rested his hand down upon Jo’s shoulder and turned his attention back to her.  
  
“They’ll be okay,” he affirmed. “Michonne seems the most highly capable of keeping them all safe and sound. She rivals you with her sword.”  
  
Jo snickered. “Let’s be honest here: she’s better at it.”  
  
“She’s just had consistent practice,” Rick maintained.  
  
“Which makes her better at it,” Jo repeated.  
  
“Well, maybe. But you’re better at plenty of other things.”  
  
The most hilarious sounding snort escaped Jen’s lips and she was quick to raise in remaining hand to her mouth as her eyes went wide, and she tried her best to rein herself back in. “Sorry, sorry,” she muttered, as Rick, Jo and even Tyreese looked her way with curious raises of their eyebrows. “There’s no way that wasn’t such a loaded sexual innuendo. _Real_ subtle there, Rick.”  
  
Mirroring Milo, Rick smacked his lips. He shook his head and tried to appear unamused. “Clearly you’re doing better than I previously thought if you can manage to turn a perfectly innocent compliment into something so dirty.”  
  
“You said it, not me.”  
  
“Eureka!” Milo’s voice could be heard bellowing from down below, dragging everyone’s attention to the basement door.  
  
Waiting a few moments, the sounds of footsteps on the stairs became louder the closer they got. When the bearded blonde man reappeared, he was holding his flashlight in one hand and somehow managing to maintain a grip on the necks of two bottles of wine in the other hand.  
  
“There’s a wine cellar down there,” he announced with glee. “Fully stocked.”  
  
Finn stepped out from around the basement door several seconds later, juggling a few bottles in his arms. “You dick, you left me to walk up those stairs without any light.”  
  
Looking down at his flashlight, Milo grimaced guiltily and then shrugged it off. “My bad, brother.” Stepping over toward the kitchen, he set the two bottles down on breakfast bar and then turned happily back toward everyone else. “This is a great find. Why is no one else as excited?”  
  
“It’s only wine,” Rick shrugged. “It’s not the first time we’ve come across.”  
  
“Yeah, but this is different. We got a night to relax and unwind. We can drink this with dinner instead of wasting our water supply. If we sleep in tomorrow ‘cause we’re hungover, then I say why the hell not. We fuckin’ deserve it, if you ask me.”  
  
“He’s not wrong,” Tyreese piped up. “But we shouldn’t drink ourselves into a stupor. We still need to keep ourselves alert. If we have to get out of this house real quick for any reason, we don’t want to be doing so drunk.”  
  
“I doubt that’ll happen,” Milo contended.  
  
Rick cocked his head to the side, considering the likelihood of Tyreese’s comment. “Never say never.”  
  
Milo waved his hand at the other two men. “Pfft, whatever, Debbie Downers. I’m going back downstairs to get some more bottles.”  
  
“Uh, was there anything else downstairs of use to us? You know, like, maybe _food_?” Karen questioned, leaning against the breakfast bar, while nonchalantly turning one of the bottles to inspect the label.  
  
Milo stopped in his tracks, just as he was about to disappear back down the stairs. “What—oh. No, no food. Tons of boxes of Christmas decorations and a beatdown, old wooden armoire full of winter jackets. Shit like that.”  
  
Without another word, Milo retreated back down to the basement, not waiting to see if Finn joined him or not. As the group upstairs looked around at each other, they couldn’t help but nonverbally admit they were all intrigued at the idea of enjoying some wine, with the exception of Jo and Karen, though, who couldn’t drink because of their pregnancies.  
  
“Well, this should be an interesting night,” Morgan remarked, shaking his head and smirking as walked into the living room and took a seat across the couch from Tyreese.  
  
“I’ll second that,” Rick replied.

 

* * *

  
After only a half hour or so, Tara and Nicole returned with the girls, but Michonne hadn’t, which got those inside the house feeling a little worried at first. Tara explained Michonne had gone inside the house with the pool to bring out towels for everyone else to dry off with and, not five minutes later, the katana-wielding woman walked back inside the yellow house, looking and feeling fresh and clean, and with a slight skip in her step because of it. There really wasn’t anything like it. Finn went with Jen next, the two of them coming back in under twenty minutes. Tyreese and Karen offered to let Rick and Jo go before them, but the latter insisted otherwise, wanting to square things away in the house. In about the same amount of time, the other expecting couple returned, with Tyreese shirtless because the shirt he had found upstairs in the master bedroom didn’t fit. Because of it, he planned on heading to one of the other homes on the road to find a shirt that would. Finn offered to go with him, as they had all agreed no one was to go off alone, ever.  
  
Rick and Jo were finally next; which meant the single guys were last. Since the Dixon brothers hadn’t returned yet from their hunt in the woods for dinner, Morgan and Milo would most likely head to the pool together; one keeping watch while the other bathed, and then switch up as planned. The Dixons could go together whenever they returned, if they so choose.  
  
Armed with their weapons, clean clothes in hand, the bar of soap and bottle of Herbal Essences shampoo that everyone was sharing, Rick and Jo exited the yellow house and walked diagonally across the street to the red brick, Georgian-style home that sat alone on its side of the street. The backyard was fenced in, but it was still open to the rest of the neighborhood since there were no other homes in the immediate area to obscure the view. It was both easy to keep an eye out, as well as easy to be seen.  
  
Lifting the latch to the gate leading to the back patio area, Rick let Jo head in before him. She had left her crutch behind, determined not to rely on it, and she was doing better without it already as it were. Plus, it wasn’t really a far distance to go without it anyway. They both spied the clean towels on an Adirondack chair, which Rick pulled closer to the pool ladder for easier access when they got out. Then, looking at each other, they both smirked as they began the process of disrobing.  
  
“I know we all seemed to agree to neither of us couples having sex in the water, but how do we know Tyreese and Karen, or Jen and my brother haven’t disregarded that agreement?” Jo questioned with a grin as she shimmied out of her jeans without falling over.  
  
Rick grinned back at her, balling up and tossing the soiled shirt he’d been wearing for a week to the ground. “Do you really wanna know?”  
  
Jo grimaced. “No.” Then, “I mean, if they did, I don’t care. Get it when and where you can, right?”  
  
“We haven’t done it since the night we got to the hotel. Same situation, too,” Rick muttered, removing his boots. “We were taking a bath.”  
  
“Wasn’t exactly the most comfortable experiences, what with that cold bath water and cramped, dark space, but we made do.”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow at her, watching as her shirt went flying to the ground and she began to unhook her bra. “Yeah, we do. And, if you think about it, this would be much better: more space, fresh air, the evening sun beating down on the water to warm it up a little bit.”  
  
“You trying to get yourself laid, Mr. Grimes?”  
  
“I might be, Mrs. Grimes. Lord knows I haven’t gotten tired of you yet.”  
  
A sudden cackle of laughter bubbled out of Jo as she shook her head at him, and how good it felt, too. There wasn’t much call for laughing lately. There were so many things to weigh heavily on their minds: their losses that seemed to mount, the exhaustion of traveling on foot, constantly having to be vigilant with their surroundings in case of walkers and, if there were walkers, there was the need to keep quiet and not lose focus. It was stressful and Nicole was right. Despite the need and desire to reach Hope as soon as possible, and however they could, there was no denying the group needed some respite from the road.  
  
Rick stood back, still in his faded black jeans as he let his blue eyes darken at the sight of Jo’s form as she stood there before him in only her underwear. If he wasn’t mistaken, her breasts already seemed slightly fuller, and there was a somewhat noticeable bump to her stomach that had been hard to tell was there when she was fully clothed.  
  
“What?” Jo questioned, shying to his gaze as if she had something in her teeth.  
  
Smiling at her with complete and utter awe, Rick shrugged. “I didn’t get to see you this early into your pregnancy with Hope. I met you at the tail end; tired, scared, but still beautiful. This time I get to see you all the way through, and I’ll be damned if you ain’t the most beautiful pregnant woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.”  
  
“Pssh, you’re biased.”  
  
“Don’t mean it ain’t true.”  
  
Jo smiled at his response, and then slipped her underwear off, kicking it to the side with her left foot so she could put the brunt of her weight on her right. Slowly and casually, she stepped backward toward the ladder as Rick seemed to make a mad dash in unzipping his jeans and shoving them down off his narrow hips. Naked as the day he came crying, Rick stalked up to Jo like a lion eyeing up a gazelle in the African grasslands. Looking around for any signs of life and finding none, he reached his arms around Jo’s waist and grabbed her ass with his rough, calloused hands. The amused squeal she began to elicit was quickly muffled by his lips upon hers.  
  
Before she could react any further, Rick pulled her closer to the edge of the in-ground pool, held onto her more tightly with their bodies pressed flush against each other, and then fell back into the water with her on top of him. Their bodies caused a considerable splash of water to erupt around them as they went under. The sharp smack of his back against the water’s surface was well worth the momentary sting when they reemerged and Jo was laughing and wiping her soaked hair from her face.  
  
That was all Rick wanted. He just loved seeing her bright smile.  
  
“You jackass,” she chided happily, giving him a decent splash of water to his face.  
  
With his dirty curls slicked back and water dripping from his salt and pepper beard, Rick looked utterly delectable to Jo as he began to swim closer toward her. And she just remained unmoving, too. She waited for him to come up to her and snake his arms back around her, to envelope her. She closed her eyes with bated breath until she felt his damp beard lightly scratch against the side of her face just as he began to kiss his way down from her earlobe to her shoulder blade. Jo leaned into the gesture, raising her arms to reach around his back and dig her nails gently into his skin. Their bodies pressed firmly against each other, which seemed to warm their skin all over from initial contact alone, and things between them could’ve easily escalated right then and there.  
  
Pulling her face back, Jo put a pause on that moment and just looked knowingly at Rick. “We should really just clean up,” she said, feeling somewhat disappointed in herself for not making the most of the opportunity before them. She had just blue-balled herself. “We can make the most of our alone time tonight when we go to bed. We’ll have a bedroom to ourselves then.”  
  
With a relenting sigh and a nod of his head, Rick agreed, releasing his hands and arms from her. “I’m gonna hold you to it,” he mused, reaching for the shampoo bottle near the edge of the pool.  
  
Jo chuckled, dipping a bit lower under the water’s surface when a cool breeze brushed along her wet shoulders and gave her a slight chill. “I keep my promises.”  
  
Rick simply smiled in return as he squirted a generous dollop of shampoo into the palm of his hand and then handed the bottle off to Jo for her to do the same. When she returned the bottle to the pool’s edge, both began to lather up their hair, scrub at it and massage their scalps. To rinse, they merely ducked under the water a few times while running their fingers through their hair to get rid of the soapy residue. Left behind was a film of dirt on the surface where they’d been wading, so they moved over a few feet and passed the bar of soap back and forth to clean the rest of their bodies as best as they could. When they felt as clean as they were gonna get, Rick and Jo swam back over to the pool ladder and climbed out, with Rick letting her go first.  
  
Once they were out of the water and had dried themselves off with the clean bath towels, they wasted no time in redressing in clean clothes. Well, Rick still opted for his same black jeans; feeling like they were something of an old friend he couldn’t part with. Jo looked at him as he stood there wearing only those jeans and shook her head with a smirk.  
  
If they were going to be stationary for at least two days, she was going to get those pants off him for the sake of washing them. She knew there was an extra pair of pants lying around in one of the dresser drawers to that master bedroom. Rick could sacrifice one day wearing drawstring sweatpants or something similar so she could prevent his jeans from growing some sort of fungus.  
  
Rick pulled on a new T-shirt, however and a clean pair of socks before sitting down on a patio chair to pull his boots back on. All the while, Jo had slipped on a clean pair of underwear and a new (to her) pair of jeans that happened to be a size too big, but that she knew she’d grow into soon enough if these were the only pants she’d get to wear for a while. She had a belt to use, which helped keep the jeans from falling off her ass. Next came her bra, which was the same one. The bras belonging to whoever lived in the house they were staying in, were two cup sizes too big for her, so continuing with the same one or none at all were her only options. She was sure Rick wouldn’t mind the latter, but if she had to run for any reason, not wearing a bra could hurt. Next was a clean pair of socks and her boots and, lastly, she pulled on a clean shirt; pulling her damp hair out from underneath the collar.  
  
“Remind me to find a brush in that house to get rid of these snarls, or a pair of scissors.”  
  
Rick looked up at her, looking almost horrified. “Why scissors?”  
  
“My hair’s getting much longer than I’m used to. It’s a pain in the ass sometimes. Maybe I’ll just cut it down to my shoul—”  
  
“Please don’t,” he cut her off, stepping up to her and grabbing a handful of her blonde tresses. “I like your hair as it is.”  
  
“Can I at least give it a trim?” she asked with an amused grin.  
  
Smirking himself, Rick moved his hands to both sides of her head and pulled her face close to his. “I could live with that,” he murmured seconds before pressing his lips to hers. Then, “You smell amazing.”  
  
As they parted, Jo nodded down at the bottle of shampoo. “That would be the,” she bent down and picked the bottle up to read the label, “Moroccan rose and passion fruit.”  
  
“You smell like passion alright,” he quipped.  
  
“Oh for the love of God,” Jo retorted with a roll of her eyes and a smile she couldn’t hide.  
  
Rick laughed a bit and then simply leaned forward again to drop a simple kiss to her shoulder. “Okay, let’s get back. Leave the shampoo for Daryl and Merle to use whenever they get around to it.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Gathering up their dirty clothes, the couple exited the back patio and made their way back to their temporary abode, feeling much better about several things after their first chance at bathing in a week’s time.

 

* * *

  
Several hours later, after enjoying a meal of barbecued venison, thanks to the young doe Daryl had snagged, and a bowl full of blackberries Karen had picked from alongside the edge of the woods with Mika, the entirety of Team Family was lounging around in the living room, enjoying the rare and comfortable downtime.  
  
Rick, lodging himself into one corner of the red leather couch so Jo, Karen and Tyreese could also fit easily enough, sat with Jo curled into his side with her feet tucked up underneath her and an arm draped across his chest and her head resting on his shoulder. He was looking around the room, at Tara setting up a game of Monopoly in the center of the floor for the girls and herself, at Finn sitting in the tan chair and Jen sitting there with him between his legs, and at everyone else either carrying on conversations with each other or resting their eyes amid each other’s company as their stomachs settled from their meal.  
  
With a smile on his face, Rick couldn’t help but agree that Nicole had been right. This was something they needed. As desperate as he and Jo were to reach their daughter, they couldn’t do it on fumes. Running themselves and everyone else ragged was doing no one any favors. One extra day spent for rest here or there was necessary. Plus, they were so much closer to DC now, of that Rick was certain. And, if they could just find enough vehicles or vehicles with enough room and plenty of gas, they could reach DC in a day’s time so long as whatever roads they traveled were clear enough. Nowadays there would always be abandoned cars or sizeable herds of walkers blocking some routes to contend with.  
  
“Oh ho ho…aww yeah,” Milo exclaimed excitedly as he came into the living room with portable CD player in one hand, lifting it up for all to see, while dragging one of the kitchen chairs with the other hand. “This bad boy has batteries in it.” As everyone turned to watch him set the device down on the chair he’d brought in with him, Milo crouched down and pressed the release button to pop open the top of the player. “I know I saw some CDs over here earlier…”  
  
“If those are working batteries, we shouldn’t waste them on music. We can use them for flashlights or walkie-talkies. You know, items of necessity,” Nicole admonished, standing in the doorway to the kitchen with her hands on her hips.  
  
Rifling through one of the cabinets of the entertainment center, Milo shot a look at her over his shoulder as he held up a couple of CDs. “I’m sorry. I don’t know about you, but I’d say Coldplay, 3 Doors Down, and OneRepublic are pretty big necessities,” he quipped.  
  
“One who?” Rick questioned.  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “You don’t know who OneRepublic was?”  
  
“I stopped paying attention to new bands sometime in the mid-90s, I think.”  
  
Letting a hearty chuckle escape her lips, Jo shook her head and gave Rick’s side a squeeze. She wasn’t the only one amused by his self-proclaimed musical Luddite. Everyone seemed to find it a bit hilarious in some way, shape or form.  
  
“What was the last album you remember buying?” Finn inquired, running a hand absentmindedly through Jen’s hair.  
  
“For myself?” Rick questioned, casting a look over toward his brother-in-law; coincidentally playing with Jo’s hair as well.  
  
“No, for the Pope.”  
  
Rick rolled his eyes this time and tried to think back, licking out at his bottom lip in concentration. “Uh…” he stalled, and then grimaced. “I’m not saying.”  
  
“Aww, come on. You gotta,” Michonne insisted from where she sat backwards on a kitchen chair with a grin plastered on her face. “You have us all curious now.”  
  
“You’re all gonna laugh at me.”  
  
“No we won’t,” Tara assured with a bright smile. “Not to your face.”  
  
Glowering playfully at the brunette, Rick shook his head. “Fine. It was Ricky Martin.”  
  
Of all the people to laugh out loud, it ended up being Jo, who promptly covered her mouth with her hand and then craned her head to look up at him. “Sorry.”  
  
“And you call yourself my wife,” he chastised with a smirk and a shake of his head. “I’ll have you know that ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’ was fun to dance to…when I was home alone, of course.”  
  
“You didn’t dance with Lori to that song?”  
  
Rick chuckled. “No, Lori—bless her soul—couldn’t hold a beat to save her life.”  
  
As soon as the words left his mouth, Rick’s face fell; his mind immediately forcing him to think about Lori’s death. Milo, though, sensing the sadness that had quickly fallen over their group’s leader and several others in the room, was quick to remedy the situation.  
  
“Ah, ah, ah…let’s have none of that,” the bearded blonde man chided. “Let’s think happy thoughts and enjoy ourselves tonight. Fuck knows we earned it.”  
  
“You ain’t wrong,” Daryl spoke up from where he was hanging back in the kitchen, picking at some of the leftover blackberries in their bowl.  
  
“Why don’t we crack open these bottles of wine you found,” Merle suggested, stepping into the living room, brandishing a bottle in his lone hand.  
  
Sophia leaned away from the board game between her, Tara, Mika and Piper and crawled over to where Milo was to inspect the CD collection as well while Daryl whipped out his Swiss army knife which had a corkscrew. Letting out an exclamation of joy, Merle set the bottle down and watched as his little brother proceeded in using the corkscrew to open the bottle up.  
  
“Hey, Red, make yourself useful and get some cups for everyone,” Merle remarked.  
  
Nicole placed her hands on her hips and scowled back at him. “I’m the closest thing this group has to a doctor. I’m already pretty damn useful.”  
  
“Yeah, whatever, sweet cheeks. Cups. _Prontisimo_.”  
  
Rolling her eyes and letting out an exasperated huff, Nicole stalked off toward some cupboards in the kitchen.  
  
“Hey, Dad,” Sophia called out.  
  
Rick didn’t react right away; forgetting she was talking to him as he was still getting used to the girls referring to him as such, just as he was sure they were still getting used to saying it. Turning toward the teen, he narrowed his gaze. “Hmm?”  
  
“You’re in luck,” she smirked, holding up a CD in her hand. “ _Greatest Hits from the ‘90s_.”  
  
“Oh good Lord,” he winced.  
  
Milo snatch the jewel case from the girl’s hands and flipped it over to inspect the back. “And it’s a double CD. Double the music, double the fun,” he laughed. “And look…Ricky Martin.”  
  
A few eruptions of laughter wafted around the room, definitely at Rick’s expense, as Milo opened the jewel case and promptly popped the first disc into the CD player.  
  
“Ladies and gentleman…and Merle—”  
  
“Hey,” Merle bit out.  
  
“—I give you…Toad The Wet Sprocket.”  
  
As soon as Milo pressed the ‘play’ button, the sounds of Toad The Wet Sprocket’s song ‘All I Want’ began to fill the room. Feet, hands and fingers began to tap to the beat, legs bobbed in place and even heads.”  
  
“But the air outside so soft is saying everything…everything,” Tara began singing, without realizing the others had brought their attention toward her.  
  
“All I want is to feel this way, to be this close, to feel the same,” Nicole joined, despite her reservations, as she stepped into the room with a few plastic cups in her hands.  
  
Tara turned and looked over at the redhead and smiled as they sang along together. “All I want is to feel this way, the evening speaks, I feel it say...”  
  
Soon enough, Milo had gotten up to his feet and moved to help the Dixon brothers open up the bottles of wine and hand filled cups off toward everyone except Jo, Karen and Mika. When cups were passed to Sophia and Piper, Morgan was the one to speak up against it, but Rick and Jo waved it off.  
  
“It’s alright,” Rick insisted. “I was younger than Sophia the first time I got drunk, and this could be their only opportunity to take part in something like this.”  
  
“It’s a rite of passage,” Jo added.  
  
As the wine was passed around and gradually imbibed by all who could, everyone began to loosen up and finally allow themselves to relax and enjoy the evening. Even Mika was able to snag a sip, but promptly grimaced at the taste, reminding Rick of Carl’s reaction to the wine he’d tasted at the CDC. The further along the evening progressed, the first cups were finished and seconds and thirds were eventually poured. It got to the point that almost everyone was up on their feet and either singing along to the songs, dancing joyfully around the living room and kitchen, making the best of the first good night in a very, very long time, or doing all of the above.  
  
Most amusing of all was watching Rick teetering as he carried a bottle around with him and occasionally used it as a microphone to serenade Jo, who remained seated on the couch staring up at him with the biggest smile on her face.  
  
When “Hush” by Kula Shaker began to play, Rick beckoned to Jo with a curl of his index finger in order to get her to join him.  
  
With a shake of her head, Jo bit down on her bottom lip and held her hand out to him so he could help her up to her feet. Without wasting any time, he encircled his free arm around her waist and pulled her body flush against his.  
  
“You’re getting drunk,” Jo remarked.  
  
“It’s not the first time you’ve seen me this way.”  
  
“Only my second, and the last time was at that house after the prison. And we both got drunk then,” she clarified. “It’s a different experience when I gotta be sober and you don’t.”  
  
“I’m drinking for the both of us tonight. Enjoy it,” Rick joked. “You probably won’t see this version of me for a very long time to come.”  
  
“Don’t say that. We might have moments to celebrate in due time. Like, finding Hope and Shane, the birth of our children.” Jo threw a look over toward Karen and Tyreese, referring to both pregnancies happening at the same time. “We’ll have moments like this again. I’m sure of it.”  
  
“I hope so, but for now…”  
  
Jo nodded. “I know, I know. Enjoy it while we can.”  
  
“Yes,” Rick muttered, bringing the bottle in his other hand to his lips and knocking back the rest of it in a few hearty gulps.  
  
At some point, Daryl had cut himself off and gone outside to the front porch to take watch for the night, because someone had to and he figured the others deserved the time off from their everyday lives more. Plus, he tended to prefer his solitary moments, enjoying the quiet.  
  
As the night wore on, Rick found himself staring Jo down with such lust-filled eyes and he kept forgetting the kids were present every time he reached around and grabbed her ass or ground into her as they danced together. It didn’t help his case any when “Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover” by Sophie B. Hawkins began to play.  
  
“Oh wow, this song takes me back,” Rick muttered against her lips, letting his hands rest inside the back pockets of her jeans.  
  
“You’ve said that about every song so far.”  
  
“Well, they all do,” he insisted. “I think I was, like, eighteen when this song came out. It was that summer after Shane and I graduated high school. We were at some party in a field somewhere. Someone had the radio in their car blaring music, someone had fog lights on top of their truck that we used to light the area, and there were coolers filled with Pabst Blue Ribbon and peach Schnapps.”  
  
Jo let out a cackle of amusement. “Sounds memorable.”  
  
“I wouldn’t know,” Rick countered. “I passed out at some point in the grass, but I did wake up the next morning with a dick drawn on my face.”  
  
“It was probably Shane,” Jo laughed.  
  
“Yeah, I never found out who did it, but I always suspected him. And if having a dick on your face wasn’t bad enough, imagine having to explain it to your parents when you tried sneaking quietly back into the house, hungover as all hell.”  
  
“Hey, speaking of which…”  
  
“Hangovers?”  
  
“No,” Jo shook her head and stood up on tiptoe to whisper in his ear at the same time she discreetly reached a hand between their bodies. “Rhymes with your name.”  
  
Leaning his face back, Rick raised an eyebrow at her, catching her drift. “I gotcha.” Slipping his hands out of her pockets, he took her by the hand instead and patted Tyreese on the shoulder. “We’re gonna call it a night.”  
  
“Okay,” Tyreese nodded.  
  
“Sophia, don’t you girls stay up too much longer, okay?” Jo spoke to her eldest adoptive daughter.  
  
The teen nodded obediently, while shoving a pile of colorful Monopoly money at Piper with a laugh, just as Finn came over and asked his surrogate niece for a dance. An unnoticed look of jealously passed over Piper’s face at the same moment as Sophia jumped to her feet and began to dance around to C  & C Music Factory’s “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)”.  
  
“Hey, Rick—wait,” Karen called out to the retreating couple. Stepping away from Tyreese, she walked up to both Jo and Rick, placing a hand on either of their shoulders. “Tyreese and I were talking, and we agreed that you two should take the master bedroom.”  
  
“No, that’s okay. Tyreese is a bigger man. He needs more room,” Rick insisted.  
  
“You and Jo shared a twin mattress for months and months at the prison. Think of the master bedroom as your honeymoon suite and this is your wedding night. I mean, you two never even got one. And this,” Karen gestured around the room, “was your wedding reception.”  
  
Jo smiled brightly as she looked back at her fellow mom-to-be. Leaning forward to hug Karen, Jo whispered, “Thank you.”  
  
Rick went to protest again, but Jo simply grabbed his hand and yanked him away.  
  
“Wait, wait, wait!” Karen called after them once more. Grabbing an empty wine cup from an end table, she raised it up and gestured toward Rick and Go. “Tara, pause the music for a moment, will you?”  
  
Tara nodded and crouched down to press the appropriate button. As soon as the music was temporarily silenced, everyone’s attention moved to Karen and then to Rick and Jo.  
  
“I think we need to make a toast,” Karen continued, as everyone followed suit in either raising up their own cups or entire bottles of wine. “To Rick and Jo: our tireless leaders, our president and first lady, our king and our queen. I highly doubt any of us still here tonight would still be alive if it weren’t for you two. Everything you’ve lost and fought hard against has kept us all going. You don’t stop fighting, even when the world tries knocking you. You don’t listen, you get right back up, and I know I’m not alone in saying you two are an inspiration and I am lucky to have you both in my life and consider you as much my family as if you were of my own flesh and blood.”  
  
Rick looked down at the ground, shying at the pretty words, and gave Jo’s hand a squeeze. Jo, also, seemed a bit shy at what was said and wasn’t sure how to react other than to smile awkwardly and nod at a few faces.  
  
“To Mr. and Mrs. Grimes!” Tyreese bellowed with a hearty chuckle.  
  
“Long live the King and Queen!” Merle quipped from the sidelines of their group’s little party.  
  
“Long live the King and Queen,” several voices repeated.  
  
Rick rolled his eyes in response, but smiled at it nonetheless. “I think this is just the wine talking,” he joked.  
  
“For the love of Pete, take my sister to bed already and show her how good it is to be the King,” Finn remarked, garnering several chuckles from the peanut gallery.  
  
“Wow,” Jo muttered, shaking her head as her cheeks blushed slightly. “And with that, we’ll say goodnight.”  
  
Not waiting to be mortified by her brother any further or the subject of any more toasts, Jo pulled Rick away from the living room and led the way up the stairs. Even before they had made it to the stairs, they could hear the music continue, and it wafted all the way up to the second floor with them. Once they were inside the master bedroom, though, the sounds were muffled by the closed door.  
  
Taking a moment, Rick and Jo both looked around at the room, giving it a brief once over, only to settle their respective gazes upon the bed before them which was the real conversation piece. It was a dark, cherry wood sleigh bed that looked so incredibly comfortable and was covered with several decorative pillows which Jo reached out for and tossed to the ground. As she pulled back the covers and ran her hands over the material of the bed sheets, she threw a smile over at Rick.  
  
“Ooh, Egyptian cotton. At least a four hundred thread count.”  
  
“I’ll assume that’s a good thing.”  
  
“Oh yeah,” Jo nodded, reaching out and grabbing onto Rick’s belt to pull him closer to her. As she sat down on the edge of the bed, she spread her legs so he could easily stand between them while she wasted no time in undoing his bed for him. “The higher the thread count, the better it feels against your skin.”  
  
“Your skin must have the highest then, ‘cause you feel the best against me,” he quipped with a shit-eating grin.  
  
“I married myself to the cheesiest motherfucker,” Jo laughed.  
  
“No regrets?”  
  
“Never.”  
  
Locking eyes, Rick placed his hands upon Jo’s shoulders and pushed her back down onto the bed and watched as she leaned upon her elbows while he finished removing his belt on his own. Tossing it to the side without a word, he began to unzip his pants and then leaned forward to do the same to hers. As he slid her jeans down over her hips, he made sure he removed her underwear at the same time.  
  
Sitting up a bit more, Jo lifted her shirt off over her head as Rick removed his own. All that was left on between them was her bra and Jo let him remove it for her. He fumbled with the clasp but only because he was slightly drunk, which meant his agility was a bit off.  
  
“I hope I have enough stamina to get the job done tonight,” he muttered lowering his body weight down atop her before claiming one her nipples into his mouth as his beard tickled the underside of her breast.  
  
“Then, to hell with foreplay,” Jo commented, placing her hands to either side of his bearded face.  
  
“I might need a little help, though. All that wine didn’t exactly help.” Looking between their bodies, he gestured toward his manhood which was only semi-hard as it pressed against her inner thigh.  
  
Jo giggled slightly and nodded. “Very well,” she muttered, reaching her hand down and taking hold of him.  
  
His entire body practically shuddered at her touch and thrust very slowly into her grip to help her help _him_ get erect. With very little effort needed after all on her part, Rick was rearing to go. Scooting them around on the bed so they were lying vertically across the mattress instead of horizontally, Rick pulled the covers over them and groaned.  
  
“These sheets really _are_ soft, aren’t they?” he remarked.  
  
Jo giggled again, nodding back at him. “Shut up, okay?”  
  
Smiling down at her with heavy eyelids, Rick spread her legs further apart with his knees and then pressed himself at her entrance. Without a word, he thrust deeply into her and watched with contentment at the way she tipped her head back, allowing him to suckle his lips against her neck. With each thrust he made, a moan bubbled inside her throat, bringing a satisfied grin to his lips. The deeper and quicker he drove into her, the tighter she wrapped her legs around his waist while digging her fingers into his ass to urge him on even more.  
  
Encasing his arms around her back, Rick leaned his head down against her shoulder and buried his face into her neck as he pounded into her and moans escaped both their lips.  
  
“Kinda nice not to worry about if we have any condoms or not,” Jo remarked, reveling in how amazing it felt each time he thrust upward with his entire length.  
  
“Did we really ever worry about it?” he questioned into the crook of her neck. “I mean, honestly?”  
  
“I suppose not.”  
  
Running her hands up his back and then through his soft, brown curls, some of which were clinging to the sides of his face from the perspiration building up between them. She let out a few happy squeaks when he began to roll his hips slightly. Removing one of his arms from around her back, Rick slipped a hand between their bodies and began to rub his thumb against her clit to bring her quicker to the edge when he knew he wouldn’t last much longer.  
  
When he came, moments later, his ass clenched and his entire body stilled momentarily before the usual convulsions followed. Letting his body sink lower against hers, he rode out his orgasm more slowly and continued to rub against her until he felt her inner walls clenching around him. Her legs seemed to bolt upright and go rigid as she came, releasing the most heavenly cry his ears had ever heard.  
  
Content they he had brought her to fruition, Rick collapsed completely down upon her and rested his head upon her chest, placing a few kisses to the valley between her breasts here and there. Craning his face toward her, he looked up at her through his eyebrows which brought an impish grin to Jo’s lips.  
  
“You better not fall asleep on me,” she warned, letting out a yawn.  
  
“That goes for you, too.”  
  
“Oh, I won’t. We need the make the most of this big ol’ bed and our downtime.”  
  
“Mmhmm,” Rick murmured, moving up her body a little and placing his lips upon hers. Taking her hands in his he lifted them up over her head and pin them against the pillow while he left a trail of kisses down the side of her face and all the way down to her shoulder.  
  
Licking at her bottom lip and tasting the remnants of wine from his, Jo smiled when she felt his cock twitch inside her. In response, she began to move her hips, which elicited a small groan from Rick.  
  
“Stop that right now,” he teasingly chastised.  
  
“Oh hell no.”  
  
Snickering, Rick shook his head and released his hands from Jo’s. Pulling himself out brought a whimper from her lips, but he simply grinned back at her. He pushed up off her body and knelt there between his legs, reaching out for the bedsheet which he lifted up over his head and flashed a toothy grin as he looked down at her.  
  
“Uh oh,” she muttered with a laugh.  
  
“You’ve been very bad, Mrs. Grimes,” he jested. “I’m afraid you’ve gotta be sent to the love dungeon.”  
  
The biggest, heartiest laugh bubbled out of Jo’s mouth as she reached up and slapped Rick gently on the chest. “You’re so dumb,” she remarked, as he held the sheet out wide like it was some sort of cape or parachute.  
  
“Mwahahahaha,” Rick bellowed like some cartoon villain, and then lowered his body back down over her, covering them both underneath the sheet.  
  
“If you Dutch oven me, consider your ass divorced,” came Jo’s muffled voice from under covers.


	43. Dangerous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is officially the largest chapter of anything I've ever written, at over 15k words/30 pages in Word document. Like, holy shit? Hah, there was just so much to tell and no good place to end it except where I finally did, and even then it was actually supposed to be longer in my head. I just really liked this chapter a lot, and I hope all of you do too! As always, please R&R!  
> \- Holly, xoxo

_“The danger is I'm dangerous  
__And I might just tear you apart”  
_ — Gin Wigmore

* * *

  
“I was stabbed.”  
  
Rick shifted around in bed, lying on his stomach with an arm draped across Jo’s chest and his face buried in his pillow. Hearing her voice in his ear, he lifted his head and cast a glance at her with sleep in his eyes as he knitted his brow at her.  
  
“What?” he questioned.  
  
“During that storm at the farmhouse, I was talking to Daryl about all the shit I’d physically been through up until now and how—somehow—I haven’t miscarried. I don’t know how it is I overlooked it, but I was stabbed, by Clara, in the woods.” Jo turned was lying on her back; her left hand resting upon Rick’s arm and the fingers of her right hand grazing along the scar on her left shoulder. “I don’t know how it is that I could forget something like that.”  
  
“Momnesia,” Rick mumbled. “Pregnancy brain.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “I never had to really deal with ‘momnesia’ when I was pregnant with Hope. There wasn’t much to forget about when all I did all hours of the day for the bulk of the pregnancy was lie or sit around in the dark. I slept a lot, daydreamed, too.”  
  
Pushing himself up to lie on his side with left hand propping up his head, Rick studied her face and how she seemed to disappear into her memories for a moment or two. She didn’t seem too terrified or upset by them as much anymore; just more…detached. It was like a past life she was privy to the memories of; as if it hadn’t actually happened to her, but a former version of herself which, in a way, was more or less true.  
  
Shifting around again, Rick hovered diagonally over Jo’s body and lowered his lips upon her scar, which mirrored the scar he had in the same place from Morgan. Although, his was much more faded now as compared to hers since she had received that particular wound only a month or so ago.  
  
Changing the subject, he lifted his head up and kissed her jaw and then her lips. “How come you’re already up?” he questioned, leaning back from her face to get a better look at her. “The whole point in resting here until at least tomorrow morning was so we could catch up on _rest_ and sleep in. You, especially, should be taking advantage of it. You _and_ Karen I expect to take it as easy as possible while we have this opportunity.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I dunno. I just woke up. Couldn’t sleep anymore.” Turning to look at him she offered a small smile. “Not tired.”  
  
“Yeah, well, I think I’m hungover.” Pushing away from her and dropping back onto the mattress, Rick stared up at the ceiling and ran and hand down his face. “We shared that bottle of bourbon whiskey at that house after the prison, and that hangover was okay, but I’m pretty sure I drank an entire bottle of wine by myself last night.”  
  
“You did,” Jo confirmed with a giggle. “But it was nice to see you relax and just…let your hair down, so to speak. You needed this just as much as the rest of us.”  
  
“I hope we didn’t make too much noise downstairs last night, with the music and everything,” Rick remarked, as a groan followed due to the ache in his head. “Last thing we need is a herd of walkers or any unfriendly types descending on us because we slipped up.”  
  
“The music wasn’t that loud.”  
  
“I remember being able to hear it from in here.”  
  
“But it was muffled; like, _really_ muffled. And it’s not like the music was pumping from some expensive stereo equipment with an obnoxious bass. It was a dinky, little CD player,” Jo assured. “Plus, Daryl went out to take watch. I’m sure that if he thought the music was too loud and would draw anything unwanted toward this house he would’ve come back in and told us to shut it off, or at least turn it down.”  
  
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.”  
  
“Of course I am. I’m the wife,” she teased. “That’s how it works, isn’t it?”  
  
Grabbing one of the decorative pillows that was somehow still on the bed and hadn’t been knocked off during their sexcapades the night before, Rick smacked Jo gently in the face with it. With a sputtering sound escaping her lips, she pushed the pillow away and practically launched herself at him. Settling upon his hips, Jo grabbed hold of his wrists and pinned his hands up over his head, just as he had done to her the night before. Purposely, she gave a swivel of her own hips and he instinctively inhaled sharply from the friction she caused between their bodies. Looking down at him with a victorious grin, Jo lowered her chest upon his and brought her lips to his ear.  
  
“Best be careful, Mr. Grimes,” she whispered, and then gently pulled at his earlobe with her teeth. “I bite.”  
  
Rick studied her face with a contemplative grin. “Is that a promise?”

 

* * *

  
After another hour of further intimacy and just general laziness, Rick and Jo decided it was time to get out of bed and greet the day and the others. Taking their time to redress, they smiled and smirked at each other while letting their minds start to wrap around the tasks they planned on undertaking for the day. Walking up to Rick with his gun belt, Jo stood there in front of him while waiting for him to pull his regular belt through the loops of his black jeans. When he was finished, he glimpsed her patient stance and raised an eyebrow at her; prepared to take his gun belt from her but took pause when she reached her arms around his waist and pulled it on for him. Rick just stood there, watching her and smiling down at her; his lips so close to her forehead. As soon as the gun belt was fastened and in place, Rick lowered his face and brushed the tip of his nose against the tip of hers and then kissed her properly.  
  
Shortly thereafter, the couple made their way downstairs and found almost everyone already convened in either the living room or the kitchen. Breakfast consisted of leftover venison and blackberries, as well as little to no conversation. Too many heads were throbbing from hangovers.  
  
Karen and Jo, sitting directly across the kitchen table from each other, could only snicker at those miserable faces around them; not used to drinking alcohol to that extent these days, thus becoming considerable lightweights where handling their liquor was concerned.  
  
After having something to eat and drinking plenty of water, as well as popping a few pills for their wine-induced headaches, the group came more together to discuss the plans for the day, which consisted of scavenging the other homes in the virtually new neighborhood. It was also decided that everyone would go on these runs except Jen, who wasn’t making any great improvement, and the three girls: Sophia, Mika and Piper. Those heading out would split up into small groups to cover more ground and Rick jumped to the assumption that Jo would come with him. However, she ended up suggesting she’d tag along with her brother and Tara instead, which Rick subtly frowned at.  
  
Granted, he understood it was her brother and that was a different bond unto itself he couldn’t get between, so there wasn’t anything to be jealous over. Rick just wasn’t keen on being apart from her, even if it _was_ only for a couple hours. Sometimes fifteen minutes away from her felt like an eternity.  
  
The groupings were settled on in no time at all, though. Jo _would_ be going off together with her brother and Tara, Nicole was joining Tyreese and Karen, Merle was tagging along with Morgan and Michonne, while Milo had invited himself to join Rick and Daryl.  
  
Before leaving the yellow house, the four groups had gathered up their backpacks and emptied out anything that was no longer deemed a necessity to make room for anything of better use that they might find.  
  
Kissing Sophia and Mika on the head, both Rick and Jo were the last to exit the house and make their way down the steps. Jo was going without either of her crutches; insisting her ankle was feeling considerably better, and Milo teasingly commenting about how Rick must’ve really helped her “elevate it” the night before, garnering him a swift smack to the back of the head by Finn.  
  
Shaking his own head with a roll of his eyes, Rick turned and looked at his wife with nothing but love. Reaching a hand out, he rested it down upon her waist and closed the gap between their bodies as he gave her a soft kiss.  
  
“Be careful,” he advised, primarily to her. “If something goes wrong, holler. These houses around here aren’t too far apart. The sound will carry and I’ll hear you.”  
  
“I’m sure we’ll be fine,” Jo insisted, stealing one last kiss. “But I promise we’ll holler, just in case.”  
  
“You better.” Rick narrowed his eyes at her and then lowered his voice as two of the other groups already began walking away. “You come back to me.”  
  
Jo leaned her face a tad closer to his. “I always do,” she replied with a wink.  
  
Letting her hand linger on his forearm for a few seconds, she then let it slip as she turned from him and walked over to join her brother and Tara with the faintest limp in her step, which was somewhat comforting to Rick. He was glad she was on the mend. Watching her head down one of the road that branched off from the road the yellow house sat on, Rick forced his gaze away to look back at their temporary abode before forcing himself onward with Daryl and Milo.

 

* * *

  
“Watch out for that—”  
  
Before Daryl could finish his sentence, Milo tripped over a long-forgotten lawn sprinkler in the grass of one of the homes they’d all passed the day before just before turning onto the yellow house’s street.  
  
“The fuck,” Milo grumbled.  
  
“I told you to watch out.”  
  
“You didn’t say what to watch out for or give me enough warning.”  
  
“Not my fault you ain’t paying attention to what’s directly in front of ya. I ain’t your mama.”  
  
Rick rolled his eyes as he lifted his Colt up while walking up to the front porch. Daryl followed quickly behind, his crossbow at the ready, while Rick tried for the knob on the white home’s bright red door. Lagging behind, Milo took particular care to look out for anything else that might get in the way of his feet. Eyeing each other on the silent count of three, Rick turned the knob and pushed the door open; thankful it was unlocked.  
  
Then again, most homes nowadays seemed to be left unlocked.  
  
Most people that lived in the homes didn’t bother with locking them up when they fled. Or if they’d been scavenged by anyone else previously, homes were never relocked afterward. It wasn’t something that mattered anymore.  
  
After securing the first floor, Rick turned toward both Daryl and Milo with a nod. “Food, water, medical supplies, toiletries and clean clothes are the necessities we’re after.”  
  
“If I find an iPod, I’m keeping that shit,” Milo remarked, holstering his gun.  
  
Rick took note of that gesture and pointed at the younger man with his own gun. “Don’t put that away. There could still be lurkers in here.”  
  
Milo made a face. “Pfft, we made enough noise trudging around down here. If there was anyone or any _thing_ else, they’d have popped their ugly head out by now.”  
  
The bearded blonde’s comment reminded Rick of what Jo had said to him when they’d taken up shelter in that house after the prison. He thought back to how angry they had been after their recent losses and how Jo had responded with anger; pounding on the walls and shouting for anyone or anything that might be in that house to come on out and show itself. “Some _thing_ could be locked in a room upstairs,” he warned, regardless.  
  
“Well, when I decide to open a door up there, I’ll remove my gun first,” Milo retorted, stepping back into one of the downstairs rooms they’d already inspected and secured.  
  
Casting a glance over at Daryl, Rick sighed heavily but quietly while shaking his head.  
  
“Is it just me or is he getting really annoying?” Daryl questioned in a low voice as he stepped around Rick and ducked into the kitchen.  
  
Watching his friend start to open a few of the cupboards, Rick shrugged. “I think I liked him better last night when I was drunk.”  
  
“You liked a _lot_ of things better last night when you were drunk,” the archer threw back with a smirk when he eyed Rick. “The acoustics in that master bedroom, for example.”  
  
Rick immediately grimaced, understanding at once what Daryl was alluding to. “You could hear us? Even from downstairs with the music playing?”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips and emitted a slight chuckle. “The bedroom window was open. I was walking the perimeter and happened to be passing by right underneath at the same moment you saw God.”  
  
“Fuck me,” Rick grumbled somewhat in embarrassment.  
  
“S’alright. Ain’t like it’s the first time I ever heard the two of you going at it,” Daryl added, pulling down two cans of what looked to be tomato soup. “Ya’ll weren't always as quiet as you thought you were back at the prison in that little cell of yours. Could hear that damned mattress squeaking every time.”  
  
“Alright, alright, I get it.” Slipping past the other man, Rick hung his head and began pulling open drawers. “So we aren’t as subtle as we thought.”  
  
“I’m not bashing ya. Just saying.” Daryl shrugged. “Get it when and where ya can, right?”  
  
With a sigh, Rick nodded. “Yeah, I suppose.”  
  
An amused chuckle escaped Daryl’s lips then as some sort of afterthought entered his head. “And you sure got it last night.”  
  
Without warning, Rick tossed a lime green spatula at Daryl and snickered despite the conversation aimed at his expense. “Fuck off,” he muttered with a laugh of his own.  
  
“Only if you cuddle me afterward.”  
  
“Did either of you see the family photos of the people who used to live here?” Milo asked as he suddenly appeared in the kitchen with a framed picture in either hand, holding them up. “They look like they fell down the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down…and then the tree _fell_ on them. Look—the mother has a biggest, fucking snaggletooth I’ve ever seen. Like, how do you afford to live in a nice house like this but not have a dentist to fix shit like that?”  
  
Rick and Daryl looked at each other again and just shook their heads with a smile.

 

* * *

  
Nearly half a mile’s distance away from the white house Rick was in with Daryl and Milo, Finn was leading the way into a single story, tan brick home with woods covering it on all sides except, obviously, the front. Jo and Tara followed after him with their respective weapons, keeping a wary eye out.  
  
The part of the neighborhood they were in seemed much more closed off and secluded, like a hidden gem that could prove to be a goldmine where necessary supplies were concerned. They were also fortunate in not having come across a single walker to have to contend with. That, however, did not mean they let their guards down. There was always the possibility of a walker still inside the house, unintentionally hiding where they least expected it.  
  
They were barely in the front entranceway to the house when Finn opted to go right and secure the main living space while he suggested Jo and Tara go left toward the directions they could easily assume the bedrooms and bathrooms were in. Smirking at her little brother taking a more authoritative stance with her, Jo shook her head but obliged him, leading the brunette female down the hall on their left.  
  
“It’s kind of funny, isn’t it?” Tara muttered, holding her gun at eye level.  
  
“What is?” Jo asked without looking over her shoulder.  
  
“How far we’ve come.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Well, it’s really not that big of a distance. I mean, in an ideal world, all of us could’ve gotten here from Atlanta in under eight hours by car.”  
  
“No, I mean personally.”  
  
Pausing, Jo turned and looked behind her at Tara. “Since the very beginning?”  
  
Tara shook her head as she pushed open the door to a darkened bathroom. “No, I mean…you and me,” she replied, removing a small flashlight from her pocket, turning it on and shining it into the room. “The first time we spoke or just interacted was at the prison when I cut your hands free and you told me to get the fuck away.”  
  
Looking down at the ground and recalling the memory from nearly a month before, Jo smiled sheepishly. “Yeah, sorry about that. I don’t think I ever actually apologized.”  
  
“Oh god, no. You don’t have to,” Tara commented adamantly. “I realized Brian—The Governor was in the wrong. None of that felt right, and that’s why I was trying to leave. If there was at least one good thing I would be able do that day, helping you was gonna be it.”  
  
“Well, I appreciate it. I really do,” Jo insisted. The two of them just stood there, looking at each other and not bothering to look around the bathroom at the moment; instead just continuing with their heart to heart. “If you hadn’t helped me, it might’ve taken me longer to free my own hands and I might not have been able to get to Rick and help _him_ in time and kill The Governor. Plus, you _did_ do more good that day. You helped Morgan get Mika safely away from the prison. That alone trumps everything bad you might’ve done for blindly following a man you thought to be the good guy.”  
  
“I think I always had a feeling there was something not good about him, though. He didn’t talk much about himself, but when he did he spun it to make him sound like this terrible victim and he was out for justice.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo scowled, unable to prevent her initial memories of The Governor from popping up in her mind. “He had that way about him. He could charm the spots of a leopard, and smile so brightly, but the smile never reached his eyes. That was my first clue there was something off. I mean, if you’re genuinely happy about something, a smile will reach your eyes. He just seemed…”  
  
“Dead on the inside.”  
  
Jo nodded, stepping over to the medicine cabinet and pulling it open. “Something like that.”  
  
“I’m sorry what he did to you,” Tara added, shining the flashlight into the cabinet. “He told my sister and me that the two of you had been in serious relationship, but that you ran off with another man—I assume he meant Rick—and when he confronted you about it, you attacked him and took his eye out before Hope was born. I mean, I know the truth now. Sophia filled me in on the details just after Terminus.”  
  
Grabbing a packet of some generic Ibuprofen from the cabinet’s shelf, Jo frowned. “I’m sorry, too. I know you lost your family, too, that day,” she commented, shoving the packet into her back pocket.  
  
“I saw my sister carrying my niece Meghan’s body, so I know she died. I just don’t know what happened to my sister after that.” Tara shrugged sadly. “I assume she died, too.”  
  
“Well,” Jo muttered sadly. “I hope it was quick.”  
  
“Yeah. Same.”  
  
Not half a second later, Tara’s foot slipped on the small area rug on the bathroom floor and nearly went falling back against the tub, but Jo reached her hand out in time. She latched onto Tara’s wrist and pulled the brunette back upright, both letting out an amused laugh.  
  
“Don’t tell your brother I did that. He and Milo and I have taken to busting each other’s balls, and I really don’t wanna give him any ammo to use against me.”  
  
Jo shook her head. “Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with—”  
  
An abrupt shout and a heavy thud from the other side of the house drew their attentions immediately away from each other as both females darted out of the bathroom, up the hallway and rounded their way into the kitchen where Jo spotted Finn lying face down on the floor. His pack was missing as was his gun and Jo nearly began to hyperventilate when she couldn’t tell right away whether or not he was still breathing.  
  
Dropping down to her knees, Jo ran her hand along the back of Finn’s head, her fingers through his sandy blonde hair before pushing him over onto his back to get a better look from him. Placing two fingers to his neck, she sank back onto her feet in relief when she felt a pulse.  
  
“He’s alive. Thank God.”  
  
“Jo,” came Tara’s nervous voice from behind her.  
  
Turning around, Jo found herself looking up at the brunette and an incredibly dirty man in his late twenties or early thirties and a W carved into his forehead holding a knife to Tara’s neck. Tara, while still holding her gun in one hand, had both her hands raised up and looked rather terrified as the blade hovered dangerously close to her skin of her throat.  
  
“What the—” Jo began to mutter and instinctively reached for her sword, but was stopped by the tutting of someone appearing around the corner from the other end of the kitchen. Slowly and cautiously, she turned and looked up at another man, who appeared to be slightly older than her with a W on his forehead as well, and who was aiming Finn’s shotgun at her head. “Listen, you can take our supplies. You can keep our weapons. Just…just let us go.”  
  
The man with Finn’s shotgun smirked. “The supplies and weapons are an added benefit for us, but not what we’re here for.”  
  
“And what would _that_ be?” Keeping her focus on him, she avoided making any sudden movements that would see her or her own maimed or killed. It was hard to keep a steady breath, though; her nerves suddenly fraying.  
  
“We need numbers.”  
  
With grin full of yellowed teeth and a nod of his head, the man with Finn’s shotgun gave some sort of signal to his buddy. Jo turned over to glance over her shoulder as the younger of the two men snatched Tara’s gun away from her and began to pat her down for other weapons; finding a pocket knife and slipping into his own pocket. He then shoved Tara forward, forcing her to take a seat at the kitchen table as he approached Jo while the man with the shotgun kept the weapon trained on both women in case of any sudden movements.  
  
“Drop it, Buffy,” the man with the shotgun advised when Jo had yet to take her hand off the hilt of her sword.  
  
With cautious reluctance, Jo did as advised and held her hands up in a sort of surrender, watching with furious eyes as she held the older man’s gaze while the younger one began patting her down. When her own gun and her own pocket knife were removed from her, he then took her sword and slipped off her scabbard.  
  
Stepping forward, the younger man handed the sword he sheathed into its scabbard over to his friend, who lowered the shotgun long enough to slip the scabbard over his left shoulder.  
  
“Get the ties,” the older man advised.  
  
Opening up the satchel on his hip, the younger man removed to men’s neckties and stepped over toward Tara. Grabbing her roughly by the arm, he jerked her hands behind her back and began to bind her wrists together. Jo took her gaze away from the man with the shotgun to look nervously over at her friend, to give her some silent assurance that they’d be okay and somehow they’d get out of this.  
  
Once her hands were bound good and tight, Tara was shoved back down into the kitchen chair and the younger man stalked up behind Jo and grabbed both of her arms and pulled her up to her feet. As she stood there, Jo didn’t fight as her hands were pulled behind her back and tied together the same as Tara’s. She simply brought her attention and a deathly stare back at the older of the two men with promise that she would find a way to destroy them. And if she didn’t have the opportunity, she sure as hell knew Rick would find them and their asses would belong to him. Of that Jo was certain.  
  
And, because of that certainty, she allowed the tiniest of smug smiles to toy at the corners of her lips and it was not lost on the man with Finn’s shotgun.  
  
“What’s so funny, princess?”  
  
“Just thinking about the different ways I’d like to kill you right now.”  
  
“You flatter me.”  
  
As he pressed the barrel of the shotgun against her chest, Tara cried out. “No, don’t! Please. She’s pregnant.”  
  
The older man glanced at Tara, taking in what she’d said, and then back to Jo and an amused grin. “That is definitely useful information.” Gesturing toward the doorway to the kitchen where Jo and Tara had initially come in from, the older man with the W on his forehead commented to his friend. “These two will do.”

 

* * *

  
Rick walked along the road with that damned bowlegged gait of his and a content smile upon his face. With his Colt holstered, his carried his backpack over his left shoulder while leading Daryl and Milo onto the next house on the street he felt worth scavenging. Milo brought up the rear, lagging as usual as he messed around with an iPod he had indeed found while Daryl maintained his position between both men, with his crossbow lowered at his side and his blue eyes squinting more than normal from the sunlight shining directly into their faces.  
  
“Don’t even think of listening to whatever shit’s on there until we’re back at the house,” Daryl muttered, throwing a brief look over his shoulder at the bearded blonde.  
  
“I’m not gonna,” Milo assured. “I’m just trying to untangle the headphones. You’d think someone in the last decade would’ve mastered inventing non-tangling headphone cords.”  
  
Rick smirked and cast an eye over his own shoulder to Daryl. “Anything trivial you’d like to find for yourself in the next house?” he asked his friend.  
  
Daryl shrugged. “Nah.”  
  
“Not your very own iPod? Listen to some Boston or Foreigner?”  
  
With a snicker, the archer shook his head. “Fuck that shit. AC/DC, man. Some ‘Back In Black’ or ‘Highway to Hell’ is what I’m talkin’ ‘bout.”  
  
“I would think you’d had enough highway to hell with how this world is,” Rick quipped.  
  
Daryl shrugged. “The world’s more quiet now. I’m okay with that part.”  
  
Rick looked back forward and nodded. “Yeah, it is.”  
  
“How d’you think the others are faring right now?”  
  
“Well,” Rick looked around in the direction of the other homes and tilting his head to the side, “I haven’t heard any shouts for help. I suppose that’s a good sign.”  
  
“What if they aren’t close enough for us to hear them if they shout?” Milo questioned. “Four groups, spreading out. Seems unlikely we’d know if shit goes down.”  
  
Rick paused and looked back at Milo with a frown. “You’re annoying, you know that?”  
  
Off Daryl’s grunt of amusement, Rick caught his eye, gave a shake of his head and continued onward.

 

* * *

  
“Keep walking.”  
  
Jo and Tara had been traipsing begrudgingly through the woods for about fifteen minutes since leaving the tan brick home where Finn had been left unconscious on the kitchen floor. The only comfort Jo took was that her brother was alive and when he came to, she knew that when he couldn’t find her or Tara that he would go straight for Rick and the others and a search party would be thrown together. She knew her group had enough muscle and fire power between them; she just didn’t know if the two men behind her were by themselves or, if not, how many people they _did_ have.  
  
She’d survived being taken prisoner by The Governor enough times and each time somehow ending with people she cared about getting hurt. She could only wish this time would be different.  
  
“What exactly do you need numbers for?” Jo asked, wincing when a rather sharp branch scratched at her bare arm.  
  
“Nothing you need to worry your pretty little head over,” the younger man replied.  
  
“What’s with the W’s on your forehead? Some sort of gang symbol?”  
  
The older man snickered. “You could say that.”  
  
“What does it mean?” Tara braved her own question.  
  
“Wolves.”  
  
Jo hesitated for a moment. When one of the men gave her a rough push forward, she picked up the pace again. Briefly, she cast a glance over at Tara. “Wait—all that graffiti.  _Wolves Not Far._ That was you?”  
  
“We’re just one cog in the wheel.”  
  
“Two lone wolves part of a larger pack?” Jo mused.  
  
Placing his hand on the back of her head, the older Wolf gave Jo a brief shake and snickered. “Exactly.” Casting a look at his friend, he added, “See, I knew that thing about blondes being dumb was a myth.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “Where are you taking us? Are you taking us to your _pack_?”  
  
“You ask too many questions. It’s kind of annoying. Chris, get another tie out.”  
  
Instinctively, Jo’s senses went on alert as the older Wolf grabbed hold of her shoulder to stop her from walking. Tara stopped as well, turning to see the younger Wolf reaching into his satchel for a third necktie which he proceeded with wrapping around Jo’s mouth; so, if she tried to speak any further, her words would come out garbled.  
  
Practically snarling at the gesture, Jo’s green eyes darkened with anger as the tie was tightened around the back of her head. As soon as she felt the older Wolf’s arm hand leave her shoulder, the barrel of Finn’s shot gun took its place to urge her onward again.  
  
Soon enough, the woods came to an end and the four of them exited out onto a quiet road that was lined with houses on the other side. Dead leaves scattered the pavement and the grass, there were a few abandoned cars and most of the homes seemed to have been either ransacked or torched. Each car or truck, though, mirrored the other vehicles and buildings Team Family had spotted on their way through town the day before. They shared the same message.  
  
_Wolves Not Far._  
  
They certainly weren’t anymore.  
  
A few yards up ahead, they reached an intersecting road, which Jo paid attention to the name of for later in case she and Tara had to find their way back to the others.  
  
Raleigh Avenue.  
  
Squirreling that name away for later, Jo let herself be led along the road beside Tara in utter silence, aside from the two men occasionally chattering about random shit, like making sure they found some more water for later and to go back to some house they’d checked the day before and get some magazines they’d apparently forgotten.  
  
Judging by their immature laughter in regard to that latter piece of information, Jo could easily wager a guess those magazines were of the pornographic variety.  
  
Twenty minutes along that same road, it came to an end and Jo glimpsed the street sign for the new road they were approaching: West Atlantic. Slowing her pace down, Jo waited to see which direction the wolves led them.  
  
“Turn right,” the younger Wolf ordered, and both females obliged.  
  
Continuing on, they made their way past a few houses on either side of the road. The pavement was surprisingly clean, considering most roads Jo and the others had found themselves traveling in the last few weeks. The only exception was the school bus they meandered past which had the same graffiti on it in white spray paint.  
  
That wasn’t what caught Jo and Tara’s attention, though.  
  
Not the graffiti.  
  
Not the Wolves Not Far message.  
  
It was that the bus was filled with dead children, slumped in their seats or against the windows, horribly decayed and unmoving. Not one moved as the four walked past, meaning each child had most likely received that final death blow to the head before or after they died and turned. Either which way it happened was traumatizing; especially to Jo and Tara, what with Jo being a mother and Tara having lost her niece.  
  
Closing their eyes tight to try and erase the image of the bus out of their minds, both women inhaled and exhaled a steadying breath.  
  
After another ten minutes up the road, they approached a rundown Quik Stop gas station with several abandoned vehicles at the pumps and otherwise encircling the property, possibly put there for strategic reasons. Unlike the road, the lot was covered in debris and decaying bodies of regular people and walkers alike, both inside and outside the vehicles. The awning over the three pumps, as well as the three pumps, to the left of the gas station’s convenience store were toppled over and charred. It seemed that the lifted Chevy Silverado 4x4 pickup truck lodged atop one of the pumps had caused an explosion at some point in the past after the initial outbreak. The pavement in the immediate vicinity had dark marks caused from a fire long since extinguished. The left side of the building was also somewhat blackened and the structure cracked with blown out windows from the obvious blast. The two individual pumps to the front and other vehicles seemed untouched, aside from the signs tacked on informing there was no more gas available.  
  
“And here we are,” Chris, the younger Wolf announced, stepping around in front of both women with his arms held out wide at his sides.  
  
“This is where you live?” Tara wondered.  
  
“No, we don’t live anywhere,” the older Wolf, whose name still went unknown, replied as he nudged them along to follow Chris forward toward the building. “We are just sleeping here for a while.”  
  
“Why here, though, when there are a ton of homes around here?”  
  
“People don’t belong in homes like that anymore.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
With a sigh of aggravation, the older Wolf stopped walking and lowered the shotgun to snapped his fingers from his free hand at Chris. “Will you gag her, too? I’m done with the twenty questions.”  
  
Tara seemed to reveal a mix of nervousness and defiance on her face when Chris removed yet another necktie from his satchel and cover her mouth with it the same as he did to Jo. She and Jo were then led inside the building and forced down onto their knees near the cashier’s counter as a sense of fight or flight entered their minds.  
  
“Stay put,” the older Wolf commanded, stepping down an aisle of virtually bare shelves toward a door near the back of the building.  
  
Jo watched after his retreating form; how he still held onto the shotgun and how her sheathed sword was strapped to his back.  
  
Chris, meanwhile, smirked down at both women and hoisted himself up to sit on the counter with his legs dangling over the edge. As the older Wolf slipped into the back room and shut the door behind him, both Jo and Tara glanced up at Chris.  
  
Jo took that moment to mutter something to him as best as she could figuring that Chris was the weaker link of the two men. Unable to understand what she was saying due to her necktie gag, he just rolled his eyes at her while picking at his fingernails with the tip of the blade from Tara’s pocket knife. When Jo attempted to get back up to her feet, Chris immediately jumped down to the ground and shoved the small blade toward her face in a silent warning to get back down to her knees. When she relented and sank down to the dirty tiled floor, Jo attempted to communicate with him for a second time.  
  
With a sigh, he kept the knife aimed at her face but pulled the gag out of her mouth to rest on her chin for a moment. “ _What_?”  
  
“I just want to know what you’re planning on doing with us,” she finally spoke. “We have a lot of people that will be looking for us, and when they find you, you’re dead. So why don’t you just let us go and we can let bygones be bygones.”  
  
“Nope,” Chris shook his head and replaced the gag in her mouth without a second thought. “Like we said, we need the numbers."  
  
“Feh wuh?” Jo mumbled.  
  
“For what?” Off her nod, Chris smirked and ruffled a few strands of her blonde hair with the small blade. “It never troubles the wolf how many the sheep may be. Virgil.”  
  
“Ah we seep?” she continued to try and speak as clearly as possible.  
  
“ _Baaa_.”  
  
Off Jo’s scowl, Chris drew a W mid-air in front of her forward and then stepped backward toward the counter to lean against.  
  
A wave of anxiety quickly began to build up within Jo as she cast a wary glance over at Tara.

 

* * *

  
Not much time had passed for Jo and Tara when Rick and Daryl were leading the way out of the second house they’d scavenged that afternoon. Milo was rushing out right after them, adjusting the belt on his pants and frowning at the older men ahead of him on the road.  
  
“You couldn’t wait two minutes? I was almost done.”  
  
Rick couldn’t help himself but flash a shit-eating grin over his shoulder at Daryl while Milo fumbled with getting the prongs into the holes of his belt. “Time and tide waits for no man.”  
  
“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize we were on a _tight_ schedule considering we ain’t heading back out onto the road until _tomorrow_ ,” Milo retorted sourly.  
  
Smacking his lips, Daryl shook his head. “Should’ve gone before we left the house, then you wouldn’t have to worry about us leaving ya.”  
  
“Well, I didn’t have to go before, now did I?”  
  
Rick knitted his brow together and threw Milo a look. “You know we weren’t actually leaving you, right? And even if we did, we’re only staying down that road right there,” Rick remarked, gesturing in the direction of the yellow house which was quite visible from where they were. “You got a gun and a knife on you. If we’d left you to make it back all by your lonesome, I’m sure you’d manage with flying colors.”  
  
Ignoring Milo’s indignant huff, Daryl reached over and nudged Rick’s elbow with his own. “I think we’re pretty good with supplies, unless you wanna hit up a third house. Like Milo said earlier, we got four groups spread out. We’ll have enough, I think.”  
  
Rick looked at his friend and nodded. “Yeah, I think we’re good, too,” he agreed. “We gotta be able to carry all this shit with us tomorrow anyway. Might as well quit while we’re ahead.” Throwing a half-smirk over at Milo, he asked, “You good with that, princess?”  
  
“Oh shut up,” the bearded blonde snapped back with a chuckle, clearly showing no signs of ill will. “I should’ve gone off with Finn and Jo. You could’ve taken Tara instead.”  
  
“Probably would’ve cleared both those houses quicker, too, with Tara,” Daryl teased, just plain ol’ instigating now.  
  
Ducking down, Milo grabbed up a handful of small stones and tossed them at the back of Daryl’s legs. When the archer spun around with an aggravated grunt, Milo simply laughed.  
  
“You best watch it, boy. I’ll lodge one of my bolts into your head faster than you can whine about it.”  
  
Milo skirted off to the other side of Rick as if attempting to put a safe distance between him and Daryl. “See, if you do that, though, Finn would get pissed off at you, and then Jo would get pissed off to see her brother so sad over the loss, and then Rick would get mad to see his beautiful wife sad that her brother’s sad.”  
  
“You don’t know my wife very well,” Rick quipped. “And we could always just tell Finn it was an accidental shooting; friendly fire. I think Finn would get over it.”  
  
“Aww,” Milo mock pouted. “That’s not fair.”  
  
Muted chuckles went between Rick and Daryl as the three of them made their way back down the road they were staying on when they spotted Michonne, Morgan and Merle heading back, cutting across some tall grass that between several properties to the north of the house they were staying in. Rick gave a wave, which Morgan saw and nodded back while holding up his pack which looked to be almost bursting at the seams. The smile on the other man’s face suggesting his group’s scavenging trip had gone as well as Rick’s group.  
  
As all six of them came together in front of the yellow house, Rick shifted his own pack on his shoulder while Milo ascended the stairs to duck inside the house while the remainder caught up with each other.  
  
“Everything go okay? No issues?” Rick inquired.  
  
Michonne gave a shake of her katana, flinging off some excess blood as if to denote there might’ve been a minor hiccup. “Just a few walkers,” she replied. “Nothing we couldn’t handle.”  
  
Rick looked at her and then to Morgan, who he noticed was letting his gaze linger on the woman a moment longer than necessary. Not reading too far into it, Rick shifted his weight and focused his gaze on Merle, although he addressed all three when he asked, “You see if any of the others got back yet?”  
  
Michonne nodded. “Karen got sick in one of the houses. Dead bodies sealed up in some room she looked into. Started throwing up, so Nicole headed back with her. Tyreese went with them and we passed him on our way out of the first house we checked. He said that since he knew Karen was okay to leave behind here that he was going to go find—”  
  
“Finn!” Rick shouted, suddenly spotting something concerning over everyone’s shoulders.  
  
Michonne let her words fall away as she whipped around along with the other three men standing there. Up the road perpendicular to the yellow house, Tyreese was helping Finn walk while the younger man held a hand to the side of his head. Rick dropped his pack and was beating pavement instantly.  
  
Finn was his family now, his brother-in-law, and his well-being was therefore elevated in his eyes. If he was injured or something was wrong with him he was thoroughly concerned.  
  
“Hey, hey, hey, what happened?” Rick demanded, eyeing Tyreese and then looking around for Jo and Tara. “Where are the girls?”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Finn muttered pitifully, which did nothing to sate Rick’s nerves which were starting to skyrocket.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
“I found him in some house, face down on the kitchen floor, out cold,” Tyreese explained. “The girls weren’t there.”  
  
“I was checking the kitchen cupboards, had one of the doors open. I never even saw him walk up from the other room,” Finn began saying, looking up at Rick with pained eyes. “As soon as I closed the cupboard door, I saw him standing there. I didn’t even get to ask him who he was or what he wanted. He hit me with a fucking frying pan. I blacked out instantly. I don’t even remember falling to the ground or if I even shouted in pain. And I don’t know what happened to my sister and Tara. I woke up to Tyreese hovering over me, shaking me.”  
  
“Once I got him up, we checked the house and the one across the street, but the girls weren’t there,” Tyreese continued, eyeing Rick who felt sick to his stomach.  
  
“Okay,” was all Rick muttered as he began walking away from them all toward the direction Tyreese and Finn had just come from.  
  
“Rick, wait!” Daryl called out.  
  
“I gotta go find Jo.” He paused and turned around, locking eyes with the archer for a moment and then looking over to Tyreese. “Get Finn into the house. Have Nicole look at him; make sure he ain’t concussed.”  
  
Just as Rick turned to keep walking, Daryl hurried up and caught up to him, grabbing his arm. “Hey, if you’re going to look for them, I’m coming with you,” he insisted. “You’re a damn fine leader, but you sure as hell ain’t a tracker.”  
  
“I’ll come, too,” Merle offered. “Two trackers are better than one.”  
  
“So will I.”  
  
Rick and the Dixon brothers turned their attention toward Michonne who was just as rearing to go as they were.  
  
“I’ll stay back here in case the girls come back and want to know where you are,” Morgan commented.  
  
Rick nodded back at him. “Thank you.”  
  
As Rick, Michonne and the Dixons began to head up the road, Finn called out to them before they were out of sight.  
  
“Rick!”  
  
The former sheriff’s deputy spun around mid-step. “Yeah?”  
  
“First house on the right after the bend in that road,” he informed, referring to the road Rick and the others were about to turn onto. “Tan, brick house. That’s the house we were in. There were other houses a little further down, and also a lot of woods.”  
  
Rick took the hint as the brothers-in-law held each other’s eye for a moment.  
  
If Jo and Tara had been taken by the man who knocked Finn out, they could be anywhere.

 

* * *

  
The older Wolf returned back into the storefront after a few minutes, eyeing his partner in crime with a mischievous smile before turning his full attention on both females. He let his fingers drag slowly along the bare shelves, staring between Jo and Tara with a look of contemplation on his face.  
  
“Eeny, meeny, miny, mo. Catch a tiger by the toe,” he murmured in a sing song voice. “If he hollers, let him go. Eeny…meeny…miny…” Settling his gaze upon Tara, he grinned. “Mo.”  
  
Jo and Tara both began to breathe a little quicker, worried about what he had up his sleeve for them.  
  
“Wuh ah yuh gon’ do?” Jo questioned as audibly as she could muster despite the necktie impeding her speech.  
  
“Well, we have no plans to kill you so don’t worry your pretty little head just yet,” he answered, seeming to understand what she was asking. “I mean, that decision isn’t up to us anyway. That’s up to our alpha who we’ll be taking you to. Either you’ll become one of us or you’ll become part of our army.”  
  
Jo knitted her brow in both fear and confusion.  
  
Off her look, the older Wolf smirked. “For now, the only thing we have to kill is time.”  
  
Stalking up to Tara, he crouched down and cupped his hands over her ample breasts, giving them a quick massage that caused her to squirm uncomfortably. It was like a lightbulb going on for both women then; understanding exactly what the older Wolf meant by killing time.  
  
“I’ve always been a breast man, too,” Chris chuckled, giving his nameless friend an agreeing look.  
  
“You’ll do just fine,” the older Wolf spoke directly to Tara as he grabbed her arms and pulled her up to her feet. As he began to lead her toward the backroom, with her petrified whimpers filling the air, the older Wolf turned and pointed at Jo. “When I’m finished you can take a turn or have blondie there.”  
  
“Pfft,” Chris shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had your sloppy seconds.”  
  
Before the older Wolf could reach the backroom door, Jo was able to use her tongue to successfully push the necktie out of her mouth to rest more upon her bottom lip instead.  
  
“No!” she bellowed; shaking as she saw red.  
  
The older Wolf stopped and he turned to look directly at her. “Excuse me?”  
  
“I said no,” she repeated with a suddenly calm and collected voice. She was swallowing back her rage, knowing it wouldn’t help her think straight. She need a clear head and to gain as much control over the situation as she could. “You cannot have her.”  
  
“Oh, I can’t, can I?” The older Wolf snickered and lifted his gaze to Chris, who was now holding Jo’s gun to the back of her head. “And why’s that?”  
  
“She’s a lesbian. She’s never been with a man,” Jo admitted.  
  
“Even better,” Chris chortled. “We’ll boldly go where no man has gone before.”  
  
“She won’t be able to give you the satisfaction you need because she’s naïve to a man’s touch,” Jo pressed on.  
  
“Oh?” the older Wolf raised an eyebrow at her.  
  
Before she spoke, Jo saw Tara shaking her head at her, as if the brunette was willing to resign herself to being raped for the sake of Jo’s and her baby’s wellbeing. “I, on the other hand, have the experience. I know all the moves. Take me instead. I will go willingly with you. I will not put up a fight. You can both have me, as many times as you want. Just leave her alone.”  
  
Tara was staring at her with horror now and whimpering through the necktie hindering her words as she fought to convince Jo to not sacrifice herself in such a way. She knew what Jo had suffered at the hands of The Governor and she shouldn’t have to be subjected to a similar fate again. Tara would take one for the team if that’s what it took.  
  
The older Wolf and Chris exchanged looks, considering this new option set before them.  
  
“What say you to this, brother?” The older Wolf questioned.  
  
“I dunno, Kev. I was really hoping to see those tits of hers,” the younger Wolf admitted, gesturing toward Tara.  
  
Jo pursed her lips. “Kev? That short for Kevin?”  
  
The older Wolf nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“Funny. That’s what my first boyfriend’s name was. Kevin Pataski. Real good kisser.”  
  
Kevin, the older Wolf, looked back at her with an impish grin and hesitated for a few moments, letting the wheels in his head turn. “You would be the better choice, now that I think of it,” he remarked. “If we keep you around, we don’t have to worry about impregnating you because apparently you’re already knocked up. However…” He shoved Tara aside so roughly that she fell into a half empty rack of road maps.  
  
Tara’s yelp could be heard clear as day despite the necktie gag as she tumbled unceremoniously to the ground and out of Jo’s immediate line of sight. The older female glanced from Kevin, toward the direction Tara had fallen and back to Kevin as he glared at her; withdrawing his own knife and pointing it toward her.  
  
“However,” he continued, “you _did_ tell me earlier that you were thinking about a bunch of ways to kill me.”  
  
“How can I kill you with my hands tied behind my back?” she questioned him as if he were a small, idiot child. “I’m offering myself up to you as a real live sex toy and you’re hesitating? Are you not man enough to know a good thing when it’s offered? Are you really going to look a gift horse in the mouth?”  
  
Biting back on his pride, Kevin huffed and shook his head. “Okay, then. I’ll take you instead,” he agreed, “if only to shut that smartass mouth of yours.”  
  
“If you promise to be gentle, I’ll promise that my mouth will make you see God.”  
  
Licking his lips, Kevin nodded and smirked. “Alright. I accept your…challenge.” Without another word, he stalked up to her and pulled her up to her feet. Looking down at her, his breath was hot on her face and he watched the way her gaze never wavered as she stared back at him; unknowing that she was fighting back the gag reflex in her throat due to the putrid smell of his breath. “C’mon.”  
  
As he began to drag her toward the backroom, Chris walked over to Tara and brought her back over toward the cashier counter where he sat her down on the floor. Jo was able to toss a look over her shoulder back at Tara, and see how terrified to younger woman looked, just before being pushed forward into the dark room where one stout pillar candle rested upon a small table.  
  
Once the door was shut behind them, Kevin locked it and led Jo toward the other end of the room where two sleeping bags were spread out. Jo looked around at the way the minimal light from the tiny flame jumped along the walls nearest it. Although, since they were at the opposite side of the room, which had been a storage room before but was not virtually wiped clean of supplies, the two of them were still mostly bathed in darkness.  
  
Slowly, Kevin forced her to sit down upon one of the sleeping bags and she watched as he removed whatever weapons he still had upon him. She could see, over by the table with the candle, that her sword and its scabbard were propped against the wall, along with Finn’s shotgun. When he turned back to her, Jo sank within herself for a moment, the memories of The Governor popping into her head without invitation. Closing her eyes briefly, she tried her best to tune the images out but the sounds of Kevin unfastening his belt jogged her back to the present.  
  
Staring up at him, Jo clenched her jaw and watched with anxiety coursing through her veins as if her blood was on fire. She tensed up on instinct at the way he grabbed her legs and forced her to lie down, which was awkward with her hands still bound behind her back. She also flinched when he reached for her face, but was able to calm herself slightly when she realized he was removing the necktie that had been used as he mouth gag. When he tossed that aside, though, that was when she began to tense right back up, despite how willing she had presented herself to be in the storefront.  
  
It had all been a show, of course; to spare Tara and find a way to separate both men that would be beneficial to Jo in order to do whatever she could to save her and Tara’s asses if no one from their group could get to them in time.  
  
The feel of Kevin’s rough hands unbuttoning her jeans and pulling them down her waist, along with her underwear made her want to cry out and thrash around, but her body went rigid. She held her breath as she watched him removed her boots, and then her jeans and underwear completely; tossing them aside and then spreading her legs so he could kneel between them. As he shoved his own pants down off his hips, Jo could just barely make out his stupid, grinning face and, suddenly, everything went calm for her.  
  
There were no memories of The Governor assaulting her senses. There was no anxiety over how she was about to allow herself to become raped for the sake of protecting Tara. There wasn’t even fear anymore. There was only pure, undulated rage and it was like a drug. Jo welcomed it. She breathed it in like a fragrant rose. And suddenly everything felt peaceful, and what she had to do made perfect sense.  
  
As Kevin lowered himself down upon her body and went about positioning himself at her entrance, Jo caught his eye and smiled.  
  
“What?” he asked out of curiosity before he made a single advance.  
  
“Can I just ask _one_ favor and then you can do whatever you want?” she asked.  
  
“I suppose, since you’re being such a good sport.”  
  
Never letting her smile fade, she craned her neck to the side. “Can you come closer? I don’t want my friend to hear me. It’s kind of embarrassing and I want to be able to leave this room with whatever dignity I can manage.”  
  
Obliging her, Kevin leaned forward so that her lips were closer to the side of his face.  
  
“I want you to do just one thing,” she whispered, wrapping her legs around his waist to hold him in place.  
  
“What’s that?”  
  
Hesitating for a moment, Jo could practically hear him smiling into her hair from how close she’d forced his body against hers. However, for Jo, her smile faded and her expression turned murderous.  
  
“Die slowly.”  
  
Without warning, Jo opened her mouth wide, turned her face toward his neck and bit down as deeply as she could manage. As soon as her teeth tore into his flesh, blood began to spill out. He gasped instantly in both pain and shock, and she wouldn’t let go. When she began to gag on his blood which was spilling into her mouth, she pulled her face back; ripping a chunk away the same as Rick had done to that Claimer just before Terminus.  
  
Kevin rolled off her and she released her legs from around him as he began to bleed out from the gaping wound in his neck. Spitting the chunk of flesh from between her teeth down upon him, Jo rolled away from him and struggled to pull herself up to her knees without the help of her bound hands. Hunched forward slightly, she was able to force herself upright and stand on both feet as she turned to look around the room briefly before glancing back down at him struggling to suppress his hands to his wound.  
  
“The more you thrash, the faster you’ll die,” she whispered, looking away from him as he still attempted so somehow prevent his impending death. “Just let it happen naturally, _princess_.”  
  
Spitting excess blood from her mouth, Jo darted across the room as quiet as a mouse, thankful Kevin was dying quietly on the floor from not being able to shout for help, let alone gasp for air. All he could do was choke on his own blood and wait for death.  
  
Jo, meanwhile, had no time to waste as she turned her back to the table and reached for one of the knives Kevin had set down. Gripping the handle with one hand, she tipped the blade upward and pressed it against the necktie binding her hands together and struggled with cutting at the silken material as she watched Kevin’s body begin to tremor and the last sounds of his death rattle filtered into the air of the backroom.  
  
The moment his body stilled was the moment the necktie loosened and began to unravel. Dropping the knife back down onto the table, Jo wrestled her hands free and gave her wrists a brief rub as soon as she could pull them around to her front. Her next move was to put her underwear and pants back on, and then slip into her boots; the latter two she nimbly zipped up.  
  
Completely redressed and still sputtering Kevin’s blood from her mouth, Jo grabbed up her sword and reached for the door handle. Turning the lock, she pulled the door open a crack.  
  
“Chris!” Jo called out. “Kevin wants me to tell you it’s your turn.”  
  
A moment of quiet was soon broken by the sound of the younger Wolf muttering to Tara, “You make a run for it, and your friend dies, understand?”  
  
Jo couldn’t hear if Tara responded. She simply stood behind the door, waiting with bated breath.  
  
As Chris’ footsteps became closer and the moment she knew he was at the door, Jo opened it a bit wider and when she knew he was about to step inside and then smacked it hard into his face. In his moment of disorientation from the pain the door caused, Jo threw the door all the way open and stalked out.  
  
In a flurry of motion, he went to raise the gun in his hand at her but Jo was quicker as she shoved the large blade straight through his chest, essentially impaling him. His finger pulled the trigger, but his aim was off and he merely struck the wall off to the side, behind Jo. Slipping the blade of out his chest as he began to teeter on his feet, Jo hauled off and brought the sword’s edge swiftly against his neck, decapitating him in one fell swoop.  
  
His head tumbled off his neck and hit the ground and Jo was sure she saw him manage to blink once before the rest of him slumped to the ground like a sack of potatoes.  
  
Dropping her arms down at her sides, Jo looked at the front of her shirt and saw how covered in blood she was. Part of it was from Kevin and the blood that had sprayed from his neck when she tore the chunk out as well as what had spilled from her mouth. The other part was now the splatter caused from lobbing off Chris’ head as easily as a child swinging his or her bat during a game of baseball.  
  
Looking up briefly as a justifiably stunned Tara, Jo turned back toward the backroom and retreated into it. Setting her sword down for a moment, she grabbed up Finn’s shotgun and stepped over toward Kevin’s dead body, aimed the end of the barrel at his face and pulled the trigger. She refused to pay attention to destruction of his head the blast caused and instead focused on lowering the barrel down toward his dick before pulling the trigger a second time.  
  
The sudden blast from the weapon splattered a bit more blood and chunks of _him_ in a few directions and the sound ricocheted off the walls, which caused a slight ringing in Jo’s ears from it being in such a contained space. Turning around, she set the shotgun down for the moment to pull her scabbard onto her back, pocket her handgun, and the smaller knives, and then she grabbed the shotgun in one hand and lifted her sword up and over to sheath it behind her.  
  
Heading back out into the storefront, Jo stepped over Chris’ body and over to Tara. Crouching down, she gently helped the younger woman up to her feet and removed the gag from her mouth before stepping behind her to untie her wrists.  
  
“Holy _fucking shit_ , Jo,” Tara blurted when she could finally speak freely again. “That was _fucking hardcore_.”  
  
Jo stepped back around to face Tara and wasn’t sure if the brunette was impressed, terrified or both. As Tara walked around her and headed over to the backroom, Jo watched without much thought while Tara stuck her head into the room, with her arms bracing the door frame, and then whipped back around to stare open-mouthed.  
  
“Whoa.” Dropping her hands down at her sides, it was more obvious now to Jo that Tara was shaken by the violence. “What did you do?”  
  
Catching Tara’s eye, Jo shrugged nonchalantly. “What I had to.” With the end of Finn’s shotgun, she pointed toward Chris’ body. “Get your weapons he took from you; the gun, the pocket knife.”  
  
Timidly, Tara obliged. She crouched down and reached for the gun still clamped into Chris’ hand. She then felt around his pockets for where he’d tucked away her pocket knife with such an uneasy expression on her face. Once she stood back up, she hurried back over toward Jo.  
  
“Did he—?” she began to ask, watching how Jo was looking down at the shotgun in her hand. “Did the other one…?”  
  
“No,” was Jo’s curt response, her eyes lingering toward the dirty tile floor as several thoughts ran through her mind. “He didn’t get the chance.”  
  
Chewing on her the inside of her bottom lip, Jo’s nostrils flared as the gravity of what she’d had to do began to sink in. But, she refused to let it cloud her thoughts just yet. Not when they needed to get back to their family. Not when she needed to get back to Rick.  
  
With a nod of her head, she gestured for Tara to lead the way back outside the building. Hovering in the doorway once she reached it, Jo cast a look back inside. “They called themselves the Wolves, right?”  
  
Tara looked back at Jo and nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“If those two inside don’t make it back to the group they were going to take us to, the other Wolves will probably come looking for them.”  
  
“Maybe, probably,” Tara shrugged and nodded at the same time; feeling like nothing more than a bundle of nerves. “So, we shouldn’t linger around and wait for them to find us. We need to get back to our own people.”  
  
“We will,” Jo agreed. She hesitated some more, though. “Those messages we saw yesterday and today…they were warnings.” Focusing her gaze on Tara, she steeled her expression. “We should give the rest of them a warning of our own.”  
  
“What—no. Let’s just get out of here.”  
  
“We will,” Jo repeated.  
  
Without another word, she slipped back inside the building, leaving Tara outside, looking around anxiously in case any walkers or maybe even more Wolves happened by. Moments later, Jo returned, holding Chris’ head. Sauntering over toward a white, Ford Bronco that was no more than ten years old, Jo set her brother’s shotgun down across the hood. She then placed the palm of her right hand against the bloody underside of Chris’ severed head and began to spell out a message with his blood along the side of the car, which raised Tara’s curiosity, despite wanting to just get the hell out of Dodge.  
  
“Wolves beware. The Survivors are near,” Tara read once Jo had finished.  
  
Turning to look at the younger woman, Jo nodded and set Chris’ head on the hood and grabbed the shotgun back up.  
  
“Alright, let’s go.”  
  
Not waiting for Tara, Jo began walking away toward the road to head back the way she remembered them coming from not even an hour earlier.  
  
And what a fucking crazy hour it had been, was Tara’s thought process.

 

* * *

  
  
“The footprints lead toward that road right there,” Daryl commented, after they had been meandering through the woods on what felt like a wild goose chase.  
  
Rick looked down at the four different pairs of footprints they had been following and then looked up toward the gap in the trees and the pavement beyond them. Leading the way, Rick stepped out from amidst the coverage of nature and looked to his left and to his right. He was drenched in sweat by now, partially from heat and overexertion, and partially from his nerves getting the better of him.  
  
“How the hell do we know which way they went?” Rick asked; his nerves all but shot. He blinked away the few tears that began forming along his lids and threatened to fall, and then turned to look to his right with his hands on his narrow hips.  
  
“We could split up. Merle and I will go left, you and Daryl go right,” Michonne suggested.  
  
As she and the Dixon brothers waited for a response, Rick let out a sigh and turned his gaze down toward the pavement. After a moment of consideration, he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. Th-that’s good. We’ll cover more ground that way.”  
  
“Or we could just stand here and wait for Jo and Tara to make their way back to us,” Merle quipped, which garnered the dirtiest scowl from Rick.  
  
“You know I can’t just stand her and—”  
  
“Shut up and turn the fuck around, Rick,” Merle cut him off.  
  
Letting out a huff of frustration, Rick tore his eyes away from the older Dixon and turned to look up the left side of the road to see two figures rounding a corner and heading in their direction. Due to the late afternoon sun beating down on him, Rick had to shield his eyes as well as squint, but dropped his hand immediately and felt as if his heart was going to burst out of his chest.  
  
“ _Jo_!” he shouted, tearing off up the road and passing those vehicles spray painted with the Wolves Not Far messages. As he neared her, he saw how much blood she was covered in, as if she’d taken a bath in it and his eyes widened in horror. Reaching for her, he manhandled her as gently as possible to inspect her for bite marks or scratches. “Oh God, Jo—what happened? Are you bit?”  
  
“She’s not bit,” Tara spoke for her.  
  
Not caring about the blood transferring onto him, Rick snaked his arms around Jo’s waist and pulled her into a loving embrace. “I was so scared,” he muttered against her ear. “I didn’t know what happened to you, if you were okay or not.”  
  
When he pulled back to look her in the face, he could see she wasn’t really reacting to anything he’d said and that her body was starting to tense under his touch. The frown lines from worry didn’t leave his forehead as he brought his hands to either side of her face.  
  
“Jo? What happened?”  
  
“Two men,” Tara answered. “They called themselves Wolves. It’s their messages we were seeing. They took us, bound our hands, gagged our mouths, and brought us to an old gas station. They wanted to take us back to wherever the rest of their people are.”  
  
Rick cast his eyes over toward the brunette. “What happened there? Why is Jo covered in all this blood?”  
  
Exhaling a nervous breath, Tara refused to go into the details, mostly for Jo’s sake. While she had been shocked and scared over everything that had happened and what Jo had taken upon herself to do, Tara knew that Jo had put her life and virtue at risk for Tara, and in doing so it had saved both their lives. A strong sense of solidarity kept Tara from admitting the details. She would leave it for Jo to go into when she chose to.  
  
_If_ she chose to.  
  
“She did what she had to do,” Tara replied. Reaching out a hand, she gave Jo’s a squeeze, and then walked off to join Michonne and the Dixons.  
  
“Jo, what happened?” he pressed.  
  
When she finally looked him in the eye, he felt a sense of relief, but it quite short-lived.  
  
“The gas station had plenty of vehicles. I know the signs said no gas, but those Wolves got here from somewhere, and I doubt by walking. One of the vehicles there they might’ve been using. There could be gas. There was van. We could fit plenty of us in there along with our supplies,” she began to ramble. “We can’t keep walking. It’s already taking us longer than it should to get to DC and find Hope.”  
  
His gaze darting back and forth between each of her eyes, Rick’s nerves were still jumpy. He wasn’t used to seeing Jo this clinical and nearly catatonic. “What’s important is you’re okay and getting you back to base,” he insisted. “We can live without vehicles. They’re not really the necessity here. You’re alive, I’m alive, everyone else is alive. We got food, water, clothes on our backs and we can find shelter in a heartbeat. _That’s_ what’s important.”  
  
Focusing her gaze on Rick, she almost nearly glared up at him. “There were vehicles,” she repeated. “I’ll show you.”  
  
Just staring at her, confused with how to handle this sudden change in her, Rick looked over his shoulder at the others. “Merle, c’mere a second.” As the one-handed older Dixon approached, Rick leaned in to continue quietly, “Stay here with Jo while I talk to your brother, okay?” Off the man’s nod, he walked at a quickened pace over to Daryl, Michonne and Tara. First, he eyed Tara with a stern gaze. “Will you _please_ tell me what happened to her?”  
  
Tara frowned. “They…” She shrugged, not wanting to reveal what went down unless Jo chose to say anything about it but seeing torn up Rick seemed about not knowing felt almost worse, and in turn made her feel guilty. “They were gonna rape me,” she admitted in a low voice, which caused the three standing around her to stare back with mild shock and horror. “Jo stopped them by offering herself instead. One of them took her into a backroom and they were gone only a few minutes. Five tops. Then the door opened and Jo called for the other guy, said it was his turn, but just as he got to the door she smacked it in his face and came out of the room covered in blood and she ran the other guy through with her sword and then cut off his head. Then she went back inside and shot the other guy who was already dead.”  
  
“She did that all by herself?” Daryl questioned. “What were you doing?”  
  
“I was tied up.”  
  
Rick got in her face, but in a kind manner. “Was that all that happened?”  
  
“She left a message for anymore Wolves.” Tara looked back at him and then down. “We were talking about The Governor earlier today. And then what just happened with those Wolves, I think it took her back to that place when he kept her locked up. I think her doing what she did today was a way of…I dunno. Closure? But I don’t think she realized how far she would be able to go. I think it scared her. I think that’s why she’s acting the way she is.”  
  
Rick blinked a few times, letting the information wrap around his mind as he stood up straighter and placed his hands on his hips. “Thank you…for telling me.” Looking to Daryl, he nodded. “Head back to the house, keep an eye on things for me. Don’t go into detail with the others about what Jo did, just what they need to know.”  
  
“What are you gonna do?” Michonne asked.  
  
“Jo says that gas station had plenty of vehicles and she’s adamant about us getting some. Right now, I just want to appease her by checking it out, and frankly I think I need to see what went down with my own eyes to better understand why she’s…”  
  
Rick turned and gestured toward Jo who was gripping Finn’s shotgun tightly in her right hand and looking off toward the trees on their right.  
  
“Michonne can take Tara back. I’ll come with,” Daryl offered.  
  
“No, I need you back at the house. I’ll take Merle,” Rick insisted. “If more of those Wolves come by, we need as many of our people there for protection. And if something should happen to me, Jo or Merle, I need you to lead the others. You made me a promise in Atlanta that if anything ever happened to me you’d take care of our people as I would and I need you to hold to that right now.”  
  
“I will.”  
  
“Good, then head back. Jo knows the way to this gas station, so she can show us how to get there.”  
  
“I can go. She shouldn’t have to go back to that,” Tara remarked.  
  
Rick shook his head. “No, I want her near me,” he replied. “I need to keep an eye on her, and if she gets upset about anything I know I can calm her down. She used to wake up with terrible nightmares about The Governor. I’ve seen her flustered and beside herself with that kind of fear that’s hard to shake off right away. And, she’s my wife. It’s my place to take care of her, no matter what.”  
  
Without saying anything else and simply giving a solemn nod to Daryl, Rick walked off back toward Merle and Jo, informing Merle where they were going and then taking Finn’s shotgun from her. Initially, she tightened her grip at the gesture, but then released and let Rick take it from her. As he used the weapon’s strap to throw it over his shoulder, Rick took her bloody right hand in his left and gave it a comforting squeeze.  
  
“Alright, honey, show us to these vehicles.”

 

* * *

  
A half hour later, Rick found himself looking up at the gas station in question and how utterly destroyed most of the outside of it looked. The closer he got toward the building with Jo and Merle, the tenser he got and the more he could feel Jo tensing beside him. Off to the right of the building, he spotted the message Tara had mentioned Jo leaving.  
  
He hadn’t been expecting it to be written in blood on the side of a white, Ford Bronco and for there to be a reanimated severed head with a W on its forehead on the hood. However, he was content in knowing it was the head of a man who would’ve violated her if given the chance and it was something he could live with. With a nod over at Merle, the older man took the hint and walked up to the head, and shoved his bladed prosthetic through to the brain.  
  
Turning his attention to Jo, he saw her looking away, wandering over toward a white, 12-passenger van that was parked near the side of the building, close to the toppled and charred gas pump awning. She peered inside the driver’s side window and unsheathed her sword. Since the all the side windows were tinted, it wasn’t until Jo pulled the door open to reveal a walker in the driver’s seat that Rick understood why she’d removed her weapon. As the walker turned and began to reach for her, Jo just stood there. Rick began to approach, withdrawing his Colt, but then slowed his pace when he realized the walker was still strapped in by its seatbelt and could only attempt to reach for Jo and not actually attack her. Watching his wife return her sword to its scabbard, though, was confusing.  
  
But then he saw the way she pulled out a small knife from one of her pockets and sank it into the walker’s eye socket with a quick jab. Once it was dead for good, Jo reached across its lap and unfastened the seatbelt and began to yank the corpse out of the driver’s seat and let it fall pitifully onto the paved ground below.  
  
Kicking the walker further away from her with her the toe of her boot, Jo then pulled herself up into the driver’s seat. Making a face from the smell that had lingered for a long while due to the dead body and leaned forward to inspect something on the dashboard, just in front of the steering wheel.  
  
“Jo,” Rick called out.  
  
“It’s got three quarters of a full tank. Key’s in the ignition still,” she announced, turning to look back at him.  
  
Slowly, Rick nodded. “Okay. We’ll see if there’s some extra gas in any of these other vehicles that we can top the van off with. How big’s it inside?”  
  
Jo turned around and did a mental count of all the seats including the front two. Glancing back at him, she replied, “Twelve.”  
  
“So then we find a car with enough gas and that’ll fit all of us,” Merle commented. He then gestured to the van. “Can’t be much storage in the back of that beast. We can load up our supplies in the trunk of whatever car we pick.”  
  
Rick looked at the older man and nodded. “Let’s aim for a newer model; something that won’t break down more easily.”  
  
“On it,” Merle insisted, walking off to take a gander at the other cars and trucks abandoned around the gas station.  
  
Stepping over to the opened driver’s side door of the passenger van, Rick returned his Colt to its holster and placed his hand on the side of the vehicle, up closer toward the roof as he peered inside at Jo. “You okay here for a couple minutes?”  
  
Turning to look him in the eye, Jo nodded. “I’m not going anywhere,” she assured. Then, almost as if she was suddenly a bit nervous, asked, “Where are _you_ going?”  
  
“There’s something I need to see,” he replied with a knowing look. Not moving away from her right away, though, Rick held her gaze as he watched how she appeared almost embarrassed. Off her slow, understanding nod, he brought his hand down upon her shoulder and gave it a loving squeeze. “I’ll be right back.”  
  
Moving away from the van, Rick walked back toward the front of the building; throwing a brief look back over toward Jo to make sure she was staying put, only to see that she was leaning forward on the steering wheel with her forehead pressed against it.  
  
Frowning, Rick pulled the glass doors open and stepped almost soundlessly into the building. He saw nothing out of the ordinary at first until he spotted the opened backroom door. Moving toward the back aisle, he immediately spotted a decapitated body lying on the ground in a pool of blood and a puncture wound in its chest. It wasn’t rocket science to determine the body belonged to the head outside on the Bronco’s hood. Lifting his gaze toward the interior of the backroom, he could barely make out a flickering of light from what he could easily assume was some candle that was still lit, and stepping warily into the room, he would find he was correct in his assumption.  
  
On the left was a small table with a single pillar candle upon it, so nothing too exciting there, but on the right was another story.  
  
Lying across two sleeping bags was the other Wolf, naked from the waist down and whose groin area had been destroyed by a shotgun blast. Rick, out of instinct, winced. However, he held no remorse for the man. Letting his eyes wander higher, he saw a gaping wound in the side of the man’s neck and that there was a pretty decent hole in the center of his face.  
  
“Fuck,” Rick muttered, taking in the carnage administered by his beautiful bride.  
  
Letting the police officer in him take over as he inspected the crime scene at hand, he figured there was no way the Wolf would’ve allowed her near the shotgun. It would’ve been kept far away from her reach. He would’ve had her on the ground and if his pants were already off, Jo’s might’ve been as well, and the pit of Rick’s stomach fell at the thought that she might’ve actually been raped again by the sorry excuse of a human being lying at his feet. Tara said Jo and the Wolf hadn’t been in the room for long, but she didn’t tell him whether or not the Wolf had managed to rape Jo. He could’ve been quick about it.  
  
Rick felt sick to his stomach just considering the notion.  
  
If she had been raped again, he could picture how the Wolf might’ve rolled off Jo and then she launched herself at him, caught him unaware and ripped out his throat. Judging by that wound and the dried blood around Jo’s mouth and down her chin, Rick knew she had done to the Wolf what he’d done to the Claimer. If her hands were bound as Tara said they’d been, Jo’s teeth would’ve been her only weapon. And then, as the Wolf bled out, she somehow got hold of the gun. But she would’ve had to free her hands first.  
  
Closing his eyes, Rick brought his hands up to his face and fought back his tears. He stepped back into the doorway and leaned against the frame. Sinking down the length of it, Rick took a minute to just sit there with his knees bent up toward his chest as he ran his hands over his face and then rested his arms over his knees. Inhaling and exhaling a few steadying breaths, Rick cast his gaze back and forth from inside the backroom at the half naked Wolf and outside in the storefront at the headless Wolf.  
  
As he funneled his rage over whatever may or may not have been done to Jo and how he wished he could’ve been the one to fight off the Wolves instead of her, Rick looked up when he heard glass doors opening. He couldn’t see who was walking inside from where he sat on the floor, but the heavy footsteps alerted him to the fact that it was Merle.  
  
Once the older Dixon turned down the aisle closest with a view toward the backroom, he stopped and frowned when he spotted the headless body a couple of feet from Rick.  
  
“Shit,” Merle commented, walking forward toward the man seething with anger over his wife’s bad luck. “Jo can hold her own, there’s no doubt about that.”  
  
“She shouldn’t have to,” Rick retorted, wiping at his nose with the back of his hand.  
  
“No, she shouldn’t, but she can.” Peering his head into the backroom, Merle let out a hiss upon seeing the other Wolf’s decimated crotch, neck and face. “ _Dayum_. The missus don’t play games when she’s fighting back, does she? Remind me to never get on her bad side.”  
  
“It’s not funny, Merle.”  
  
Frowning, Merle took a step back. “Sorry. Just trying to make light of a terrible situation.” After a moment, he added, “I found a car. Looks like it’ll run just fine. Has a half tank of gas in it. A few others have a quarter or less here and there. We can syphon from those and top off the half full car along with the van.”  
  
“Is Jo still in the van?”  
  
“Yeah, she’s just sitting there.”  
  
“I’m scared that whatever happened in this room might’ve…” Rick lingered. “I don’t even know.”  
  
“She ain’t broken.”  
  
Looking down at his hands, Rick shrugged. “I hope not.”  
  
“Believe me when I say what The Governor did to her was worse than whatever happened or almost happened here, and she bounced back from that,” Merle remarked. “And you know why?”  
  
Letting out a sigh, Rick looked upward at Merle. “Why?”  
  
“Because she had you. And we can all be so lucky to have what you two got.” Stepping away from Rick and heading back for the doors, the one-armed Redneck called over his shoulder, “She’ll bounce back from this, too.”

 

* * *

  
After syphoning the gas from several cars and filling up the tanks of the passenger van and a cherry red Toyota Yaris that Merle had chosen, it took just over five minutes to drive away from the gas station and reach the yellow house the group had been staying in. Merle led the way in the van, with the windows rolled down to air out the interior as best as he could, while Rick drove him and Jo back.  
  
Despite the sour mood in the car, it felt wonderful to Rick to be able to travel behind the wheel again and was looking forward to how much quicker they would be able to reach DC now.  
  
Pulling the Yaris into the driveway behind the van, Rick put it into park and then turned off the ignition. He made no move to get out of the car and just looked over at Jo, reaching his right hand out to place it down upon her leg. Part of him was half expecting her to jump at the gesture, but was fully comforted in how she just looked back at him with a sad smile and slipped her hand palm side up under his so that their fingers could entwine.  
  
Offering her a loving gaze, Rick gave her hand a squeeze and pulled it up toward his lips so he could kiss her knuckles.  
  
“I love you,” he spoke quietly.  
  
Her sad smile gave way to a slightly happier one as she gazed at their hands. “I love you more,” she replied.  
  
Rick snickered. “I love you the most.”  
  
Waiting a few moments, he was pleased to see the way her smile became gradually brighter. “I love you the mostest.”  
  
“That’s not even a word.” He kissed her knuckles again. “I’ll let it slide, though,” he added in a teasing tone.  
  
Lowering their hands down across the center console, Rick used his left hand to reach for his door handle. Before he could even open it up, though, Jo gripped tightly onto his hand. Turning to look back at her, he saw the way she immediately began to tense up, so he sat back into his seat.  
  
“Not yet,” she muttered. “I don’t wanna get out just yet.” Looking down at her clothes, she frowned. “I don’t want the others to see me like this or know what I had to do.”  
  
“We’ll stay in here as long as you need to.”  
  
“I don’t need to stay in here that long, just…a few more minutes.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Okay,” he replied, giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. “If you want, you can wait in here and I’ll go inside and find you some new clothes. We’ll go back to that pool across the street so you can clean up.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo agreed. “Okay.”  
  
“Alright.” After a few moments of silence and watching as a few of their group stepped outside to see what was going on, Rick looked over at Jo and released his grip on her hand. “I’ll be right back.”  
  
Jo simply nodded in return and remained inside the car as Rick exited it.  
  
Walking quietly across the lawn, Rick moved to the front steps and headed up to the porch, stepping past Daryl and Karen who were both asking him if everything was okay. He avoided details and muttered a simple reply about Jo having been through a bit of hell and he was going to take her to get cleaned up. He left it at that and headed upstairs without another word. As he went through the dressers and the closets, he couldn’t find any new pants or underwear, but there was a men’s black shirt that seemed like it was something that would fit easily enough on Jo. Plus, if she had to hold onto the shirt for a while, with her pregnancy, it was something she could grow into.  
  
Taking the shirt, he ducked into the master bedroom where he knew he had seen an extra bottle of shampoo and a bottle of body wash. Throwing a clean towel over his shoulder as well, and grabbing a washcloth, Rick exited the bathroom and then the master bedroom; heading down the stairs without saying anything to anyone. Rick made a beeline for the Yaris and walked around to Jo’s side of the car, opening the door while juggling the bottles and washcloth in his free hand.  
  
Once she climbed out, he shut the door for her and placed a hand on the small of her back, leading her down the rest of the driveway and across the street while he knew a few of their group was watching with concern and curiosity.  
  
Quietly they slipped into the backyard to the red brick Georgian-style home, pushing open the gate to the patio and then edging close to the in-ground pool. When Jo turned to face him, she watched as he set the towel on the patio chair and then the bottles and the washcloth on the concrete edge of the pool so it would be easier to reach once they were in the water.  
  
“You don’t have anything else to change into,” she remarked lamely.  
  
“I’m fine.”  
  
Reaching his hands out, he helped her lift her shirt off and then pulled her over toward another patio chair to sit down in as he crouched down so that he could slip her boots off. Looking up at her, Rick watched the way she began to frown when he set her boots aside. She pushed his hands away when he went to help her back up and he just took a step back to give her space.  
  
“I can do the rest. I’m not injured or incapable.”  
  
Her tone was bitter, but he knew that bitterness was not meant for him. It was just the day having gone in a direction she hadn’t wished and was doing her best to get through.  
  
As she began to unzip her jeans and slide them down along with her underwear, Rick began to undress as well. Stepping over to the pool ladder, he waited for her to join him before climbing down first and then pushing aside to give her room to climb down after.  
  
Once they were both submerged in the water, Rick made his way over toward the edge and grabbed for the bottle of body wash. He wasn’t surprised when he turned back toward Jo and saw she had ducked under the surface. He just popped the cap open and squeeze a dollop of the thick liquid into the wash cloth and waited for her to come back up for air. When she did, he offered the cloth to her, which she took and began rubbing at her face and arms with to remove the dried blood from her body.  
  
After a minute or two, Jo tossed the wash cloth out of the pool and stared back at Rick. He could see the way she was suddenly clenching her jaw and pursing her lips, and how the water lining her eyes was not from the pool water but from her tears, that she was ready to break down.  
  
Before the first tear could fall, Rick closed the distance between their bodies, encircling his arms around her back and wrapping her tightly in his embrace. He leaned his face against her and listened as the first sob escaped her lips just as she let her face drop down against his shoulder. Snaking his right hand upward, he cradled the back of her head and just continued to hold her there with him.  
  
As the tears fell and her body shook from sobbing, Rick couldn’t seem to avoid shedding his own tears; of sadness for what she’d gone through today and of happiness that she was alive and made it back to him.  
  
“You’re gonna be okay,” he murmured. Then, mirroring Merle’s earlier statement to him, he added, “You are not broken.”  
  
“No, I’m not broken,” she whispered against his shoulder in agreement.


	44. Arlington

_“Now the people cry and the people moan_  
_And they look for a dry place to call their home_  
_And try to find some place to rest their bones_  
_While the angels and the devils try to make them their own”_  
— Meat Puppets

* * *

  
After a tiresome two days on the road, going almost nonstop, Washington DC came into view. Since leaving the yellow house in the town of South Hill, they group had stuck to the major highways on a hunch that, the closer they got toward formerly densely populated areas, the roads might’ve been cleared by now by other survivors. For the most part, the hunch was right. A vast majority of the cars, trucks, vans and buses abandoned on the roads seemed to have been shoved aside by something large enough, judging by deep dents and scrapes in the sides of the vehicles as if something plowed right through them. Maybe a military vehicle of some kind had been the culprit. Whatever it had been, the group was thankful.  
  
The other hunch was more of a hope; that any herds on the roads would’ve dispersed into the woods or anywhere else beside the road. That wasn’t quite the case and was the main cause of Team Family not making it out of Richmond before nightfall that first night on the road.  
  
Right by Virginia Union University, they found themselves stuck on Interstate 64, just before sunset, as they happened upon a rather large herd. Because they were down to barely a single lane on the interstate with the abandoned cars on either side of them, and the concrete barrier separating the northbound route they were on from the southbound route to their left, they couldn’t turn around. They had to sit still, hunker down and wait for the herd to pass. There was enough room on either side of both vehicles the group was traveling in — the passenger van in the front and the red Yaris behind it — for the walkers to slip by one or two at a time.  
  
It was difficult, having to sit still for so long; five long hours, to be exact.  
  
They had turned off both vehicles to save on gas and then just sat there in virtual silence, except for the radios they discreetly talked through back and forth, so those in the Yaris could be updated on how the herd was coming along in front of the passenger van which Tyreese was driving.  
  
Rick had sat behind the wheel of the Yaris, his knuckles white from gripping the steering wheel too tightly as he glanced Jo subtly at his right. She had been watching the walkers shambling by on her side of the car with her jaw clenched while her right hand gripped the seatbelt strap crossing over her chest. As before, the backseat consisted of Tara, Sophia and Mika; all of whom were sitting just as deathly still to keep any walkers from noticing movement inside the car. If that had happened, just one walker could’ve attracted plenty more and the accumulative weight pressing down on the windows could’ve broken the glass, the walkers would be able to get at them and there would be no way for any of them inside to make a run for it if they wanted to.  
  
The other issue had been the windows being rolled all the way up, and it was a really warm day. Add that with the cumulative body heat in the car, and it was downright sweltering, but Rick couldn’t turn the car back on to roll the windows down even a hair because the engine roaring to life would’ve attracted attention.  
  
The only upside of the stifling heat was that it made breathing more of a chore. Now, normally that would be a problem, but in this case, their breathing slowing down made it easier to fall asleep. And, if they were asleep, they weren’t moving much. Plus, it helped pass the time.  
  
According to his watch, Rick could determine it was just after two-thirty in the morning when the walkie-talkie crackled to life and Merle’s voice came through to let them know the last of the herd was finally trickling by. Rick had jumped from the initial static, and when his eyes popped open and he remembered where they were and why they were there, he stilled; fearing his movements would attract walkers. But then Merle’s words sank in and he quickly lifted the walkie-talkie up and answered back that they should get ready to move again.  
  
They would unfortunately have to travel a bit in the dark, but only until they could pull off the interstate somewhere and find someplace to call home for the rest of the night. They would need some proper rest and to use the bathroom.  
  
After driving an hour and only getting as far as a mile and a half down the interstate, they came upon an off-ramp that brought them immediately right into a residential neighborhood. There was a Clarion Hotel on the left, but it wouldn’t be as easy and quick to clear as a one-story brick ranch.  
  
The passenger van and the Yaris pulled up along the side of the first home on corner where there was no curb and parking was easier. Rick hopped out of the car, checked his Colt and then advised Jo and the girls to remain inside while he went to clear the house with the help of Daryl and Morgan. What with it being such a small house, only the three of them were needed for the task, and even then, two would’ve sufficed. Morgan was the one who offered to tag along with the ringleader and the archer; insisting he needed to get up and move around. Being cramped in that van for so long had his joints feeling sore and tight.  
  
Once they determined the house was clear, after killing one, solitary walker shut in the bathroom, Rick came out and ushered everyone inside, except for Daryl and Michonne who opted to take watch over both their vehicles. With all their supplies stored within both the van and the car, they needed to keep an eye on it all in case anyone strangers happened along and decided to pilfer their hard-earned findings, or even take their vehicles.  
  
They didn’t bother with the bedrooms that night. Instead, they all lay down on the floor of the living room with their blankets. Free from the confines of their vehicles and the stifling heat they’d endured inside, and with there being no sun in the sky, the night air was quite cool and lying on the floor so close to one another kept them warm until they finally awoke several hours later.  
  
Rick and Tyreese, having gotten plenty of sleep, both inside their respective vehicles and inside the house, were rested enough to continue driving again while Daryl and Michonne were quick to fall asleep once the group was back on the road again. They couldn’t backtrack the same way they’d come during the night and ended up having to maneuver around a couple of streets before they found their way to Interstate 64’s closest on-ramp to continue their journey north onto Interstate 95 .  
  
To save on time, they ate in their respective vehicles instead of hanging around at the house to do it. However, they wound up having to stop anyway after two hours to refill both gas tanks with the canisters Rick and Merle had syphoned gas into at that gas station where Jo had gone all Kill Bill on those two Wolves. They would have plenty of fuel to get themselves to DC if there were no other major delays.  
  
About another hour later, they passed a large tower for King’s Dominion amusement park on the right, and Tara muttered something to Sophia and Mika about how her parents had taken her and her sister there one summer when she was about eight or nine years old.  
  
Just outside Fredericksburg, the small convoy was forced to get off the interstate when the road became blocked by too many abandoned cars and there was just no way around them. That part became extra stressful because Rick had to put the car in reverse and drive backward for about ten minutes until he could lead them in the car, as well as the passenger van, back to an off-ramp they had passed earlier. The first onto that off-ramp, Rick was now the leader of the convoy as they made their way onto Route 1.  
  
To help lighten the mood, Tara pointed out a Hooters in the distance, but said nothing more on the subject simply because of Sophia and Mika’s impressionable minds. Jo was still in a relatively somber mood after the what had gone down with the Wolves, but Rick was able to lock eyes with the brunette in the rearview mirror and smirk. Tara only knew he was amused by her sighting by the way his corners of his eyes crinkled and how the hue of his blue eyes seemed to brighten.  
  
Thanks to road signs, since the van had the paper map they’d been following, Rick was able to turn off Route 1, and make his way down a different four-lane road that led to an on-ramp back onto Interstate 95.  
  
They passed Stafford, Virginia an hour and half later, but came to an abrupt stop when Rick slammed on the breaks, causing Merle to throw some expletives at them via the walkie-talkies. But there had been a very good reason for the stop.  
  
Straight ahead, Interstate 95 lay before them. On the right, was an off-ramp for an Exit 143A, but that wasn’t what was so important.  
  
It was the message spray-painted in black over the exit sign.

 ** _RICK, KEEP GOING TOWARD DC_**  
**_SHANE_**

When Jo realized what the sign said, she jumped out of the car faster than lightning and collapsed to her knees on the grass below the sign. Without warning, she started to cry; her entire body hunching forward at this happy news.  
  
After nearly a month of separation from her daughter, this was the first tangible evidence that her daughter was alive since the first sign they’d seen before they made their way into Atlanta.  
  
Rick had climbed out of the car after turning it off and putting it into park. He was at Jo’s side without hesitation; pulling her back up to her feet and into his arms as they cried happy tears together.  
  
With renewed vigor, everyone returned to their vehicles after taking a brief celebratory moment at knowing their journey was nearing its end. Rick continued to lead their convoy, as he had been since that backtrack a little while before, and increased his speed, despite the narrowness of their path from abandoned vehicles.  
  
As if by some sort of divine intervention, the three-lane highway headed north toward DC seemed to clear up considerably. Their route began to curve after a while; to their left they saw the Pentagon and beyond that, in the distance, they could see the Washington Monument standing tall. Any further traffic they encountered was heading in the opposite direction, from all those poor souls that had made the attempt to flee the nation’s capital after the outbreak began. Traveling toward the capital was relatively smooth sailing and everyone in both the Yaris and the passenger van was alight with happy chatter.  
  
As soon as they made their way onto the Arland D. Williams, Jr. Memorial Bridge, Rick brought the car to a stop again and placed it in park, which confused not only those in the van but Jo as well.  
  
“Why are we stopping right here?” she asked him.  
  
“It’s Shane.”  
  
“What about him?”  
  
Holding a hand up for her to give him a minute, Rick climbed out of the car again and signaled to Tyreese, who turned the ignition off to the van and climbed out as well.  
  
“What’s up?” the larger man asked, looking around cautiously in case of trouble.  
  
Jo followed suit, as well as almost everyone else, in order to hear whatever was weighing on Rick’s mind.  
  
Looking over his shoulder toward DC, Rick placed his hands on his hips and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “If I know Shane at all, he wouldn’t have gone directly into the city. I don’t know why he came all this way, but I do know he wouldn’t risk going into a hot zone that could be crawling with a ton of walkers or other unpleasant factions alike. I’m not saying it’s not possible he’s there, but my gut is telling me that if he came this way with Hope, he would’ve sought shelter on the outskirts of the city, somewhere with fortifications. Protecting Hope, keeping her safe, would be his first thought.”  
  
Daryl nodded in agreement. “We don’t know who or what might be hanging out in that city either,” the archer piped up, lighting up a cigarette and bringing it to his lips. “We can’t just go waltzing into those streets without a game plan.”  
  
“Exactly,” Rick remarked. Throwing a look over at Jo, he saw that she understood what he was getting at despite her anxiousness to find their daughter. “Shane and Hope could be anywhere within a five mile radius of here. We gotta do this right and play it safe. We gotta find a place to set up as our base of operations, where we can rest at night and work out where we look first. We’ll use our map and we break up into groups, clearing neighborhood after neighborhood, for however long it takes. I just hope ya’ll are okay with that.”  
  
Merle snorted and shrugged. “S’not like we got anything better to do. And we didn’t come all this way just to sit back on our asses and enjoy the historic sights.”  
  
Rick nodded in appreciation. Off everyone else’s obvious like-mindedness, Rick pointed north along the George Washington Memorial Parkway. “We’ll head up that road there along the river, head a bit more north of this immediate area and hopefully find something a bit more residential. DC’s gonna be our home for the foreseeable future so we gotta find someplace with actual beds, but in an area that’s secure and not directly accessible to just anyone.”  
  
“Unless we got a moat filled with fire, anyone and anything can get through any barrier we’d create,” Finn offered up. “We can find a small hotel. I’ve cleared one before, I can do it again.”  
  
“A hotel in an area like this, though?” Nicole questioned rhetorically. “You know how many people fled from across the river and probably hid out in the hotels on this side. All those that are probably dead and just waiting for idiots like us to wander inside thinking we can take it. Lightning doesn’t strike twice, Finn.”  
  
“I don’t hear _you_ offering up any suggestions.”  
  
“Townhouses,” she blurted, placing her hands on her hips. “Places like this — DC, Boston, Philadelphia, New York — are known for their townhouses in residential neighborhoods. Or rowhouses; whatever you wanna call ‘em. We find one or two to share between all of us. It’ll give us the height to see pretty far because most are typically about three stories high. Two of ‘em might share a front stoop. We can barricade off the street with cars parked perpendicularly.” The redheaded nurse looked away from Finn, toward the parkway and then to Rick before shrugging. “We can do it. It’s worth a shot.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Nicole’s right. While I’ve no doubt in your abilities to clear another hotel, Finn, I think the last one left a bit of a bad taste in most of our mouths.” He tossed a glance over at Jo, who was resting her hands on the top of her side of the car and was squinting back at him from the late afternoon sunlight. “Now, we got about three, three and a half more hours of sunlight and I don’t want us to have to be rushing to find someplace to stay in the dark. We lucked out last night with that house right off the off-ramp from the interstate. Like Nicole said: lightning doesn’t strike twice.”  
  
“So, let’s stop wasting daylight and get our asses moving again,” Merle commented, already two steps ahead and slipping back into the passenger van’s passenger seat where he’d been riding shotgun since the day before as Tyreese’s navigator.  
  
Nodding at the others, Rick turned and stepped back to the opened door of his car but didn’t step right in. Straight ahead there was a single walker shuffling toward them, but it was just one and it was still several feet away so it posed no threat to them at all. Throwing a look over the top of the car at Jo, he found her easily looking back at him before they slid back inside the car and closed their doors.  
  
Glancing over his shoulder at Tara and the girls, Rick gave them a smile and then brought his attention back to Jo. He reached his hand across the middle console and took entwined his fingers with hers.  
  
“We’re close,” he muttered reassuringly when he glimpsed the doubt staining her features.  
  
She simply nodded. “I know. But that’s what makes it worse. She’s close and we can’t exactly do anything about it right now. It’s like dangling a carrot in front of a horse’s face to get it to keep going, but it never gets the carrot.”  
  
Rick flashed Jo an insistent smile. “We’re gonna get that carrot.”  
  
Jo squeezed his hand and smiled back. “Sooner rather than later, I hope.”  
  
Lifting Jo’s hand, Rick leaned in and kissed her knuckles before leaning in closer and kissing her lips. When he removed his hand from hers, he brought it up to the key in the ignition and turned the car back to life, put it into gear and made a U-turn. Tyreese started the van back up as well and brought it around to follow after Rick; letting the blue-eyed leader take lead again. He drove a couple hundred feet back the way they came and then made a sharp turn to take the Exit 10C off-ramp which brought them onto the parkway.  
  
Once driving a straight route again, Rick claimed Jo’s left hand in his right and held it over the middle console as they passed brown signs indicating Arlington Cemetery and a Memorial Bridge up ahead. On their right were magnificent views of the Delaware River and Washington DC; making them forget for a few moments that the world had fallen apart.  
  
What had quickly snapped them back to reality was the sight of three walkers feasting on some young man wearing a backpack on the side of the road.  
  
As the parkway curved around a northern neighborhood of Arlington, Rick found another route to take them off the parkway and head in toward what he believed would be residential, and he would be more or less correct. Driving onto the North Sprout Run Parkway, Rick eventually made a left turn onto a Lee Highway where their convoy was immediately greeted by the sight of large, red brick apartment buildings on either side of the road. The entire strip of roadway seemed littered with different apartment buildings here and there, but nothing exactly seemed safe to him. Rick was aiming for something like a cul de sac of sorts, which he’d only reach by getting off the main road and taking some side streets.  
  
After passing a 7 Eleven that looked to have been looted ten times over and then set on fire at some point, Rick saw some townhouses blocked by a considerable amount of tree coverage. Slowing the car down, he removed his hand from Jo’s and grabbed for the walkie. Turning it on, he brought it to his lips, while making a steady left turn onto the side street next to the townhouses.  
  
“I think this is gonna be the area for us,” he spoke. Removing his thumb from the button, he waited for a response.  
  
“ _Just keep leading the way_ ,” came Tyreese’s response.  
  
With a smirk, Rick turned the walkie off and set it down in the middle console while simultaneously watching where he was driving. He kept going down the same road, looking at a string of townhomes here and some apartment buildings there and then realized he had to slam on his breaks because the street was a dead end. Backing up and turning the car around, Rick retraced his steps and the van was forced to do the same.  
  
“ _What the flying fuck, Rick?”_ Merle called out over the airwaves.  
  
Rick didn’t bother replying; he just focused on finding another side street, which he didn’t and cursed himself for it. Heading back toward the main road, he turned left to continue in the direction they’d all been originally headed. Merle piped up again, asking what the hell was going on and why where they were wasn’t good enough.  
  
Jo grabbed the walkie-talkie before Rick could and brought it to her lips. “I thought you said you had nothing better to do, Dixon?”  
  
Rick smirked as he looked at her.  
  
When no immediate response came, Jo smirked as well and added, “What—cat got your tongue? Got no smartass remarks now?” With a roll of her eyes, Jo turned in her seat and looked out the back window toward the van where she could just barely make out Merle sitting in the passenger seat with his feet propped up against the dashboard and his bladed prosthetic dangling out the rolled down passenger door window. “Just keep your panties on, alright?”  
  
Turning the walkie-talkie off, Jo let it drop into her lap and then reached her left hand out to toy with the curls at the base of Rick’s neck. Stretching his right arm out toward her, he patted her thigh and then just left his hand there.  
  
Not as content as he thought he’d be with that initial area, Rick kept going forward winding around east along the Custis Memorial Parkway until he came to an intersection with a building labeled the Air Force Association on the corner to his immediate left. Straight ahead just seemed like more roadway they would lead them away from and residential area, so this side street they’d come upon felt like a last ditch effort. Turning left down it, though, he was pleasantly surprised to find townhouse after townhouse lining both sides of the street.  
  
This was exactly what he was hoping for.  
  
Winding around the narrow street, Rick came to a dead end, but this one was okay. In fact it was rather perfect. On the left were the homes, complete with garages on the ground floor they could pull their vehicles into as long as they were empty. Directly in front of them at the dead end and on the right was a steep drop with a view down to the Air Force Association building.  
  
For the time being, Rick pulled the Yaris into the driveway of the second last home and parked. Cautiously, he climbed out of the car and looked back toward the road where Tyreese had parked the van out front instead of pulling that beast into the short driveway next door.  
  
“I think these two will be good enough,” he called out as Tyreese hopped out of the van. “We’ll clear this end unit first. Tomorrow morning we’ll work on clearing next door so we have extra room to spread out. We’ll spend the rest of the day going over the map of and figure out the areas we’re gonna clear as we go.” Rick said all this as everyone was climbing out of both vehicles. “We’ll split up into small groups, check each floor tonight. It’ll go quicker that way.”  
  
“What if it ain’t safe? What if there’s too much for our group to clear?” Karen wondered.  
  
Rick stared back at her. “It’ll work out. Places like these got evacuated early on. They’re too clean.” He gestured up at the homes and around the street. “There’s no garbage or debris. Whoever lived in these homes packed up quick and left, or they died inside.” Rick shrugged. “Either way, this is gonna work for us.”  
  
“We should check out the other homes, too,” Jo commented. “Don’t just keep an eye out for the usual items like food and water; that goes without saying. But keep an eye out for big tickets items that’ll be important, like portable generators or propane gas stoves.”  
  
“Also, candles. Lots of candles,” Mika contributed with a smile. “Especially if they smell like roses. No vanilla. Vanilla candles make me sick.”  
  
Jo chuckled, pulling the girl against her side. “Girl after my own heart,” she quipped, looking down at the top of Mika’s head. “Are you sure I didn’t give birth to you?”  
  
When Jo looked up and over toward Rick, she found him already staring at her with a small smile, but also as if he was momentarily lost in thought. Snapping out of whatever reverie was distracting him, he removed his Colt from its holster and checked it, but then returned it again. Stepping around to the back of the Yaris, he popped the trunk open by way of the button on the key fob and reached inside to remove his machete.  
  
“We’ll split up into pairs; each pair will take a floor. Once the entire house is clear, we’ll bring our shit inside,” Rick informed, looking around at all the faces.  
  
“You think there might be a basement?” Milo wondered.  
  
“Looking to score some more wine like the other house?” Michonne teased, grabbing her sheathed katana from inside the van where she’d been sitting. She removed the sword but still placed it’s the leather carrying strap around her for safekeeping when she determined she would no longer need the weapon once the house was cleared.  
  
“Ha ha,” Milo replied sarcastically. “No, I was just thinking that if there’s a basement that makes five floors to check, ten of us total going in and six staying out here with the vehicles.”  
  
Rick adjusted his utility belt and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, and?”  
  
The bearded blonde shrugged. “Just wondering who all is gonna go inside and who with.”  
  
“Well, I think goes without saying that my weak ass will be staying behind,” Jen spoke up from where she was leaning against the grill of the van. She looked tired still, but her face had more color than it had a week ago. Perhaps resting in that yellow house really had been just the trick to put her back on the path to healing better. “I’ll stay with the girls again,” she added, nodding toward Mika and Sophia, and then pointing over at Piper.  
  
“Actually, can I come?” Sophia asked, looking between Rick and Jo for permission. “All I ever do is sit around and wait while everyone else gets to scavenge. I wanna do more. I wanna do my part.”  
  
Rick nodded, placing a hand against the back of her head and dragging it down to the space between her shoulder blades. “Yeah, okay,” he relented. “Get your knife. We don’t want to use guns and waste bullets if we don’t have to.”  
  
Sophia nodded and hurried around to the back passenger side seat where she’d been sitting behind Jo in the car. There had been a backpack at her feet the entire time and now she dug into it and withdrew a sheathed bowie knife with leg strap that she immediately began to put on. Rick looked at her with approval and then glanced over her head toward his brother-in-law.  
  
“Finn, would you mind taking Sophia with you?”  
  
“Sure thing,” the younger man acquiesced. “After all, she _is_ kinda sorta my niece or whatever now.”  
  
Jo chuckled at her brother but then turned and eyed Rick as she gestured between her and him. “You and I.”  
  
“You know it,” he nodded with a smile. Shooting an impish look over at Milo, he asked, “Alright, Rain Man, how many more people does that leave?”  
  
“Oh, _so_ funny.” With a roll of his eyes, he added, “Three more groups of two.”  
  
Smirking, Rick began to dole out the pairings. “Michonne, Morgan. Daryl, Milo—”  
  
Daryl could be heard grumbling under his breath about something no one could quite make out, but from the look Rick gauged from the archer, he knew the other man wasn’t exactly keen with who his partner was. At least Daryl made no further show of his displeasure as he sidled up next to Milo and hoisted his crossbow onto his back.  
  
“And…Merle and Tara.” Stepping up to Tyreese, Rick placed a hand on the other man’s large bicep. “Hope you’re okay sitting this out. I just figure you’ve been driving all day.”  
  
“So have you,” Tyreese countered, although he didn’t seem at all bothered at the idea of hanging back; not when he had his ladylove at his side.  
  
Rick shrugged and tilted his head. “Yeah, but I’ve never been one to sit still for too long.” Tyreese just nodded and clapped a hand upon Rick’s back, as Rick made his way over toward Nicole. “You’re on nurse duty for Jen and Karen. I also want you on communications duty. If something goes wrong in there, for whatever random reason, and you can’t get to us and we need to pull off some medical miracle without you, I’ll need you at the ready to talk us through whatever we’d have to do.”  
  
Nicole nodded. “Got it.”  
  
“Jen, why don’t you use the backseat of the car and stretch out a bit.”  
  
“Gladly,” Jen smirked, slowly sauntering over toward the red vehicle.  
  
“Piper,” Rick called out, turning around to glimpse where the other teen girl was and finding her standing off to the side behind Karen with her arms folded across her chest and what looked to be a faint, moody teenage scowl on her face. Knitting his brow together in concern, he leaned more toward her direction. “There a problem?”  
  
Instantly, the girl blinked rapidly and snapped out of whatever funk she was in and actually looked almost terrified of Rick for a moment. “What—oh. No. Sorry, I was just daydreaming.”  
  
“Alright,” Rick accepted her answer. “Do me a favor and keep an eye on Mika.”  
  
“I can keep an eye on myself,” Mika insisted.  
  
Rick looked over his shoulder at his youngest adoptive daughter and chuckled. “I’m sure you could, but right now I’d feel better with an extra pair of eyes on such precious cargo.” Walking up to the ten-year-old, he placed a hand on the side of her face and leaned down to kiss the top of her head. “Get your own knife out and keep it on you just in case,” he added with a whisper. “If something happens, though, shut yourself in the car, okay?”  
  
Mika nodded obediently. “Okay.”  
  
“Good.” Looking around at the others, trying to figure if he missed anything or anyone, he let his eyes pan up toward the sunlight filtering through the trees lining the dead end road. Bringing his gaze back down, he looked upon the pairs standing around, waiting. “Alright, Jo and I will take the top floor. Daryl and Milo can have the basement in cast there’s wine,” he remarked with a teasing smirk.  
  
“Aww, c’mon man, stop busting my balls.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “You make it easy, Milo.” Then, he continued without missing a beat, “Morgan and Michonne, take the garage/ground floor…whatever you wanna call it. Tara and Merle, the second floor. Finn and Sophia can take the third. That okay with everyone?”  
  
Off each respective nod, Rick gripped his machete and, with a wink to Jo, headed for the front door.  
  
Cautiously, he turned the handle to see if it was unlocked, as most houses seemed to be these days, but found it actually _was_ locked. With a shake of his head, Rick glanced over at Daryl who moved around the front of the Yaris and crouched down to grab the handle at the bottom of the garage door and grunted as he bent at the knees while hoisting the sonofabitch up. Milo was at the archer’s side without being asked and helped lift the door up. With a bit of a shove upward, they were able to send the door rolling along on its track along the garage ceiling. Just off to the side, within the garage, was a door that no doubt led inside to the house. Rick stepped into the garage and grabbed that knob and turned it, finding it was unlocked and letting out a noticeable breath of relief through his nostrils.  
  
Because he and Jo were heading straight up to the top floor, he stepped through the door with her first; both with their respective blades raised and at the ready. Jo had kept her sword and scabbard at her feet the entire drive; finding comfort in having it close in case she needed it at a moment’s notice. While Rick had been divvying out partners, she had grabbed the sword out of its scabbard, slid the scabbard onto her back and taken the sword into her hand. Along with her sword, she had also clipped the walkie-talkie from within the car onto her belt. She was now just as ready for anything as Rick was.  
  
Finn and Sophia were right behind the couple, followed by Merle and Tara. While the latter pair stopped as soon as they reached the second floor, the others continued on; parting ways once Finn and Sophia made it to the third floor. Rick and Jo continued upward to the fourth and top floor and, by the time they had, they were nearly out of breath from all the stairs. They were both active people, but very unused to ascending so many stairs and the kind of exertion that went along with it.  
  
Looking around, there were only two doors on either side of them once they cleared the stairs and were standing in the upper hallway. Reaching for the door to their right, Rick yanked it open and was prepared to stab anything in the head if it lunged at him. However, nothing happened.  
  
They found themselves merely staring at a gated elevator shaft for an elevator that didn’t run anymore.  
  
Turning to look at each other, they both refrained from smirking, despite wanting to. They had a floor to clear. Joking around could wait until later.  
  
“There’s another floor up there,” Jo pointed out, gesturing to how the stairs twisted around to yet another level they hadn’t been able to notice from outside at ground level.  
  
Rick nodded, having already noticed the stairs as well. “We’ll give it a look after we clear this floor.”  
  
Pushing open the only other door, Rick stepped across the threshold first and was greeted by a rather comfortable-looking master bedroom. The front window looked out to the street below and just barely had a view over the treetops of downtown Arlington directly ahead. To the left, if he peered enough, Rick could just barely make out the river and the tops of buildings in DC.  
  
As Jo came into the room behind him, she tapped the point of her sword against a bare spot on the wall and clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth a few times. Rick turned, looked at her, and both stood still…waiting.  
  
Moving forward, Jo led the way through from the bedroom and into a dressing area. Along the way were two doors, of which she opened the first and peered inside, only to determine it was a walk-in closet. Rick slipped past her and opened the door at her right, only to realize it was a second walk-in closet, and both were void and anything that might want to kill them. Directly ahead of them now was one last door and, since Rick was closest, he turned the knob and opened it.  
  
On the other side of the door was a master bathroom, complete with his and her sinks, a soaking tub, a glass-enclosed shower stall and a toilet. Basic, run-of-the-mill master bathroom stuff. There was nothing out of the ordinary, no dead bodies or disgusting smells. It was clean and brightly lit from the sunlight filtering in through the large window.  
  
Sauntering out of the bathroom, Jo purposely bumped her shoulder against Rick’s and smirked at him as she slipped into the dressing area. “I don’t know about you,” she muttered, gesturing at the bedroom toward the front, “but I say we call dibs on this entire floor.”  
  
Rick stepped out into the dressing area behind her, leaving the bathroom door open so more light extended in. “It’s more space than we need.”  
  
Jo gestured to where a desk and a book shelf occupied two, perpendicular walls. “We get rid of those and we have room for two cribs; one for Hope and one for the new baby. We can take the books off the shelf, move the shelf over to that wall,” she turned pointing to the space between the walk-in closets’ doors, “and stock it with supplies, like diapers, wipes…butt paste.” Lifting her sword over her head, Jo sheathed it into its scabbard on her back and then brought her hands to her stomach as tears stung at her eyes. When she brought her gaze from the bare wall between the closet doors to Rick, she pouted slightly. “This can be our home. We can make this work. We’re close to the river. We can fill up water into buckets, transport it back here to boil to make safe for drinking and cooking with, and bathing in. We can raise our family here.” Jo and Rick stepped closer to each other and she welcomed his embrace when he encircled his left arm around her shoulders and pulled her face toward his chest. “We can be happy here.”  
  
Rick nodded.  
  
He wanted to be more pragmatic about the likelihood of this home being only a waystation until they found Hope and Shane. He didn’t want them to get to comfortable and to raise their hopes in case this all fell through, but he couldn’t deny how well this place really _could_ work. There were plenty of selling points working in their favor.  
  
“We wouldn’t all have to share just this house or the one next door. We could spread out even more on this street,” Rick commented, pressing his lips to her temple before parting from her. “Tyreese and Karen could take a house for themselves and their growing family. Finn and Jen, and probably Milo would take another. Nicole could set up a sort of infirmary to work out of in another house. She could live in whatever house that would be with probably Michonne, Piper and Tara. Merle, Daryl and Morgan could take a house, and Shane if we find him and Hope.”  
  
“Sophia and Mika could each take one of the bedrooms downstairs.”  
  
Rick nodded. “We really _could_ make this place work.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
Maintaining his gaze upon her, Rick dropped his arm from around her shoulders and let his hand slip down to rest upon her lower back. “Let’s check what’s up above,” he suggested, somewhat changing the subject, but not intentionally.  
  
Letting him take lead, Jo followed behind him as they slipped back out of the bedroom and into the fourth floor gallery to stand at the foot of the stairs leading upward. Rick continued in going first, rounding a landing before reaching the uppermost floor which had windows looking directly out onto a rooftop deck. Like on the master suite floor, there was a door to a gated, out-of-work elevator, which was no doubt all the way down at the garage level or lower; in the basement. To their right was a room that turned out to be a half-bath and to their left was the door leading out onto the deck.  
  
Together they stepped outside and were greeted by a cool, blustering breeze. Immediately in front of them was a deck chair and a covered hot tub, which no doubt contained plenty of water that they could boil to use for drinking, cleaning up and cooking with. Even if they could get it running, soaking in a hot tub, as lovely as it would be, was not a necessity. Toward the back were an outdoor table and an outdoor kitchen, as well as a black, cast iron wood chiminea.  
  
The view was also much better from up there. The back of the rooftop deck had a clear view of the river and Georgetown University. From the front, they could see more easily toward Arlington, even making out the cemetery with ease and, most importantly, most of DC was more visible. They could make out the Washington Monument still, but also the Lincoln Memorial and the dome to the Capitol Building.  
  
It was truly breathtaking and, again, for a moment, they both were able to forget the kind of world they were living in now.  
  
Rick and Jo could easily forget all the bad things and pretend they were just normal newlyweds who’d never ripped anyone’s throats out with their teeth, and that had just bought this amazing home with its amazing views to raise their family in. In this little fantasy, perhaps Rick had taken a job in DC, working with the FBI, having moved on up from his dinky, small town career as a Sheriff’s Deputy. And maybe Jo had taken a position working for the Department of Education, or the Smithsonian…something grandiose compared to her former life as a first grade teacher in Decatur.  
  
Sheathing his machete through a loop on his utility belt, Rick took the opportunity to step behind Jo and encircle his arms around her waist. Pressing his front to her back, he rested his hands upon her stomach and leaned his face forward over her shoulder so he could press his bearded cheek to her smooth cheek.  
  
They just stood there, admiring the way the sun was drawing closer to the horizon; casting hues of orange off the homes and buildings both nearby and in the distance.  
  
“Hope’s out there somewhere,” Jo muttered. “She’s waiting for us.”  
  
Rick went to say something in response, but words seemed lost on him. He hadn’t actually known what he’d intended to say, and now the feeling had passed, so he pressed his lips back together and just her words marinate between them both instead.  
  
“ _Rick! Jo!_ ” Finn’s voice carried from somewhere down below. “ _Where are you two?_ ”  
  
“Up here,” Rick replied, finally finding some words to say.  
  
A few moments later, Finn appeared in the doorway out onto the rooftop deck. “Whoa. I didn’t know this was up here.”  
  
“Neither did we.”  
  
“And look—a hot tub.”  
  
“Which we’re gonna use the water from for practical purposes.”  
  
Finn snickered jokingly. “Party pooper.”  
  
That brought a smile to Jo’s lips.  
  
As the three of them stared out at the view of DC in the distance, Sophia appeared as well with a big grin on her face. “Oh, cool,” she muttered, admiring the view. “It’s so pretty.”  
  
“Not half as pretty as you two,” Rick quipped, pulling his surrogate teen daughter over so that he could hold both her and Jo in his arms.  
  
Sophia simply rolled her eyes in typical teenage fashion, but her pleased smile was enough to express how happy she was by the comment. Jo, too, found much solace in this moment. She was able to further push away the events of South Hill with the Wolves that had been plaguing her for mind and spirit for several days now. She was able to focus on what lie ahead for them. She was pushing down the bad things in order to make room for good things.  
  
They all were.

* * *

  
All the lower floors were clear and safe in the townhouse, including the garage and even the basement which turned out to be completely furnished with a living space, bathroom and fourth bedroom. There wasn’t running water in the house, though, so if they needed to use a toilet and flush it, they had to add water into the bowl, which definitely helped in having that hot tub on the rooftop deck. Plenty of buckets were filled up and carried to each bathroom on every floor until there was next to nothing left inside the hot tub, which Rick decided to leave uncovered so it would collect more water. It would serve the same basic purpose as the barrels they’d used at the prison for collecting rain water for irrigation and cleaning purposes.  
  
Everyone gathered in the living room of the second floor where Jo laid it out that her and Rick would be taking the top floor for themselves and no one seemed bothered in the least. There was still just enough daylight left to clear the second townhouse, which was technically the third from the end, but after a day of traveling, everyone was tired and just wanted to call it an early evening. They’d carried all their belongings into the townhouse and more or less dropped it all here and there. All they had in food was brought into the kitchen, weapons were laid out on the dining room table and blankets were set down around the living room. Any and all medical supplies were left on the coffee table and then the stomachs began to growl.  
  
With having no fresh food in the form of squirrel or rabbit, which Daryl was typically able to hunt, they had to rely only on the canned goods they’d brought with them or what they’d found left behind in the house, which was lacking. Either the previous owners took most of it with them, or someone else came through and cleared the house at some point before them. However, judging by the locked front door, the group assumed it was the previous owners. Anyone scavenging wouldn’t have cared to lock up after they left. Plus, aside from dust, the house was just too clean for anyone to have been rifling through. The family that lived there before took what they could and left.  
  
As everyone settled in for the night, eating canned whatever, Jo was wandering around the living room, glancing at picture frames that were void of pictures.  
  
“There’s no photo albums, no pictures,” she muttered when she sensed Rick coming up beside her with a can of baked beans in one hand and spoon in the other.  
  
“The family took it all with them. Lori did that when Shane got her and Carl out of King County.” He shoved the spoon into the can, scooped a helping out and shoveled it into his mouth. After chewing a bit, he swallowed it back and licked the spoon clean. “When I made my way home from the hospital, I realized the pictures were missing. That helped me determine they were alive when they left. Lori wouldn’t have left without pictures.”  
  
“All the pictures we had left of our families are back at the prison,” Jo remarked. “The one Shane found of you, Lori and Carl, for one.”  
  
“You had some you got back from your house in Decatur.”  
  
Jo nodded, looking down into the can she’d been holding in her left hand. “They were only photographs of Oscar, my dad and Finn.” She looked over her shoulder and nodded toward her brother, who was seated beside Jen on the couch. “I have my brother still. I can live without pictures of my dad and my first husband. I find it sadder you don’t have anything left of your son.”  
  
Rick frowned and looked down toward the floor before glancing back up at her with a shrug. “I can always look in the mirror; see part of him in me. And I can jog up some memories when I need to,” he added, using his spoon to gesture to his head. “I wish I could remember his voice, though. It used to grate on my nerves so bad back then, but what I’d give now to hear him whining when he didn’t get his way about something.” Leaning back against the wall, Rick slid down it to the floor and Jo turned to follow suit and sit beside him as they watched their group sitting around; eating, interacting with each other and just generally settling in. “Hell, even hearing him cry in pain, as terrible as that sounds.”  
  
“Maybe we’ll find a Polaroid camera and a packet of film and we can take new photographs.”  
  
“So, I thought I might mention to ya’ll that that there is _indeed_ a wine cellar in this house,” Milo spoke up as he sauntered into the dining area from the kitchen with a can of sliced carrots in hand. He lifted his fork up and pointed at every person sitting around, looking back at him. “It’s not as fully stock as that yellow house, and I’m not saying it has to be tonight, but I _am_ saying we’re gonna need another night very soon to crack open a few bottles and let our hair down again.” As an afterthought popped into his head, a coy grin began to spread upon his lips, and he added, “Even if just for another opportunity at seeing Rick drunk and dancing to Ricky Martin.”  
  
“I will shove you down that elevator shaft from the rooftop,” Rick threatened with a sparkle in his eye. “Or better yet, I’ll just throw you off the rooftop.”  
  
Milo made a jabbing motion with his fork at Rick. “Down, boy.”  
  
Jo chuckled and drew her attention over toward Mika, who was fast asleep with her head on Tara’s lap on the loveseat, while Sophia was reading a book she had found and sitting on the other side of Finn on the couch. Piper sat on the floor, occasionally throwing a look in Sophia’s direction while jabbing at whatever canned food she was eating as if it had offended her ancestors. Something felt off there, but Jo tossed it up to being teenage angst. They’d probably had a juvenile tiff about something trivial. Jo remembered what it was like to be a teenage girl. She remembered how trivial they could be, but also how easily they could forgive and forget when after an argument with friends.  
  
Karen and Tyreese had gone down the basement already, having called dibs on the fourth bedroom. Morgan was planning on sleeping on the couch in the living room, Finn and Jen were taking the back bedroom on the third floor, and Mika was going to share the bed in the front bedroom on the third floor with Tara. Sophia and Piper were going to lay out blankets and camp out on the floor of that same room, which Michonne took the living room’s loveseat, Nicole was taking the couch in the basement’s recreational room, and then there left the Dixons and Milo. Milo, who had been flirting a little with Nicole, was hinting at sleeping in the basement, too, just below the couch in case she apparently fell off while she slept and needed “a soft place to land.”  
  
_Real_ smooth.  
  
So smooth, Nicole rolled her eyes and just looked over all annoyed.  
  
As for Merle, he’d drop anywhere as soon as he was tired enough, but Daryl seemed keen on the idea of taking a blanket and pillow up with him to the rooftop. The gallery with the elevator shaft and half bath was enclosed, and it was a quiet space where he could get away from it all while he slept.  
  
Even though it had been barely over three weeks since Terminus, it wasn’t lost on anyone that Daryl was still missing Carol. Despite having a blood brother in Merle and a surrogate brother, as well as best friend, in Rick, it was obvious Carol had probably been the most important person Daryl had come to know in this new world. He wasn’t really a man of many words, not like his older brother, but he had talked about plenty of things with Carol and whatever those things were, she had taken to her figurative grave.  
  
Sophia seemed to be doing better, considering she’d lost her real mother, but having Jo and Rick taking her on as their own, and having so many people around her to call her family had made the transition from loss to gain much easier. And, she was still generally a kid, and kids seemed to bounce back better than adults. They had the ability to adapt to change in ways that made adults jealous.  
  
Jo had finished her can before Rick, setting it down on the floor beside her as Rick pushed the rest of the baked beans in his can around with the tines of his fork. Looking into the can and then over at Jo, he handed the can to her, catching her off guard a bit.  
  
“What?” she asked.  
  
“Eat it.”  
  
“I already ate.”  
  
“The baby needs to eat, too,” he said, insistently pushing the can in front of her face.  
  
With a smile, Jo took it from him and began moving some of the baked beans around as he had just been doing. “Thank you,” she whispered, leaning over for a kiss.  
  
Happy to offer one, Rick got up to his feet then and stretched. Daryl sauntered past, holding a rolled up blanket under one arm and a pillow from the couch in another as he nodded at Rick and made his way upstairs to call it a night. Turning slightly, Rick looked down at Jo and nudged her ankle with the toe of his boot.  
  
“I’m gonna head up now.”  
  
Jo let out a small chuckle under her breath. “I saw Daryl’s nod at you. Is that code? Gonna go make out with him on the down low?”  
  
Rick threw his hands up as if surrendering. “You got me,” he joked. “He might not look it, but he has gentle hands.”  
  
Jo’s laugh became bigger and brighter at the image he had just put into her head. The way her laughter bubbled out of her was so infectious that it got everyone around them smiling. Most of them had been walking on egg shells around her since South Hill. Word had easily got around about what had almost gone down and what Jo had done to save her and Tara, and with how Jo had returned to the yellow house and how nearly catatonic she had been, as well as how reserved she’d been the last few days, everyone had given her ample space and hadn’t pressed her with asking how she was.  
  
Seeing her relaxed now, smiling and laughing, eased any secondhand tension that they had all been feeling.  
  
Basically, when either Rick or Jo were unhappy, or both, the entire group felt it. When Rick and Jo were in good moods, the group felt that, too.  
  
It was as if Rick and Jo’s moods, which seemed to flow in tandem, determined the overall mood for the group at any given moment. And now the mood was light again. Everyone could take a collectively figurative deep breath and feel the weight of that tension lifting.  
  
“What’s so funny?” Finn asked of his sister.  
  
Jo just shook her head, forcing herself to focus on the baked beans. “Just something Rick said.”  
  
“And what did Rick say?” Finn eyed his brother-in-law with a raised eyebrow.  
  
“None of your beeswax,” Rick retorted with a knowing grin. Throwing a wink down at Jo, the leader walked across the room to the stairs and made his ascent.  
  
A short while later, Jo had finished off Rick’s can and clambered up to her feet with Merle’s help, as he’d been walking by from the kitchen with a packet of cashews he’d found in the pantry. With a nod of thanks she went into the kitchen set the empty cans in the sink to be disposed of somehow the next day. Sauntering back in toward the living room, Jo nudged Tara to take Mika upstairs to bed and then told Sophia not to make it a late night. Kissing both her surrogate daughters on the tops of their head, Jo bid everyone else still present and awake a goodnight and then took off for the fourth floor.  
  
When she made it up there, she paused at the top of the steps to catch her breath. She gripped the railing and then peered upward toward the stairs that led toward the rooftop and where she could hear Daryl coughing; either in his sleep if he’d already conked out or from having a cigarette. Judging by the faint smell of nicotine wafting down from above, it was safe to assume the latter. Making a face at the smell, Jo continued forward into the hallway and opened up the master suite door.  
  
Inside was dark, save for a single candle lit on one of the bedside tables. Rick wasn’t there, but the sound of movement coming from the bathroom alerted her to where he was. Shutting the suite door, she turned to head through toward the dressing area and stepped into the bathroom where she found Rick standing naked at the sink with the bucket of water meant for either the toilet or for doing exactly what he was doing, and that was sponge bathing.  
  
There was another candle lit on the counter between the two sinks and as Rick looked up at Jo through the mirror, his face was aglow from the small flame. In his hand was a washcloth and near his other hand was a bottle of some kind of body wash.  
  
“Need any help?” she inquired, stepping up behind him.  
  
Rick smirked at her reflection and rested his hands on the edge of the counter, just as she placed her hands on his bare hips and leaned her lips down to the base of his neck. Closing his eyes in contentment from the gesture, Rick let out a small breath through his nostrils. “It’s a tempting offer, but I’ll be done in a few minutes.”  
  
With a nod, Jo leaned back and gave his ass a playful squeeze before stepping away to head out of the bathroom. Rick watched her go with a smile and then looked back at himself, paying attention to just how unruly his beard was starting to get. There was a pair of beard scissors and a disposable razor he had found and was thinking of using to shave it all off. He hadn’t seen his face clean shaven in almost two years and he wasn’t sure he wanted to see that face anymore because it felt like it was the face that belonged to another man. The man who looked back at him in the mirror was the man he was now. The man in the mirror was the man Jo fell in love with. He knew she was also biased to the beard, since it was all she’d known and was unsure of how she’d react if it was gone. With so much on their plates at the moment, Rick decided maybe shaving it all off wasn’t the thing to do at the moment.  
  
Maybe once they’d settled in, maybe once they’d found Hope.  
  
At the very least he could trim it down so he didn’t look like Grizzly Adams anymore.  
  
Finishing up in the bathroom, Rick blew out the candle and sauntered buck ass naked through the dressing area to the bedroom. Jo was standing at the window, with the curtain pushed aside to look out at the scenery, the moon was almost full again, allowing enough natural light into the bedroom that made the candle at the bedside unnecessary. When she heard Rick approaching, Jo turned around looked him over with approval before stepping over to grab that bedside candle up.  
  
“I’m gonna wash up a bit, too,” she informed, giving him a slap to the ass. “Don’t go nowhere.”  
  
“Where am I gonna go like this?” he asked with a laugh, gesturing to his very naked body.  
  
Without responding, Jo walked on toward the master bath, leaving Rick alone for about only five minutes. When he heard her light footsteps coming closer, he could tell she had to be barefoot from the lack of scuffing from the outsoles of her boots. He was sitting on the bed, flipping through an old issue of Cosmo he found in the nightstand, and facing the direction of the bedroom when she approached. Looking up, Rick was pleasantly surprised to find that she, too, was naked.  
  
The way she stood there at the side of the bed, directly in front of him, was rather unassuming. She wasn’t looking at him like some tumultuous sex kitten ready for a wild roll in the hay, but she also wasn’t standing there like some uneducated virgin who was nervous to be in the presence of a man for the first time.  
  
Casually, Jo grabbed the magazine from his hands and tossed it to the floor and then gently pushed him back onto the bed. As he sank back onto the mattress, Rick’s hands instinctively reached up for her as she crawled up over him with damp hair falling in front of her face as the ends tickled at his chest. With his hands, he pushed her hair back so he could see her properly as she straddled his waist. As she sat up straight, moonlight bathed her body and gave rise to the situation, so to speak, but his first thought was to wonder if she was really in the mood for this, considering only three days had passed since the Wolves debacle. Placing a hand on her stomach, Rick gave her a look and silently asked her if she was ready. When Jo responded with a nod and a smile, she lifted her hips up and positioned herself over him.  
  
With gladdened expression upon his face, Rick guided himself into her entrance as she lowered herself all the way down on him, quite literally taking his breath away for a moment. The only reaction he seemed to have at first was to grab for her breasts, palming them with his hands while rolling his thumbs over her pebbled nipples. Holding onto his arms, Jo slowly rocked her hips back and forth as he began thrusting upward to match her movements while tiny mewls escaped from her lips. Lowering his hands, he gripped her upper thighs and, with his right thumb he began to rub her clit in slow, languid circles. That gesture alone was all it took for her to start moving faster on him, and he responded by thrusting harder and rubbing her more vigorously.  
  
Rick was starting to feel her tightening and knew she was already close when she hunched forward and gripped the duvet on either side of his head. To mask the sounds of their moaning, Rick brought his mouth up too hers and swallowed those noises. The bed creaking, however, they could do nothing about.  
  
As soon as Jo came, a breathy squeak escaped her lips and her entire body shuddered as her orgasm hit her in one fell swoop. What drew it out was the fact that Rick wasn’t quite there and was still thrusting into her core with little to no abandon. She had already collapsed down upon him, her breasts flush against his chest and her face buried into his neck. The continued thrusts, though, kept her seeing stars until he let out a guttural cry and spilled his warmth inside of her while his body became wrought with pleasant littler tremors.  
  
Wrapping his arms around her back, Rick held Jo against him and the two of them just lay there like that, unmoving and trying to focus their breathing on slowing down while their heartbeats did the same.  
  
Emitting a sigh of contentment, Rick turned his face and brushed his lips against her cheek until she lifted her head and met his lips for a proper kiss. Opening her mouth to him, he was able to slip his tongue in and graze hers while his beard scratched at her face. Even though their bodies weren’t quite ready for a round two, their lips said otherwise and they couldn’t seem to kiss each other enough.  
  
When Jo pulled her lips away, she lifted her head to look upon his face with a loving smile. Rick moved his arms from her back and brought his hands up to her face to push her hair off it again while smiling back at her.  
  
“I didn’t think you’d be in the mood for something like this so soon after what happened,” he remarked quietly. “After what those men did.”  
  
Jo frowned. “What they _tried_ to do.”  
  
Rick was confused for a moment. “So—wait. That Wolf in that room, he didn’t—”  
  
“He tried.”  
  
“But he was naked from the waist down, and Tara said he took you in there to—”  
  
Jo cut him off again, but this time by placing a finger against his lips. “He didn’t get the chance to,” she assured. “He had my hands bound, so I did what you had to do to that Claimer, and I ripped his neck out with my teeth. He bled out pretty quickly and I got redressed after cutting my hands free.” Jo shrugged and rested her arms across his chest and then her chin down upon her arms while staring up at him. “I don’t think I was so in shock over what he’d tried to do as much as what I had to do to him. I mean, after all, if I was able to survive The Governor and move on from that, those two dickheads were small change.”  
  
“Are you sure you’re okay, though? When I found you…”  
  
“I know,” she muttered, glancing down and turning her head. “I looked insane, and I’ve been quiet the last few days. I think finding that sign earlier today did the trick in snapping me out of that funk. I needed that sign. We both did.”  
  
“Yeah,” he agreed. Tilting his head upward a bit to get a better view of her, he simply smiled and returned his arms around her back and held on tight to her. “I swear on my life I will not let another man get that close to you like that again. I…shit…when I saw the aftermath of what you had to do, and the more I think about it now, the more I think I would’ve done even worse to them. Even after how you took care of the situation, I still think you showed more restraint than I would have.”  
  
“Not the monster thing again.”  
  
“I dunno,” Rick shrugged this time, narrowing his gaze. “Unfortunately, I’m starting to think the monster is a necessity sometimes. It’s not that I _want_ to call it forward, I just _need_ to. It does what I wouldn’t normally be able to.”  
  
“Like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” Jo remarked with a faint smirk toying at her lips.  
  
“Exactly like that.”  
  
Not wanting to give any more fuel to the conversation at hand, since Jo had decided those bad things that had happened were over and done with, she instead brought her mouth back up to Rick’s and kissed him again. Moving her hands to his shoulders, she slowly pushed herself back into a sitting position as she subtly ground against him. What with their bodies still connected in the most intimate of ways, and with Rick being a warm-blooded male, it took little effort to get him aroused again.  
  
Biting down on her bottom lip, Jo smiled. “How about letting Mr. Hyde come out to play,” she remarked with a slight chuckle as she rolled her hips on him, which elicited a sharp hiss from him.  
  
“With pleasure,” he grunted as he gripped her hips with his strong hands and flipped her over onto the mattress.  
  
Wasting no time at all, Rick pulled out halfway for a brief moment and then thrust deeply into her as they both chuckled and smiled at each other with such love and affection.  
  
Kissing her fully upon the lips, he snickered as her muttered into her open mouth, “My beautiful Mrs. Hyde.”


	45. Promises

_"Go for it, while you can. I know you have it in you. And I can't promise you'll get everything you want, but I can promise nothing will change if you don't try."_ ― J.M. Darhower, _Sempre_

* * *

  
At first light, once the sun was high enough to reach into the top floor windows, Rick’s eyes began to flutter open. Initially, all he could see was the spiral of dust particles dancing around as they crossed into the rays. Closing his eyes again, he tried to block out the day and return to sleep for a little bit longer, but the higher the sun got, the more directly the light hit his face, causing him to grunt with displeasure. He’d had such a great night’s sleep and wasn’t quite ready to give it up just yet. However, the realization of remembering what the group had in store for them that day, and the days that would follow, forced Rick to greet the morning.  
  
Opening his blue eyes back up, Rick squinted and raised his right arm to block the light from his face. When he made a move to sit up, he found his left arm was pinned down and, turning to look to his left, was afforded the pleasant sight of Jo curled up beside him with her head on his arm. Instead of jerking his arm out from under her as subtly as he could, he chose to roll onto his left side and curl his right arm around her waist. Lying there, facing her, Rick smiled a sleepy smile and dragged his right hand up her back, softly and slowly. When Jo began to stir, he leaned in and brushed the tip of his nose against the tips of hers.  
  
“Morning,” he greeted, his voice somewhat groggy from going hours without speaking.  
  
She didn’t open her eyes right away, but Rick could tell Jo was waking up by the way a smile began to spread to her lips. Bringing his right hand up even further, he brushed her blonde tresses off the side of her face and then dropped his lips down to the corner of her mouth. Jo immediately jerked her head back, though, when the coarse hairs from his beard scratched at her face and startled her.  
  
“Mmm,” she groaned, and then let her lids rise to stare back at him.  
  
As Rick stared into those green orbs of hers, he was overcome with such a warm feeling inside of him; as if everything was perfect or damn near it. “You look beautiful any time of the day or night, but there’s something extra special about you first thing in the morning.”  
  
Jo grinned, reaching a hand up to the side of his face and giving it a gentle shove. “Shut up.”  
  
“I’m serious.”  
  
“I’m sure you are,” she remarked. Sitting up to free his arm for him, Jo dropped her hand from his face and rested it down upon his bare and twirled her index finger around constant, light circles. “Flattery will get you everywhere, though, just so we’re clear.”  
  
Rick chuckled, starting to feel a bit mischievous. “Is that so?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at her as he sank back down onto the mattress.  
  
“It is.”  
  
“Where specifically can it get me?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “It’s too early. I’ll leave the specifics up to you.”  
  
Feeling a bit of twitching down below, Rick glanced down his front; glimpsing the subtle rise under the bed sheet still covering both their lower extremities. Bringing his gaze back up to Jo, he smirked at her again and brought his right hand to the side of her face as he started to sit up. Leaning in, he kissed her properly, and this time his beard didn’t bother her when it scratched at her chin and tickled her upper lip. Slowly, he shifted around, pushing her down onto the flat of her back while he covered her body with his.  
  
“Where is it you want to go?” she asked in-between kisses.  
  
“It’s been a while since we’ve been there, but I seem to recall the Land of Morning Sex to be a rather nice way to start the day.”  
  
Emitting out a small giggle, Jo easily acquiesced to his gestures; positioning himself between her legs which she parted wider for him. “Go slow,” she urged. “I want it to last longer.”  
  
“What—you think I’m some teenage boy and this is my first time at the rodeo?”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes and playfully slapped his chest. “I’m not saying that because I think you’re gonna bust a nut after only a minute. I just want to enjoy this moment for as long as we can. We never know where the day is ever going to lead us. Each time we should treat like it could be the last and make it worthwhile.”  
  
Rick frowned as he pressed himself at her opening. “Don’t be Debbie Downer.”  
  
“I didn’t mean for it to come out that way. You know what I mean, though, right?”  
  
Nodding, Rick dropped his face down to her collarbone and planted a few soft kisses there. “I know what you mean,” he assured. Lifting his head back up, he smiled at her and planted a brief kiss upon her chin. Then, slowly but all at once, Rick plunged into her. The small gasp that escaped her lips was like music to his ears and made him feel a bit smug that he was responsible for that reaction she made.  
  
“ _Good_ morning,” she sighed.

* * *

  
By mid-afternoon, a second house was cleared. Tyreese and Karen had decided to pack up what little belongings they had with them and headed over. The trek up to the second house’s master suite on the top floor was a no-go for them, with Karen determining that if they were all still there at the height of her pregnancy, there would be no traipsing up and down multiple floors just to go to bed. The third floor, front bedroom was far enough. Finn and Jen moved into the basement bedroom as soon as Tyreese and Karen moved out. In doing so, it gave Sophia and Mika the space to spread out, each taking one of the two bedrooms in the first home’s third floor, just as Jo had expressed the evening before to Rick.  
  
Daryl didn’t seem too content with leaving the first house. Despite being as close as he could to Merle, who was his own blood brother, Daryl tended to get along more with Rick and felt the need to stay close to the latter and his family. If anything went wrong in that first house, that’s where Daryl knew he would need to be. Sleeping on one of the couches, either in the living room or in the basement’s recreational room, would suit him just fine. He didn’t require much. It also put some distance between himself and the Grimes couple. After the night before, and sleeping in the gallery on the rooftop floor, he didn’t really need to be so close where he would constantly end up hearing them going at it.  
  
Michonne was the one who ended up with the master suite in the second house, after Merle lost a game of Rock Paper Scissors with her. Nicole claimed the bedroom in the basement of the second house and decided she would set up the living space down there as an infirmary of sorts once the group acquired some more medical equipment. As for the remaining bedroom on the third floor of the second house, Tara and Piper took it on, as there were two twin beds.  
  
By early evening, a third house was cleared. It was the townhome located on the end of the row; to the immediate right of the group’s first home if you were standing on the road, facing the fronts of all the homes. Merle, Morgan and Milo were all that remained in claiming bedrooms. Merle got his master suite. Milo and Morgan weren’t about to argue with an aggressive redneck with a knife where his hand used to be. By nightfall, three homes were claimed and cleared, and none of them contained any walkers or dead bodies, so there weren’t any unpleasant smells to contend with other than a slight scent of mildew and dust in the air from the homes being closed up since the beginning of the end of the world.  
  
The group convened in the main (first to be cleared) townhouse, standing around the dining table with a map of the greater DC area spread out wide. They’d lucked out finding such a large, detailed map. Whoever lived in the second house they’d cleared must’ve been an avid fan of the Capital’s history. There were even Fodor’s and Frommer’s city guide books that detailed all sorts of locations that would prove useful to the group when they scoured the city.  
  
“I say we clear the White House and set up there,” Milo remarked as they began discussing their plans on where they would all be going the following day.  
  
Rick glanced across the table at the other man and shook his head. “That’d be like painting a giant target on our heads. No.”  
  
“There’s a gate around the entire property; all that land on the south lawn where we can grow crops and raise animals. Michelle Obama started that vegetable garden already. The only good thing she did as First Lady.”  
  
Jo pursed her lips and nearly scowled. “Republican?”  
  
Milo smirked and nodded. Gesturing to Jo, he asked, “Democrat?”  
  
Clearing his throat, Rick looked back and forth between his wife and Milo. “Anyway,” he continued. “The White House would be the first place any number of people would’ve thought to loot or attempt to claim for themselves after the outbreak; whether or not for the security and options it presented,” he gestured to Milo, indicating what the younger man had suggested, “or the mere fact that it’s the White House. No doubt people across the ocean have tried looting castles, like Buckingham Palace in London. This shit is global and high profile locations like the White House will have drawn the public to them. So, no, we’re not going there. We got it good right here.”  
  
“For now,” Milo muttered under his breath.  
  
“We’re not going into the city to set up shop,” Jo remarked. “We’re doing reconnaissance and some scavenging for supplies. Rick’s and my focus will be trying to look for signs that Shane might be in the area. We hope the rest of you will keep a lookout for any signs as well.”  
  
“You know we will,” Tyreese assured.  
  
Jo nodded her thanks. “Rick and I have been discussing where we should all spread out to, to cover more ground.”  
  
Rick leaned over the map and began to pinpoint different locations. “We think we can break into three groups. The first group will head in north, here, going over the Francis Scott Key Bridge and make their way toward Georgetown University and the surrounding areas. Nicole,” he glanced up at the redheaded nurse, “you’re our resident medical expert, so I want you in group one.”  
  
Nicole nodded, hands on her hips. “Okay.”  
  
“Now, the university might be tricky; lots of undead teenagers and twenty-somethings. Even in the old world that’d be terrifying. Take as many precautions as you can. Stick together. Not even one person goes off alone. The university has a school of medicine here, and the corresponding hospital is next to it,” he continued, pinpointing the locations in question on the map. “It’ll be a more difficult trek in and around these places, so I want group one to be the larger group. Tyreese, Michonne, Merle and Karen; you’ll go there with Nicole. She’ll know what to look for, so listen to her. The rest of you are the muscle, as crass as it may sound.”  
  
“Got it,” Michonne affirmed, not at all insulted by being muscle.  
  
“Group two,” Rick muttered, shifting his finger along the map, “will cut across the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Bridge and then head up here on New Hampshire Avenue to make your way north toward downtown. Daryl will take lead on that. Tara, Morgan and Milo will go with him.” Looking at each of those four, standing around the table, Rick saw them nodding in agreement. He then looked at Jo.  
  
“Group three will be even smaller. Just three of us: Rick, Finn and me. Jen,” Jo addressed her brother’s girlfriend, “you don’t mind staying behind here with the girls, do you?”  
  
“I don’t mind,” the other blonde assured, giving Finn’s hand a squeeze.  
  
“Wait,” Sophia spoke up. “I don’t want to stay behind.”  
  
“Well, this might not exactly be a safe task ahead of us, and we want you girls to stay safe,” Rick countered.  
  
“Nothing about this world is safe,” Sophia threw right back at him with typical teenage defiance. “I survived the fall of the prison, those Claimers on the road, Terminus, the Commune getting overrun and _exploding_ …I can do this.” The nearly fifteen-year-old pleaded, glancing between both her adoptive parents. “Let me do this.”  
  
Rick looked away from Sophia and up at Jo instead, who was already looking back at him. Jo shrugged, so Rick nodded. “Alright, but you’re with us then.”  
  
From the outskirts of the meeting around the table, Piper seemed a bit fidgety. “I want to go, too,” she said a little quietly.  
  
“What?” Rick asked, having not heard what she’d said.  
  
“I want to go tomorrow, too,” Piper repeated.  
  
Rick sighed. “Okay. Daryl—”  
  
“No,” she cut him off, “Your group. I wanna go where Sophia goes.”  
  
Shifting his weight around from one foot to the other, Rick brought his hand up from the table and placed it upon his narrow hip as he stared back at the other teen girl. “This ain’t gonna be social hour for you two. This is serious shit we gotta do, alright? So, don’t make me regret allowing you both to come.”  
  
“I’m not an idiot. I know how to hold my own,” Piper insisted, gruffly. “I survived alone for months before Finn and his friends brought me to the Commune.”  
  
“It’s true,” Finn confirmed. “Milo, me and a couple others found her during one of our supply runs, hiding out in a Home Depot in Lindbergh. She was covered in blood and killing a few roamers with a nail gun down a Tools and Hardware aisle.”  
  
“See?”  
  
Rick emitted a small huff of breath. “Alright.”  
  
Piper smiled at Finn and then over at Sophia; clearly pleased.  
  
“Anyway,” Jo cut in, getting them back to the task at hand. “Group three will head into DC at the Arlington Memorial Bridge. We’ll be focusing on the south end, around a lot of the museums, the Capitol Building and then up toward the area east of the White House. We’ll all take enough supplies with us, because this will probably take all day and we might not all get back here by nightfall. Aim for finding someplace to stay for the night. The following day, if we can, we’ll branch out even further. We have only two walkie-talkies, though, so communicating among our three groups will be a little lacking.”  
  
“Group one should definitely have a walkie,” Rick insisted.  
  
“You take the other one,” Daryl said to Rick. “Y’all gonna have the girls, plus both your groups got pregnant ladies.”  
  
Morgan agreed. “The first and third groups are gonna need to communicate with each other, especially since you’ll be more spread out from each other. Those of us in group two will be more in-between. If we can, we’ll be able to get to either group one or group three more easily than your groups could reach each other.”  
  
Rick glanced at Morgan and gave a nod. “Yeah, okay. But if you find an extra walkie, turn it to channel two; just in case there’re any other groups nearby that might be unfriendly and listening in.”  
  
“What if there _are_ other people?” Tara wondered.  
  
“Each group has at least two people who know Shane,” Rick replied. “If you see other people and none of ‘em is Shane: avoid ‘em like the plague. Do whatever you gotta do; hide, run, kill ‘em…”  
  
“Kill them?” Karen questioned. “They could be good people.”  
  
“Obviously, only kill ‘em if they pose a threat,” Jo clarified on her husband’s behalf, giving him a semi-chastising look. “Same goes for walkers. Unless they pose a threat, don’t bother killing ‘em. Attacking will draw attention. We’re alive and have the upper hand when it comes to being able to run from them. Go slow, go carefully.”  
  
Milo snickered. “This isn’t our first rodeo.”  
  
“Well, it is for some,” Rick contradicted. “Whether you’ve become a self-proclaimed expert in this sort of thing or this is your first time; we go over the details either way. We’ll go over it twice tonight and once more in the morning if we have to.”  
  
“Better to be over-prepared, than underprepared,” Morgan remarked, folding his arms across his chest.  
  
“Exactly.”  
  
“So, then, are we good for tonight?” Milo asked. “We all know who’s going where and what we’re looking for. Maybe we can just call it a night?”  
  
Rick clenched his jaw; reining in his growing aggravation with Milo. The younger man had really been grating on his nerves for the last week. “Yeah,” he bit out. “We’re done.”  
  
“Alright, cool.” As Milo took his leave from around the table, he looked across toward Rick and tipped his non-existent hat at him in a sort of mock salute.  
  
Rick, along with a few others, watched the bearded blonde head down the stairs to make his way out of the house to go next door to the end townhouse where he was staying now. Several of the eyes that had followed Milo’s retreating form shifted their attention over to Rick to gauge his reaction, but he seemed to be somewhat calm, all things considered. It was possible that Jo’s hand on the small of his back, as a way to center him, helped.  
  
“He means well. I promise,” Finn spoke, directing the comment toward his brother-in-law.  
  
“Yeah, well, at this rate, I promise that I might punch him in that smart mouth of his someday very soon,” Rick remarked.  
  
Daryl grunted in amusement from where he stood, which caused Rick to look over and respond to the noise with a faint smirk on his lips. Both friends had already had the discussion back in South Hill about how annoying Milo was becoming the longer they got to know him.  
  
“Perhaps calling it a night would be best,” Jo stated. “We’ll sleep on all this tonight, and go over anything that needs to be gone over tomorrow morning before we head out.” Gripping the material on the back of Rick’s shirt, she waited as everyone began to slowly disperse; either heading up or down to their bedrooms or to the other two homes altogether. Daryl lingered; and not only because he slept on the couch several feet away. Jo had been about to mutter something to Rick when she realized there was something on Daryl’s mind. “What’s up?”  
  
Chewing the inside of his lips, the archer scratched at his nose and then pointed at Rick. “You owe me big time for putting that dickhead with me again,” he quipped; his tone gruff as usual, but his eyes seemed bright with amusement regardless of whether or not he was actually pissed.  
  
Rick shrugged. “If you find an opportunity to shove him into a group of hungry walkers, take it.”  
  
Lifting her hand from the back of his shirt, Jo slapped Rick playfully across the chest with the back of her hand and snickered. “He might very well be a dickhead, but Milo also happens to be my brother’s best friend,” she reminded both men. “How would you like it if Milo advised Finn to shove either of you into some walkers to save himself?”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “No offense, but I’d drop Milo with a bolt to the head before he had a chance to lay hands on me. Same goes for your brother, just so you know. You two, Merle, Sophia, Mika and myself: that’s my priority. That’s my family. If I gotta shove Milo or Finn into some walkers to save my ass or yours, that’s what I’ll do.”  
  
“Well, I suppose I appreciate the sentiment,” Jo remarked, a little unsure. “You’re my family, too, Daryl, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t beat the ever-living shit out of you if I found out you were responsible for my brother dying.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “I wouldn’t expect any less,” he added with a grin.  
  
“And with that, goodnight,” Rick spoke, sticking a finger through one of Jo’s belt loops and pulling her away from the table.  
  
With a nod of his head toward Daryl, both men said a silent goodnight to each other before Rick led his wife over toward the stairwell. Quietly, side by side, they made their way up to the third floor. Just before Rick turned to continue on toward the fourth floor, Jo stepped toward the bedroom door closest to the stairs and knocked lightly.  
  
“Come in,” was the quiet response from inside the room.  
  
Turning the knob, Jo merely poked her head in and found Sophia lying on her stomach, diagonally across her bed. A single candle was lit on the bedside table as she flipping through some sort of fashion magazine.  
  
“Hey,” Jo greeted. “Just wanted to say goodnight.”  
  
Sophia rolled onto her side somewhat and smiled at her adoptive parents. “Goodnight,” she replied, glancing from Jo to Rick.  
  
“Don’t stay up too late,” Rick insisted, poking his head in as well. He crossed an arm behind Jo’s back and braced his hand on the doorframe while giving the interior of the bedroom a brief onceover. “We got a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”  
  
“I know,” Sophia assured.  
  
“Alright,” Rick nodded. “Goodnight.”  
  
“’Night,” the teen repeated, as Jo quietly pulled the bedroom door closed.  
  
Stepping away from the door and several feet away toward the second bedroom door, Jo repeated the process of knocking.  
  
“Yeah?” a small voice inside asked. Before Jo could reach for the handle, the door opened up and there stood Mika staring up at both adults with inquisitive brown eyes. “Hiya.”  
  
Jo and Rick both smirked down at her. “We just wanted to say goodnight,” Jo informed. “You comfortable in here?”  
  
Mika nodded. “Yeah. I like having my own room again, but it’s kinda lonely, too. I got used to sharing a cell with Lizzie at the prison, and when we stopped at that hotel or any other houses before here I shared with Sophia, and sometimes with Tara and Piper, too. It’s just…weird. Good weird, though.”  
  
“Well, if you get scared, I’m sure Sophia would be okay with you going into her room and sleeping in her bed with her if you asked. I don’t think she’d say no.”  
  
“What if she’s asleep? I don’t want to wake her up.”  
  
“Then, you can upstairs and wake _us_ up,” Rick remarked. “Just…knock first and wait for us to let you know that it’s okay to come in.”  
  
Jo caught Rick’s look to her out the corner of her eye. Both smirked knowingly.  
  
Mika seemed to take comfort in that offer. “Okay,” she nodded. “If you go into any of the museums tomorrow, just to look for supplies or anything, can you go into the Smithsonian? I read in one of the travel books that the Smithsonian has Dorothy’s ruby slippers from _The Wizard of Oz._ ”  
  
“You want us to get ‘em for you?” Rick inquired, raising an eyebrow at the girl.  
  
Mika’s delay in answering gave her away, causing Jo and Rick merely chuckled in response.  
  
“Alright, we’ll see what we can do.”  
  
A bright smile spreading across her lips, Mika threw her arms around both their waists and hugged them tightly. “Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. That would be so awesome,” she replied excitedly; her face pressed against Jo’s stomach. Pulling back slightly, she tipped her head upward and looked between both her adoptive parents. “Thank you.”  
  
“We’re not making any promises,” Rick reminded, placing a hand on the back of Mika’s head. “If there’s any time, and we happen to be in the area, we’ll see what we can do.”  
  
Mika backed up, dropped her arms down at her sides and nodded. “If you can, though.”  
  
Jo let out another chuckle. “Okay, go to bed,” she remarked, reaching for the door knob.  
  
“Goodnight,” Rick smiled.  
  
“Goodnight,” Mika replied. Just before the door was shut all the way, she practically leapt forward and stopped it, and then eyed the pair. “Oh, wait. There’s, like, two Smithsonian’s next to each other. The shoes are in the National Museum of American History. Not the Natural History one. _American_ History.”  
  
“Okay, Mika,” Rick spoke. “Go to bed now.”  
  
The ten-year-old smiled sheepishly. “Okay. ‘Night-night.” The girl shoved the door closed the rest of the way for them, leaving Rick and Jo just standing there, shaking their heads with smiles on their faces.  
  
Throwing an arm around her shoulder, Rick pulled Jo into a side hug and then planted a kiss on the corner of her lips. “This is nice,” he murmured. “All we need is to find Hope, and this would be perfect.”  
  
Jo leaned into his side and nodded. “It really is nice,” she agreed. “Having these two girls, finding Hope and the new baby on the way would _definitely_ make our lives perfect.” As they made the languid trek to the stairwell again, she let out a small sigh and giggled.  
  
“What?” Rick asked, as they began to ascend the stairs.  
  
“For your sake, I hope this baby is a boy. You’ll be drowning in estrogen otherwise.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “I love my girls.” He fell quiet until they reached their floor. As they stepped into their room and closed the door behind them, Rick hung back a little as he watched Jo saunter over to their bed. “You know, I’m not sure how I feel about having another son,” he suddenly admitted, catching Jo’s attention as she sank down onto the edge of the mattress. “I feel like maybe it’d be a betrayal to Carl.”  
  
Jo frowned sympathetically. “You wouldn’t be replacing him.”  
  
“No, I know that. It’s just…I dunno.”  
  
“Well, we have several months until this baby arrives. We won’t know until then if it’s a boy or a girl, so let’s not think about it until then, huh?” Reaching her hands up, she waited for Rick to take the hint and come to bed.  
  
With a somewhat sad smile, Rick walked over toward her and took her hands in his. Leaning down he kissed her forehead. “I love you, you know?”  
  
“Oh, I know.” With an impish grin and a raise of her eyebrow, Jo looked up at him and removed her hands from his and instead brought them to his belt as her fingers began to work at undoing it. “We got a lot ahead of us tomorrow, so why don’t we just relax now?”  
  
Rick looked down at her, brushing her blonde hair behind her ears and she slid his belt free of the loops on his faded black jeans. As she let the belt drop to the ground, he watched as she unbuttoned his pants and slid them down his hips.  
  
“Sit down,” she advised.  
  
Without hesitation, Rick obliged. His eyes traveled with Jo as she stood up for a moment, turned and then knelt down between his knees. Slowly, she slid his pants down past his knees and let them pool around his ankles before letting her soft hands trail back up his legs, to his thighs. A small hiss escaped his lips when he realized where this was all headed.  
  
“I did tell you I love you, right?”  
  
“Mmhmm,” Jo nodded. Taking him into her hand, she began to stroke his length and winked up at him. As he began to stiffen, and easily at that, Jo began to lean her head downward. “I love you, too.”

* * *

  
In the middle of the night, a storm rolled through; which explained why it had gotten so sticky hot and humid so late in the day. Thunder exploded, lightning flashed and rain pummeled the windows as the storm raged on. Sometime during the height of the storm, there came a very insistent knock on Rick and Jo’s bedroom door.  
  
Rick and Jo were already awake, having been woken by the storm. They had been just lying there in each other’s arms, staring out the window to their right, watching the bolts of lightning that fractured across the dark, cloudy sky; jumping slightly with each echoing boom a crack of thunder caused. Despite how tumultuous the storm was, it was actually somewhat soothing.  
  
Hearing the knock, Rick craned his head and looked toward the door. “Yeah?” he called out.  
  
“It’s Mika,” their youngest adoptive daughter spoke through the door. “The storm is scaring me and Sophia couldn’t hear me knocking on her door. I didn’t want to just walk right in on her.”  
  
Jo turned and smiled at Rick. “Hold on a minute, Mika,” she called back to the girl.  
  
Quickly, Jo sat up and reached over the side of the bed and grabbed Rick’s pants. After she tossed them at him, she reached for her underwear and Rick’s T-shirt. As they both stood up, Rick shimmied his way into his jeans while Jo slipped her underwear back on and put Rick’s T-shirt on to use as a nightshirt. She then gestured for him to sit or lay back down as she pulled the shirt down as far over her ass as it would go and walked over to the door.  
  
Opening it up, she was greeted by Mika’s very worried and tear-stained face. “Oh, honey, were you crying?”  
  
Mika nodded. “I was having a bad dream before I heard the storm. It was about Lizzie.”  
  
“Oh, honey, c’mere,” Jo muttered, pulling the girl into a hug. After a moment, she ran her fingers over the girl’s blonde hair and then led her toward the bed. “C’mon. You can sleep with us tonight.”  
  
“Thank you,” Mika replied quietly.  
  
As Jo gently kicked the bedroom door closed with the heel of her foot, she gestured for Rick to scoot over. She sat down on the bed and shifted across the mattress to lie in the middle, on her side with her back to Rick’s chest. Mika took the hint to lie down on the other side of Jo; curling up next do her as she shared the bed with them.  
  
Rick looked over Jo’s shoulder at Mika, and then glanced down at Jo before placing a kiss to her shoulder. Laying his head down upon the pillow, he rested his hand on his wife’s hip as she draped her arm over Mika’s waist; assuming correctly the girl would find comfort in the gesture.  
  
“You okay now?” Jo asked quietly.  
  
Mika nodded. “I will be. Thank you,” she answered. “Sorry I woke you up.”  
  
“We were already up ‘cause of the storm, too. It’s okay,” Rick assured, closing his eyes and trying to will sleep to come.  
  
“Just try and sleep now,” Jo whispered at the back of the girl’s head.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“Just close your eyes, ignore the thunder and focus on your breathing. You’ll fall asleep in no time.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
All three of them fell silent. The only sound was that of the thunder and the rain outside.  
  
After a few minutes, Rick nudged the back of Jo’s head with his nose. Lifting his head slightly, he whispered, “Like I said: this is nice.”  
  
Jo smiled. “Mmm, yeah.”

* * *

  
At daybreak, the birds were chirping and the sun was shining.  
  
The only sign there had been a storm during the night was the lingering clouds in the sky and the puddles on the ground outside. The rain had helped cool the temperatures by about ten degrees, so now the world felt more comfortable and no longer as sweltering. No doubt the earth needed that drenching.  
  
When Rick woke up, he was teetering on the edge of the bed; very close to falling right off. The explanation for his decreased space was that Jo had pushed back against him, because Mika had pushed spread out more while she slept. The way the girls limbs were draped all over the place and judging by how tightly Jo was curled into a ball suggested that Mika was likely tossing and turning in her sleep, and possibly even a kicker.  
  
Rick recalled Carl having been that way when he was younger and would climb into bed with him and Lori when he awoke with a nightmare.  
  
“Jo,” he muttered, pressing his lips down against the crook of her neck. “Wakey, wakey.”  
  
She stirred with a chuckle, turning her head to look over her shoulder at him. With a smile, she reached her arm behind her and draped it over his waist so that she could give his ass a pleasant squeeze. All he could do was smile right back at her and move his lips up to the space on her neck just below her earlobe while eyeing a still-sleeping Mika to make sure she didn’t wake just yet.  
  
Gently, he bit down on her earlobe with his teeth and sucked on it, causing her to bite down on her bottom lip and suddenly wish, with fervor, that Mika wasn’t there.  
  
“Stop,” she whispered; trying her best to contain a giggle due to how his lips and beard on her ear and neck tickled.  
  
“Ugh,” he groaned. “If we make it back here tonight and don’t have to stay overnight anywhere in the city, you owe me.”  
  
“ _I_ owe _you_? What do you call last night?”  
  
“Oh yeah.”  
  
Jo parted her lips in an ‘O’ and tried to glance over her shoulder at him again. “You forgot?”  
  
“No,” he replied, biting softly onto her ear again. “Alright, we’ll owe each other tonight or tomorrow night. Whenever we can manage it next.”  
  
With a roll of her eyes, Jo snickered and moved to sit up. In doing so, Rick sat up with her. However, because he was already balancing precariously on the edge of the bed, sitting up as quickly as he did was the straw on the camel’s back. Slipping, and gracelessly at that, Rick tipped over the edge and onto the floor, ass first. The thud sound was rather resounding in the quiet of the room. The yelp that escaped his lips from how his tailbone hit the floor, due to the precise angle from which he fell, also echoed throughout the bedroom space. Both those sounds, combined with Jo’s surprised gasp and giggle, caused Mike to bolt upright and look around with wide, but tired eyes.  
  
“What happened?” she asked Jo.  
  
“Rick fell out of bed,” Jo replied, failing to contain her giggles.  
  
Seeing her adoptive mother so utterly amused was enough to wipe the waking worry from her face and laugh as well. Mika leaned forward and got up onto her hands and knees to look over the edge of the bed down at Rick, who was reaching to pick himself back up.  
  
“I’ll feel that tonight.”  
  
“Hopefully you’ll be able to forget how bad it stings by tonight or tomorrow night,” Jo quipped; an impish sparkle in her green eyes.  
  
Climbing up to his feet, Rick flexed his shoulders and cracked his back and then stretched his arms upward before glancing down at Jo with the same look in his own eyes. “Yeah,” he nodded, knowingly. “I’m sure I’ll find something to help me sooth the pain.”  
  
With a wink at Jo, Rick then smiled at Mika, just as heavy footsteps bounded up the stairs. The door was shoved open and Daryl was revealed; his crossbow on his back and a hunting knife raised. When he saw the three inside the bedroom staring back at him with the same confusion on his face, Daryl lowered his hand and shifted his weight around.  
  
“Oh. You’re fine then,” the archer muttered.  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded, placing a hand on his hip while the other rubbed his tailbone. “Something wrong?”  
  
“Sophia came down and got me. Said she heard a heavy thump and a groan,” Daryl replied. “She was worried something happened to one of you. I said I’d run up here and check it out.”  
  
“Well, we appreciate your diligence, and being quick to take action,” Jo remarked, pulling a pillow around to cover her lap; Rick’s T-shirt she was wearing not doing too much to cover her waist area.  
  
“You didn’t think it might be something else?” Rick wondered, a smirk toying at the corners of his mouth. “Thumping and groaning.” Remembering Mika, he added, “You know, like maybe we were just, uh, having a pillow fight or something.”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “Yeah, doubt it now, with Squirt over there.” He pointed at Mika and shook his head with a smirk of his own. “Grown-up pillow fights are too violent. No kids allowed sort of thing.”  
  
Jo bit down on her bottom lip and placed a hand to her face. “The storm scared Mika last night. She joined us, so no pillow fights this morning.”  
  
Mika looked between the three adults; their innuendos going right over her head. “I love pillow fights.”  
  
Rick nodded; both hands on his hips now. “Yeah,” was all he could manage to say.  
  
Smacking his lips once more and shaking his head, Daryl waved the couple off and then gestured over to Mika. “C’mon, pipsqueak. Let’s let Mama and Papa Grimes get dressed for the day. Jen’s in the kitchen trying to make pancakes and it ain’t going so well.”  
  
“How is she making pancakes?” Mika wondered, climbing off the bed. “The stove doesn’t work.”  
  
“She’s got that camping stove we found in the garage, but that ain’t why it ain’t going so well.”  
  
Rick and Jo looked over at Daryl with raised eyebrows.  
  
“Do we want to know?” Jo wondered.  
  
Daryl shook his head. “A can of fruit cocktail and stale chocolate chips are involved,” he replied with a grimace. “Just stay up here. Have that pillow fight, but make it quick. Everyone else is pretty much up and packing up the vehicles already.”  
  
Without another word, both men nodded at each other as Daryl ushered Mika out of the room and closed the bedroom door behind them, leaving Rick and Jo alone. Glancing at his wife, Rick smirked but then he turned toward the large window and glanced down toward the road. Four stories down, he could barely make out a few figures throwing some backpacks and weapons into the trunk of the Yaris, the passenger van and the third car, a grey Crown Victoria they’d found parked in the garage of the house where Merle, Milo and Morgan were staying.  
  
As he focused on the bodies below, Rick barely heard the mattress creaking as Jo climbed off the bed and sidled up behind him. Pressing her chest to his back, she snaked her arms around to his chest; pulling him against her as she placed kisses between his bare shoulder blades. Rick smiled, clamping his hands down over hers while she reached her face up to nuzzle the curls at the base of his neck.  
  
“I really wanna pillow fight you right now, but we really should be getting ready,” he commented, glancing over his shoulder at her. “Even Jen’s up and around doing something. We really have no excuse to not pull our weight.”  
  
“To be fair, I’d say we’ve pulled more weight than the others and that we deserve to take a bit longer this morning to…pillow fight,” Jo replied. “But you’re right.” She kissed him between his shoulder blades once more and then slipped away from him. “We need to set an example.”  
  
Rick snickered. “Yeah.” Turning around, he gestured toward her and then reached out for the bottom of his shirt she was still wearing. As he began to lift it up over her head, he was half tempted to shrug their responsibilities off for a few more minutes and give in to his desire for her when he saw her standing there in only her underwear. “I promise I will pillow fight the hell out of you the first chance we get.”  
  
Jo immediately reacted with a hearty laugh as she shook her head at him. “I’ll hold you to it, because _you_ owe _me._ ”  
  
“Yes, ma’am,” he mock saluted, pulling his shirt back on as she went off to find something new to wear; a small, lazy smile lingering on his lips.

* * *

  
An hour later, the three vehicles were pulling out of the cul de sac of townhouses, one after the other. The passenger van, which was heading north over the Francis Scott Key Bridge to Georgetown contained Tyreese, Karen, Michonne, Merle and Nicole with the main goal of acquiring as much medicine and medical supplies that Nicole deemed they could use. The Yaris, which would take the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Bridge and head up toward downtown, contained Daryl, Milo, Morgan and Tara. Then, that left the Crown Victoria; Rick at the wheel, Jo his passenger, and Finn in the backseat with the Sophia and Piper. Aside from the people in each vehicle, they were also packed with a few food supplies and weapons they’d need to take with them.  
  
Each person present had been on runs before and knew how to scavenge, but something about this day seemed grander in scale. Those that had formerly been part of the Commune were more or less used to scouting in Atlanta, which was a major city, while those that had been part of the prison group were used to the outskirts of towns, scavenging homes. Either way, this still all felt new. For one, this wasn’t a city any of them were used to. Even if they’d visited the city in years past with their families or part of school trips, this wasn’t an area they were from. They didn’t know DC like they had known Atlanta. There was any number of things that could pop up that they weren’t prepared for.  
  
For one: walkers. They didn’t know how overrun the Capital was or, at least, which areas of the Capital were more overrun than others. That was something they’d have to figure out from firsthand experience  
  
Secondly, there was the worry of other survivors squatting around the Capital. It was hard to believe there would be _no_ survivors. After the fall and all the major cities had been napalmed, survivors would’ve begun to return to the city and clear places to make safe so life could continue. Whether or not those survivors that might be lingering around were good or bad was yet to be seen.  
  
As all three vehicles pulled out of the cul de sac and came out onto Lee Highway, they lined up side by side; each designated driver looking between each other with a silent nod that expressed to one another to stay safe and stay alert.  
  
As Daryl drove on ahead with the Yaris, Rick brought one of the group’s two walkie-talkies to his lips and turned it on as he glanced up toward the passenger van at his left.  
  
“Radio check,” he muttered.  
  
“We’re 5 by 5 here, good buddy,” Merle replied, glancing down at Rick from the van’s passenger van and flashing an idiotic grin.  
  
Rick rolled his eyes, “This ain’t a CB radio, Merle.”  
  
“Don’t call me Merle over the walkie. Call me Don Juan.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Aw, c’mon. We gotta have code names, in case we get caught by some bad guys.”  
  
Sighing Rick turned toward Jo, who shrugged, and then looked out his driver side window up at Merle. “Alright, fine. Don Juan, it is.”  
  
Merle chuckled victoriously. “Hah. So, what should I call you then?”  
  
“I’m sure you have a few names for me up your sleeve,” Rick muttered, looking forward at a lone walker staggering several yards up ahead, trying to chase what looked to be a squirrel across the road.  
  
“True,” Merle nodded. “But not code names.”  
  
Licking his lips, a smile began to spread over Rick’s lips. “I got it.” Looking back up at Merle, he replied, “Call me Officer Friendly.”  
  
Merle’s amused chortle echoed between both vehicles and across the static of the walkie in the Crown Victoria. “You got it.”  
  
“Only use the walkies in an emergency situation though. Any talk is on channel 2. Not personal chatter on it.”  
  
“We ain’t new.” With a smirk and a shake of his head, Merle looked over at Tyreese, who switched gears from park to drive. Before the van crested forward, the one-handed Dixon saluted Rick with his bladed stump.  
  
Watching the van driving up the road, Rick looked over at Jo and handed the walkie-talkie off to her. Putting the Crown Victoria into drive, he glanced at Finn through the rearview mirror and then brought his eyes forward.  
  
“Alright, here we go.”

* * *

  
With the route leading them toward the Arlington Memorial Bridge not being as direct as the other groups’ routes, a jaunt that could’ve ideally taken just under ten minutes took group three nearly a half hour. Once Rick brought the car to the off ramp that lead toward the bridge, their path cleared up considerably.  
  
As with most roadways into any city these days, the roads leading into the cities were virtually clear since most of the traffic had hit a standstill with all the people fleeing out of the city. Rick remembered the roads into Atlanta being exactly the few times he traveled there after the new world had begun; specifically the first time, when he road in on horseback.  
  
Once they made it to the bridge, he brought the car’s speed down to about 20 MPH; keeping a wary eye out for everything and anything.  
  
About halfway across the bridge, on the other side leading away from DC, was a multiple car pileup. Rick slowed down, peering at the images of the dead moving around slowly inside each vehicle. There were a few people who had been thrown through their windshields and died, and were now stuck in those positions as walkers. There was even one female walker pinned between the stone balustrade of the bridge and the front grill of a Ford Taurus; forever clawing at air.  
  
Ignoring the sight, Rick focused his attention forward again; the Lincoln Memorial immediately before them. Keeping to the right, the Crown Victoria continued on around the road circling the memorial once they’d cleared the bridge, officially entering into DC. They drove slowly for about ten minutes along tree-lined section Independence Avenue, taking in the sight of the statuesque Washington Monument that came into view on their left and the Tidal Basin to their right. Several stately building began to approach as they continued on the same road, while Rick kept an eye out for an ideal place where they could discreetly park the car.  
  
“Wait—there’s a car park over here,” Jo muttered, pointing to a spot in the travel guide she’d brought with them. “Either turn around and make two lefts or go forward and take the first right, and then another right.”  
  
Obliging his navigating wife, Rick kept going straight, and turned right onto 12th Street, and then another right onto C Street. The lettering on the building they were circling, and also according to the travel guide in Jo’s hands, stated that it was the Department of Agriculture. Mere feet away, on the right, was a tall archway leading into the back of the building, revealing a car park.  
  
“This looks good enough to me,” Rick muttered, turning into the narrow lot and slowed the car down to a snail crawl.  
  
There were several walkers inside but, in such an enclosed space and as armed as they were, they would be fine. Putting the car into park and turning off the ignition, Rick shove the keys into his pocket and reached for his machete which he’d had resting near Jo’s feet on her side of the car. Opening his door up, he climbed out and lifted his blade up. Shutting the door behind him, he wasted no time in taking out the first of several approaching walkers. The others quickly spilled out of the vehicle with their respective melee weapons, flanking around Rick as they each began to attack the dead.  
  
As Rick brought his elongated blade down into several skulls, Jo found greater ease in lobbing off heads which she would kick away. Armed with a hatchet, Finn couldn’t help but find a moment of amusement in all the carnage, muttering something about “Heeeere’s Finny” a la Jack Torrance in Stephen King’s _The Shining_. Then there was Sophia and Piper, each with a simple fixed blade, who were managing mostly by jamming their knives up through the bottoms of skulls due to several of the walkers approaching both girls having a height advantage over them.  
  
When the last walker dropped dead to the ground, Rick looked around at his small group to make sure they were okay. Sheathing his machete at through the loop on the left side of his utility belt, he looked around at the narrow parking lot and took in just how empty it was.  
  
“Place like this probably cleared out real fast,” he determined. Except for one abandoned Lexus, their car was the only other vehicle there. “This is a good place to leave it,” he continued, referring to the Crown Victoria. “It’s out of the way. This is good.” Stalking over to the back of the car, Rick pulled the keys back out of his pocket and unlocked the trunk. Lifting it open, he pulled out two backpacks, one for Finn and the other he would wear. Each contained a few food items, water bottles and extra bullets for the guns they had; although the bullets were scarce, so using the guns they’d brought with them would be a last resort type of thing. “Okay. We continue on by foot now.”  
  
“Where do we go first?” Sophia wondered, holding on tight to the handle of her knife still.  
  
“Jo.”  
  
Rick deferred the question to his wife, who walked back around to the front passenger side door and pulled it open to retrieve the travel guide book. She gave her sword a shake of the excess walker blood and then sheathed it into the scabbard on her back and then opened the book up; tearing out the detachable map inside and then tossing the book to her brother.  
  
“Put that in your pack,” she said to Finn first. Then, “We should probably head out the way we came. Head back to Independence Avenue. We’ll figure it out from there.”  
  
All in agreement, they exited the parking lot and slipped out onto the street. Turning left, they made their way to the corner and turned back onto 12th Street, but once they reached Independence Avenue again, Jo suggested they keep going straight. Doing just that, they didn’t come to a stop until they came upon the National Mall.  
  
Again, there were plenty of walkers milling about, but the group of five walked slow and stayed quiet as to not draw attention to themselves since those walkers were a safe distance away from them. Being out in the open like that, though, made the group feel a bit anxious and the relief they felt when they approached the next street, lined with trees, was unanimous.  
  
Tapping Rick on the wrist, Jo pointed to the building ahead of them and slightly to their left. Glancing down at the map in her hand and back up at the building, she smirked. “Smithsonian. The American History one.”  
  
Rick looked back at her and nodded. With a simple flick of his wrist, he gestured for the other three to follow him and Jo across the road toward the building. Each had withdrawn their weapons, taking down a small handful of stray walkers in their way.  
  
Across the road, along the sidewalk and then up the steps to the building they went; stopping once they reached the glass doors, which were shattered, likely from earlier looting. At least it would make getting inside easier.  
  
“Why are we here?” Piper asked.  
  
“Mika wanted something,” Rick replied. “Finn, would you mind standing guard?”  
  
“Sure thing,” Finn nodded, gripping his hatchet tight and keeping a keen eye out.  
  
“Wanted what?” Piper pressed onward.  
  
“Well, you can either come inside to find out or you can stay out here and guard the door with Finn,” Rick replied.  
  
Piper seemed to perk up a bit. “I’ll stay out here.”  
  
“Sophia? Wanna stay out here or come inside?” Jo wondered.  
  
The teen seemed unsure. “Are you gonna be in there long?”  
  
Rick shook his head. “No, we just need one thing. We should be longer than, what—?” he eyed Jo for a time estimation.  
  
“No more than twenty minutes?” she presumed with a shrug.  
  
That seemed about right to Rick. Glancing at his adoptive daughter, and then at Finn, he gestured over his shoulder toward the building. “If a threat poses itself out here, come and find us. This place will have plenty of cover inside.” Latched on his utility belt was the walkie-talkie, which he had put there during their drive toward the Arlington Memorial Bridge, when Rick had to stop the car and figure out how to drive around a few abandoned cars. Removing the walkie-talkie, he handed it over to Sophia. “Use this to radio Merle and the others if something goes wrong and you can’t get to us, or if something happens to us.”  
  
“Well, now I want to go with you,” Sophia pouted. “What if something happens and I can’t do anything to stop it?”  
  
“Then you go on and you three get back to the others. You keep looking for Hope and Shane for us and let them know we never stopped looking for them.” Reaching out, Rick placed a hand to the side of Sophia’s face and pulled her close to press a kiss down atop her head. “We’ll be fine, though.”  
  
Sophia’s pout turned into a frown. “Famous last words.”  
  
“No,” Jo snickered. “Famous last words would be: ‘A dying man can do nothing easy.’”  
  
Finn knitted his brow. “What kind of famous last words are those?”  
  
“They’re Benjamin Franklin’s,” Jo shrugged. “I thought it kind of fitting, considering where we are.”  
  
“At the Smithsonian?”  
  
“No, in DC.”  
  
“Yeah, but he died in Philadelphia, didn’t he? Was he ever here?”  
  
Jo sighed. “Yeah, and I don’t know. He was a founding father, and this is the capital of the US, so—oh my god, Finn, you’re killing me here. Just go with it.”  
  
Rick shook his head and rolled his eyes but not without a smile in the process. Getting them all back on track, he placed a hand to Jo’s arm and began to lead her toward the shattered doors. “We’ll be back soon enough,” he said over his shoulder to the other three. Once through the doors, Rick glanced down at the map in Jo’s hands and then up toward her face. “Alright. Where are these ruby slippers?”  
  
Folding the map and shoving it into her back pocket, Jo walked ahead toward some pamphlets scattered on the floor. Picking one up, she flipped through it quickly. Realizing it didn’t have anything inside that would help, Jo reached down for a different pamphlet. Letting her eyes scan the small directory on the back, she jabbed the glossy page. “Here,” she muttered. “There was an exhibition called _1939_ on the third floor west.”  
  
“Of course it’s on the third floor,” Rick huffed.  
  
“That’s a good thing,” Jo insisted, leading him toward the stairs. “Means people might not have bothered going up to so far to loot this place.”  
  
“Hopefully.”  
  
As they ascended the stairs to the second floor, dead bodies were scattered about; from what looked to be the result in looting gone wrong. One body had been shot in the chest and was lying in a pool of dried blood. There was a knife wound in the forehead, which was probably administered after death to keep them from coming back. There were also a few walkers wandering aimlessly around, and were immediately riled up when they sensed Rick and Jo’s presence.  
  
Turning toward the noise of the couple’s boots scuffing along the floor, the walkers came ambling out from where they were lurking. Raising his machete, Rick slashed one walker diagonally across the face, dropping it to the ground like a sack of coal. Jo withdrew her sword from it scabbard and quickly sliced another walker’s head in half; the top half spinning off toward the ground and leaving a trail of darkened blood on the white floor as it skidded. As the body crumpled backward, more blood splattered onto the floor. The others that approached Rick and Jo were easily dispatched and forgotten afterward, leaving the couple to continue down the west corridor, to an escalator that no longer ran, but functioned all the same as stairs.  
  
Climbing up the escalator, Rick led Jo and when they reached the third floor, they found themselves in an exhibition called _National Treasures of Popular Culture_. Part of it was the smaller _1939_ exhibition. Jo ducked into it first and then stopped when she saw all the shattered glass.  
  
The most important display, for Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers, had been smashed.  
  
The shoes were gone.  
  
They had been taken by looters, after all.  
  
“Shit,” Jo grumbled.  
  
Stepping up toward the empty display, Rick frowned and let his eyes wander. Meanwhile, Jo finally sheathed her sword again and placed her hands on her hips while kicking around some broken glass. She felt disheartened, but the slightly amused “hmmph” noise Rick made got her curious.  
  
“What?”  
  
“Whoever took the shoes didn’t seem to care about an original script for _The Wizard of Oz_.” Carefully brushing some broken glass away, Rick lifted up a shabby stack of papers, bound together with “original copy” handwritten on it. Holding it up for Jo to see, Rick smirked. “I’d say this is better than nothing.”  
  
Sheathing his machete through the loop on his utility belt again, he then removed the backpack off his shoulders and set it down between his feet. Jo watched as he crouched down, unzipped the backpack and carefully placed the script inside.  
  
“It might not be what she wanted, but it _is_ more practical,” Jo remarked. “The script she can read to entertain herself. She’d be able to do nothing with the shoes. They would’ve most likely been too big for her, and if she’d worn them she might’ve ruined them. Not to mention there being no need for wearing high heels in this world.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “Would’ve been nice to admire, though. That’s probably why she wanted them,” he figured. “Something nice to look at and make her happy.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Yeah, I can see how that might be the case.”  
  
Standing back up as he zipped the backpack closed, Rick threw one of the straps over his left shoulder and then stepped up to his wife. Placing a brief, but sweet, kiss upon her lips, he smiled at her. “Anything you wanna take for yourself while we’re here?” he inquired.  
  
“Nah,” Jo shrugged. Lifting her hands, she dragged them up his chest and then slipped her fingers under the collar of his shirt. “This is all I wanna take.” With a grin, she stepped up onto tiptoe and returned his kiss, but made sure it was deeper.  
  
“If we didn’t have anywhere else to be, I’d say you could go ahead and take a hell of a lot more than that,” Rick mumbled with their lips separated.  
  
Jo smiled. Sliding her hands back down his chest, she slipped one of her hands into his and gave a squeeze. “You still promise to pillow fight the hell out of me when we get the chance?”  
  
“I promise.”  
  
Squeezing her hand back, Rick led her out of the _1939_ exhibition so they could make their way out of the museum altogether.  
  
They had more important things to look for, anyway.  
  
Signs of Hope and Shane’s whereabouts was still their main goal; the promise to themselves that they would never give up looking.


	46. Headshot

_"I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep on doing so until the end."_ — Abraham Lincoln

* * *

  
“So, did you find whatever it is you went in there for?” Finn asked the moment Rick and Jo stepped out of the museum.  
  
Their eyes having adjusted to the general darker din of the interior of the building, walking back out into the bright daylight forced them to squint and shield their eyes as they focused on the three waiting for them.  
  
“Not quite,” Rick replied, shifting the bag on his back.  
  
“What were you looking for?” Sophia wondered.  
  
“Dorothy’s ruby slippers,” Jo admitted, knowing it how ridiculous it might sound.  
  
Finn simply responded by laughing and shaking his head. “Wow, seriously?”  
  
“That’s stupid.” Everyone looked at Piper as she frowned at Rick and Jo. “You were going to risk your lives for a stupid pair of shoes from some hundred year old movie? Like, they’re not worth anything anymore. They’re impractical. What—when were you planning on wearing them? Got some party to go to?”  
  
Jo pursed her lips. Apparently Milo wasn’t the only one becoming annoying. “They weren’t for us,” she replied as civilly as possible. “Mika wanted them.”  
  
“She wouldn’t even be able to fit in them.”  
  
“We doubt she wanted them to wear,” Rick piped up, placing a hand on his hip, practically glaring at the teen. “ _The Wizard of Oz_ might’ve been one of her favorite movies in the old world, and having the shoes would’ve brought a smile to her face. If we could find something to make our daughter smile, then that’s what we’ll do.”  
  
Piper scoffed and rolled her eyes. “She’s not even your real daughter.”  
  
That comment instantly made Rick see red and he reacted first without thinking. Reaching out, he grabbed Piper’s arm a bit rougher than he’d intended and jerked in toward him in a way that made her face snap up at his in a startle. “Mika and Sophia are our daughters, regardless of blood, understand me? Don’t ever speak like that again.”  
  
“Rick,” Finn muttered, placing a hand onto his brother-in-law’s shoulder to get him to back off.  
  
Timidly nodding her head, Piper managed to pull her arm away and then sulk over beside Sophia.  
  
“Sorry,” Rick muttered to the girl.  
  
Emitting a tense sigh, Jo licked her lips and began to pull her hair back into a ponytail. “We should get a move on,” she insisted, trying to get them back on track while side-eyeing her husband.  
  
“Yeah,” he agreed.  
  
Jo turned and looked straight across the road, through the National Mall where walkers seemed to be amassing in numbers the longer they remained in front of the Madison Drive entrance to the museum. Stepping to the right, Jo led them toward the side of the building; choosing to stay close to it rather than the road until they were out of the clouded eyesight of the walkers behind them. While she took lead, Rick brought up the rear as they hurried along. As they made their way onto the side street, they saw the shit ton of cars abandoned coming out from the 12th Street Expressway that had been forced to come to a stop, like the cars on the Arlington Memorial Bridge, because of an accident early on during the fall. This accident was pretty bad, though. A tractor trailer was flipped over in the intersection, blocking the expressway’s exit. Other vehicles from the intersection roads were slammed into the sides, front and rear of the overturned truck and its haul. Walkers were writhing languidly inside most of those vehicles from the people that had died inside as a result of the accident and been left.  
  
It was just another sign that DC must’ve fallen fast. An accident like that, with so many dead inside the vehicles still, meant no emergency personnel ever arrived. Anyone who was injured, no matter to what extent, was left to their own devices; which unfortunately resulted in most, if not all, of their deaths. It would’ve been heartbreaking if Rick and the others weren’t so numb to scenes like this and if they didn’t have places to be and people to hopefully find.  
  
Slipping between the gap in two of the vehicles abandoned due to the accident at the intersection of Constitution Avenue and 12th Street, Rick’s group continued going straight. The road ahead was clear, from both vehicles and walkers alike, which meant they could slow their pace from a run to a brisk walk. Moving down the center of the road, between more imposing federal buildings, they all walked side by side, instead of one in front of the other. The road being the way it was allowed it.  
  
At the next intersection, at 12th and Pennsylvania Avenue, Rick led them over toward some coverage provided by the small trees lining the street. Just standing right out in the open was unsettling, given the prospect that there could be survivors in any of these buildings spying down on them at any given moment. Plus, it blocked them from the few walkers loitering around. Grabbing the bottom of Jo’s shirt, he pulled her toward him so he could remove the map out of her back pants pocket and give it a look.  
  
“Alright,” he muttered. “The White House is to our left, but we ain’t going there. At least, we’ll avoid it for now. If we go right, we’ll eventually reach the Capitol Building but, again, I want us to avoid any more major places like that.”  
  
“And straight ahead?” Finn inquired.  
  
“Some theaters and restaurants,” he replied. “We go any further north than that and we’d be heading into downtown and Daryl’s group has that area. So, we’ll stay around here for a while, swing back for the car, and check the area to the left of the White House if there’s time.”  
  
“We’ve all agreed to take possibly two days for this particular jaunt,” Jo remarked, hands on her hips. “We can focus solely on this area right of the White House today and find someplace nearby to spend the night. First thing tomorrow morning we head back to the car and make our way to the area left of the White House and then head home before nightfall.”  
  
“Yeah, okay, sounds good to me.” He looked around to the others. “Y’all content with that?”  
  
Finn nodded. “Yeah,” he agreed.  
  
Sophia and Piper both nodded as well.  
  
Heading up to the next main road, they looked left and right; looking in every direction for signs that Shane might’ve left as well as keeping an eye out for threats of both the living and dead varieties. Their group’s main goal was primarily looking for Shane and Hope, but also food and other trivial supplies. So, when they approached a Guess clothing store on the corner of the next intersection they came to, Rick led them over with the stealth of a cat.  
  
“We should try finding some new clothes,” Rick muttered. “New pants, shirts, socks, underwear, and maybe shoes.”  
  
“There’s a Radio Shack just there, too,” Sophia pointed out up the sidewalk from where they stood. “We might be able to find another walkie-talkie, or at least some batteries.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Here first, though.” Gesturing to the first set of sliding automatic doors that were sealed shut, he looked at Finn who was holding the hatchet in his hands. “Wanna do the honors?”  
  
“We should look for a crowbar at some point,” Finn commented, shoving the hatchet’s blade into the hairline gap between both doors. With a grunt from exerting himself, he added, “It would make prying doors like this open a lot easier.”  
  
As soon as the doors began to part enough, Rick grabbed on side and Jo grabbed the other; allowing the girls to slip in first before the rest of them followed. Making sure the doors slid back shut behind them, Finn moved to the inner set to repeat the process, but Rick stopped him. Standing between Finn and the doors, Rick removed his Colt from its holster and tapped the end of the barrel upon the glass to lure out any lurkers inside the store.  
  
Nothing happened at first, so Rick tapped again; this time a bit heavier so the sound was louder.  
  
That second time did it.  
  
About seven or eight walkers began to move out toward the doors from behind clothing racks, but it was hard to see for certain just how many there were from how dark it was inside. Helping herself to digging into the backpack Finn was carrying on his back, Jo sifted around and withdrew one of the flashlights they brought with them. Turning it on, she shined the light into the store, which drew the walkers right toward them and the group was able to get a better headcount.  
  
“Shit,” Rick muttered, shaking his head and peering inside. “There’s barely anything left in there. This place was cleaned out a while ago.”  
  
“Just a bunch of roamers instead,” Piper bemoaned. “This was a waste of time.”  
  
“No, it wasn’t,” Sophia countered. “We had to check. And it’s not like it took us an hour to do.”  
  
Piper frowned back her fellow, albeit younger, teen.  
  
Frowning as well, but in regard to Piper, Rick look over the girls’ heads toward Jo; both of them silently agreeing that having — at least — Piper come along might’ve been a mistake. She might’ve been on her own before Finn found her however many months before, but how long she’d been alone neither Rick or Jo knew. What they could both tell, though, was since being found and until the fall of the Commune, Piper hadn’t needed to be out in the world like this now. She’d been coddled and kept safe. Sophia had been coddled as well, but only to an extent. Jo had taught Sophia how to protect herself when it was just the two of them, she had been able to protect Jo in turn when they made it to that old farmhouse after Woodbury, she had been trained to use guns at the prison like all the other kids and been through a hell of a lot more.  
  
Rick and Jo were confident Sophia could handle whatever situation was thrown at her if she had no one to help her. They couldn’t afford her anymore of a childhood, as sad as it was. At least they didn’t have to worry about keeping her safe as they did with Mika, who was still so young and not as jaded. Of course, now there was also Piper to keep an eye out on and it seemed that this excursion, so to speak, into DC would allow them to get to know what the older teen was like in these situations.  
  
So far, they weren’t overly impressed.  
  
Slipping back out of the building and onto the sidewalk, they decided to forgo the clothes and head up to Radio Shack. It was only a single layer of two glass doors and they’d already been shattered open, much like the entrance to the Smithsonian, so getting inside was a breeze. With their weapons at the ready, they quietly and carefully slipped inside with Rick taking lead and Finn bringing up the rear. The store wasn’t that big, so there weren’t any places for anyone or anything to hide and jump out at the group from. In fact, there was no one aside from their group and one dead walker behind the cashier’s counter inside the store. The place had been picked apart by looters early on who had taken superficial electronics which would be pointless, _literal_ steals once all the power grids had gone down. The supply of batteries was incredible slim pickings and hard to find in all the mess. Even using their flashlights and kicking things aside with their feet, they were lucky to find the small handful of AAA batteries that Finn found under packages of protective cell phone cases.  
  
“Can we use this?” Sophia asked, holding up a box.  
  
“What is it?” Jo asked, flashing her flashlight over.  
  
“It’s a 12-volt pocket jump starter,” the girl read off the description. “It says it can jumpstart a 12-volt dead battery in a vehicle and charge most 5-volt DC powered devices, whatever that part means.”  
  
“Yeah, we can definitely use that,” Rick insisted. “Toss it into Finn’s bag.”  
  
Finn, who was closer to Sophia, stepped over and held open his unzipped backpack to his surrogate niece who gently set the box inside with the batteries Finn had found.  
  
“There doesn’t really seem to be much else of use to us in here,” Finn remarked. “We’d probably have better luck at a Radio Shack in a suburban shopping plaza than in the heart of a city.”  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded in agreement, sweeping the light from his flashlight along the walls. “Was worth a shot, though.”  
  
Once they exited the store and moved toward the corner, Jo gestured to the Payless shoe store and Rick silently acquiesced that they head in and see what they could find. The shoes on most of their feet had seen better days. Sophia and Piper went down on aisle, while Finn disappeared down another. Jo, was content with her boots, as was Rick, but it didn’t stop them from looking at what was left in the store.  
  
“Mika’s probably going to hit a couple more growth spurts. We should find her a new pair of trainers.” Jo crouched down at the kid’s section she and Rick were standing in front of. “I’m not sure on her exact size right now, but these look like they’d fit; maybe not now but soon enough, right?” She twisted around at the waist and held up the pair she’d removed from a box on the bottom shelf.  
  
Rick smirked. “We might not’ve been able to get her Ruby’s sparkling ruby slippers, but I think glittery hot pink high tops are the next best thing.”  
  
Grabbing a backpack discarded on the floor near the wall behind the cashier counter, Jo tossed the sneakers inside; not needing the box they came in. Finn found a new pair of sneakers, putting them on right away and leaving behind the pair he’d been wearing. Sophia and Piper had no luck. All that was available to them in their shoe sizes were sandals and those were impractical on so many levels.  
  
Heading back out onto the road, they noticed a few walkers collecting on the road up ahead so they turned right onto G Street. A block away on their right was a Forever 21 store which Piper seemed excited about checking out.  
  
“It’s two stories. There’d be more of a selection to scavenge from,” she insisted.  
  
Rick shot her down without blinking an eye. It wasn’t practical is what he insisted. There would be too much space to cover, to many nooks and crannies for walkers and other lurkers to be hiding in and there weren’t enough of them to go around to secure the place. Any more clothes they might need they would hold off until they got back home to the cul-de-sac of row houses. They could loot the other homes and take what was left behind by the previous occupants.  
  
Grumbling unhappily to herself, Piper had no choice but accept what Rick said, especially when Jo and Finn backed him up and Sophia just remained silent on the matter; although she clearly agreed with her adoptive parents.  
  
“The walkers are thickening behind us,” Finn remarked, looking over his shoulder.  
  
“There’s a considerable amount straight ahead, too,” Jo added. “I say we turn right on this street right here. Going left with take us more north of the city and Daryl’s group has that covered. We should stay on this end.”  
  
The street on the right in question was 10th Street and there was a beautiful cathedral on the corner that seemed untouched by the apocalypse. There was something almost peaceful and poetic about it.  
  
“St. Patrick’s Catholic Church,” Jo muttered, admiring the stone façade. “It’s beautiful.”  
  
“Lori and I got married in a church like this back in King County about a billion years ago,” Rick commented.  
  
“Catholic?”  
  
“No, Lutheran.”  
  
“Jo’s wedding to Oscar was amusing,” Finn piped up. “Oscar’s mom and dad went to this Baptist church back in Decatur and our family weren’t churchgoers so Jo didn’t give a shit where she got married, so that’s where it ended up, and to this day I still think that pastor was drunk.”  
  
“He wasn’t drunk,” Jo countered. “He was just enthusiastic. He was filled with the Spirit or whatever.”  
  
“Oh, and that lady that was singing at the altar before the ceremony began. I thought she was auditioning for American Idol or to be a back-up singer for Mariah Carey.”  
  
Jo shook her head. “Don’t be a dick.” Casting Rick a glance, she saw he was amused by the interaction between the siblings and possible even trying to envision all of what Finn was saying. “I swear it was a perfectly normal ceremony.”  
  
“I think I’d rather have had your Baptist ceremony than my Lutheran,” Rick admitted, bringing up the rear of their group as they walked slowly down the middle of the road. “Mine was so dull. Pastor was old as all hell. And I remember it being so hot out and I was in a tux, sweating my balls off. Couldn’t wait for the damned reception a couple hours later where we had air conditioning.” He sighed at the memory. “Serves us right getting married in August in Georgia, during one of the hottest summers ever. To this day I don’t think any summer has come as close to being as hot as that particular summer was.”  
  
Jo had turned around and was walking backward, smiling at him, while shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand. “That’s something I wish I could’ve see for myself.”  
  
“What? Me sweating my balls off? I do that every day now. You’ve seen me drenched from head to toe in sweat more times than you can probably count.”  
  
“No,” she shook her head. “You in a tux. I’ve seen that picture of you, Lori and Carl where you had shorter hair and were clean shaven…but a tux? If money was still a thing, I’d pay whatever it cost to see you in a tux. Hell, even in just a dress shirt and tie would be amusing to me.”  
  
Rick nodded and tilted his head, considering what she was saying. “Someday soon we’ll renew those vows of ours and we’ll get cleaned up, wear nice clothes. Anything would be a step up from our little side of the road wedding; aesthetically, that is. I mean, were covered in a lot of blood that and dirt and whatever else.”  
  
“Jo deserves the best, that’s for sure,” Finn said.  
  
Turning around, Jo smiled at her brother. “Aww.”  
  
“Yeah, she does,” Rick agreed.  
  
Jo snickered. “Well, I suppose wearing an actual dress to renew our vows would be—”  
  
“Walkers!” Piper shouted.  
  
The group had reached the next intersection and to their immediate left there was a herd barely a hundred feet away. There was also a rather stagnant herd to their right that seemed riled by the movement of the herd on the left. Behind the group, from the direction they’d just been coming from, there seemed to be a considerable amount of walkers that had clumped together and had been following them. The undead would be converging soon enough on the intersections of F and 10th Streets within moments.  
  
“Keep going straight!” Rick bellowed, immediately switching off the moments of reverie to return to leader of the pack mode.  
  
Darting past Madame Tussaud’s, crossing the intersection and heading forward, the group ran. There were two metro buses abandoned haphazardly on the road. One was blocking a parking ramp entrance and the other was parked diagonally across the street, blocking their view of the other end of the block. Once they slipped around the vehicle, Rick and the others were stopped dead in their tracks by the sight of a massive herd blocking that next intersection.  
  
“We can’t go that way,” Jo muttered, pointing forward. “And they’ve noticed us.”  
  
“And we can’t go back the way we came,” Finn added.  
  
“Then we go inside one of these buildings and wait it out,” Piper offered.  
  
“Which one?” Sophia wondered.  
  
Rick darted his eyes around. There wasn’t enough time to just stand around and make much of a choice. The herds from both directions were getting too close for comfort as they staggered forward with their decayed arms outstretched, snapping their rotting jaws and snarling.  
  
Every door seemed closed or was glass, therefore easily breakable and not safe to hide behind until they could figure their next move. They would need someplace with a possible back exit, someplace that was—  
  
“There!” Rick shouted, pointing to the building on their left. One of the doors was ajar.  
  
The other four followed his gaze.  
  
“Aw, man. Something about this seems ominous,” Finn muttered, leading them over toward the door in question. “The last person of importance that went in here, left with a bullet in his head and then died.”  
  
As the group of five slipped through one of the two opened double doors, into the original lobby of Ford’s Theatre, with Rick quickly shutting the door behind them. While he scanned the narrow, original lobby for something to barricade the door to keep it from opening up from the outside, Jo had the more level head to merely kick down the doorstoppers at the base of the door. She smirked at him when he noted what she had done and nodded at her, although he wasn’t sold on those doorstoppers doing much to keeping anything out.  
  
“We’re out of sight, out of mind now,” she insisted quietly, but could see he wasn’t content to just stand there and make sure.  
  
“Keep going,” Rick muttered, pointing to the set of double yellow doors in front of them.  
  
Sophia opened them up, warily. She wasn’t sure if anything might be awaiting them on the other side. Holding her knife out in front of her, she peered through the darkness of the theater as she began to creep along the wall while the others slipped in after her. Once again, Rick shut the doors behind them.  
  
“Chairs, right there,” he said to Finn. “Grab a couple. We’ll bring them out into that hall and place ‘em in front of the doors. There’re half-moon windows above the doors, hidden by those red curtains. We can stand on the chairs to look out the windows and keep an eye out on the walker situation outside as long as they stay outside.”  
  
Finn nodded and grabbed up two chairs, as did Rick. There were four sets of double, outer doors in the lobby, so they placed a chair at each set; to the side, though. Rick figured they’d bring less attention to themselves if they peered out the sides of the windows so the curtains rustling in the center didn’t possibly draw unwanted attention. There was no sound of banging or scratching at the doors, so the group must’ve slipped into the building fast enough that, by the time the walkers converged fully onto the road in front of Ford’s Theatre, their attention spans had been distracted by their fellow dead instead of the living fivesome.  
  
Jo was right.  
  
They were out of sight and out of mind, but as long as the two conjoined herds remained unmoved on that street, there would be leaving the way Rick’s group had come in. They’d need another exit.  
  
“Alright,” Rick began as he and Finn stepped into the back of the theater. “We’re gonna have to split up and check for other exits. Maybe something leads into one of the neighboring buildings.”  
  
“There’s a back alley,” Sophia remarked.  
  
“Is there?”  
  
She nodded adamantly. “We learned about Abraham Lincoln in school a few years ago; how, after John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln in the head, he jumped down from Presidential Box to the stage and escaped out a backstage door where a horse was waiting in the back alley. He was found, like, two weeks later and shot dead.”  
  
Piper snickered. “I barely remember anything like that from school. Only the necessary stuff, like basic math really matters anymore.”  
  
Sophia folded her arms and shrugged. “Yeah, well, those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”  
  
Both girls stared at each other for a moment before Jo cleared her throat. “Okay, Sophia, you come with me. We’ll check backstage for the exit. I find it highly unlikely there would be any passages between buildings, so…Rick, Finn…keep the doors secure.”  
  
Rick hesitated. Usually he’d be the one to head off to do what needed to be done while the others stayed put. He seemed almost lost for a moment. Sensing as much, Jo touched her hand down upon his arm and brushed her thumb along his skin.  
  
“We’ll be back,” she assured.  
  
They maintained eye contact for a moment before Jo gestured for Sophia to lead the way down the center aisle to their left. Releasing her hand from Rick’s arm, Jo turned and unsheathed her sword she hadn’t been really using. She had a gun at her hip and a larger knife in her hand. It felt easier to use at the moment, in such narrows spaces. With her left hand holding the flashlight still and her right still holding her own knife, Sophia led them both toward the stairs on the left the ascended to the stage.  
  
Jo could sense Rick’s eyes were following her and, although she couldn’t see his face, the flashlight Finn was holding gave her a sense of where the other three were in the back of the theater, so she looked over her shoulder and focused on that area knowing he would see the gesture and hopefully take some comfort in it.  
  
Walking across the stage was slightly surreal for a moment.  
  
Yes, sure, the dead were up and moving outside. Inside, however; the history of where they stood was not lost on them. At least not for Jo and Sophia; Jo who had been a third grade teacher and taught her students about the presidents once upon a time, and Sophia who had just proved she had committed to memory that bit of history she had learned as a student, what probably felt like forever and a day ago.  
  
Sophia stopped center stage and aimed the flashlight up at the President’s Box. American flags were still draped over the edge with a portrait of George Washington in the middle.  
  
“That’s where Abraham Lincoln was shot,” Sophia remarked, letting the stream of light from the flashlight trail down from the box to the stage. “And that’s probably where John Wilkes Booth landed.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo nodded, taking a moment, as well, to realize they were retracing some historic steps.  
  
Just because they lived in a brand new world didn’t mean they had to ignore or forget prominent moments from the former world. They could still take time to appreciate history. There was enough of it to remember, even if it wasn’t even first- or secondhand.  
  
Without saying anything else, Jo sidled up beside her surrogate daughter and walked with her through the red stage curtain and both stopped again, taking in the sight of a partially dismantled set from whatever production had been halted by the apocalypse. They continued, traipsing around set pieces and the back scenery to the very backstage area where there was a large, brick wall. Shining the flashlight around, Sophia began looking for the door that exited to the back alley while Jo kept her main focus on anything that might jump out at them.  
  
“Right here, I think,” Sophia muttered, aiming the flashlight ahead.  
  
Protectively, Jo pushed the girl to the side. Sheathing her knife, she decided it was time for her sword again as she removed it from the scabbard on her back with her right hand and reached for the door with her left.  
  
“Keep back,” she warned.  
  
Slowly, Jo pulled the door open about a foot and stuck her head out for just a moment before quietly and calmly closing it back up.  
  
“Well? Is it clear?” Sophia wondered.  
  
Jo turned and glanced at the teen, shaking her head. “There’s a lot of dead bodies in that alley.”  
  
“Living dead or _dead_ dead?”  
  
“Living dead.”  
  
“Shit,” Sophia grumbled.  
  
Jo had to agree with the sentiment; not minding the curse from the girl’s lips. “My thoughts exactly,” she spoke, gripping the handle of her sword tightly in her hand. “We need to tell Rick about this situation; see what his thoughts are on what we do next.”  
  
Leading Sophia back the way they came, from out behind the red curtain, Jo stepped up toward the edge of the stage and grabbed the flashlight from Sophia. Shining the light toward the back of the theater, she knew she grabbed Rick, Finn and Piper’s attention when she heard Rick call out to her, asking how it was.  
  
“The alley’s blocked by another herd. I don’t see us getting out that way anytime soon,” she informed.  
  
With the flashlight aimed toward him, Jo was able to not only hear his heavy footsteps, but also see Rick saunter up the same aisle she and Sophia had come down minutes before. He was holding his machete at his side as he approached, staring up at Jo. She shined the light away, as not to blind him.  
  
“We might be stuck her overnight then.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Hopefully one night is all.”  
  
“Finn has our walkie. He can radio Group One; maybe they can make their way this way and help us out. They can always hit up Georgetown or any other nearby college any other day,” Sophia offered her two cents, trying to contribute. “I mean, we can’t contact Group Two because Group One has the other walkie, right?”  
  
Rick nodded. “We might have to do that. We don’t know how long the herds in the front of the theater or in the back alley will stay. If we’re gonna get out of here anytime soon we’re gonna need an outside distraction to draw them away so we can get out.”  
  
“Finn,” Jo called out to her brother who came walking down the aisle behind Rick with Piper in tow like a little lapdog.  
  
“’Sup? We good to go out the back?”  
  
“No. Got a herd in the alley, too,” she replied. “Do us a favor and contact Group One, okay? We’re probably gonna need some help. They can make it to Daryl’s group — Group Two — and then both groups can help us out.”  
  
“Yeah, sure,” Finn nodded, reaching into his bag. He rifled through it frantically after a moment and then dropped the back to his feet and patted his sides, whipping his head around. Turning, he eyed Piper behind him. “Did I give you the walkie?”  
  
The girl shook her head. “No.”  
  
Letting out a frustrated breath, Finn looked to Rick. “Is it in your bag?”  
  
Placing a hand on his hip, Rick turned and looked back at his brother-in-law with mild aggravation. “No, I gave it to you back at the Smithsonian.”  
  
“Where do you last remember having it, Finn?” Jo asked.  
  
Finn shrugged. “I clipped it onto my belt. I remember touching it briefly at in Radio Shack, but I swear I had it even after that.”  
  
“If it fell off in one of those stores, we would’ve heard it,” Rick muttered. “The sound would’ve echoed.”  
  
“Not if it fell outside on the street when we were running in here,” Jo lamented. “That sound would’ve been drowned out by all those snarling walkers.”  
  
Rick threw his hands up in defeat. “Well, that’s just great. You should’ve put it in your bag,” he barked at Finn.  
  
“It was a damned accident. It’s not like I dropped it on purpose,” Finn retorted.  
  
“Maybe if you hadn’t gone looking for some stupid shoes from some million year old movie, you wouldn’t have needed to hand off the walkie-talkie to Finn in the first place,” Piper retaliated. “So, don’t blame Finn. Maybe blame yourself.”  
  
“Wow.” Sophia shook her head as she sheathed her knife at her side and folded her arms. “Seriously? Yeah, it was an accident Finn dropped it, but it was still his responsibility. Telling my dad to blame himself for Finn’s mistake is ridiculous. If we had only one water bottle and you gave it to me to drink from and I lost it, I wouldn’t go blaming _you_. That would be my mistake because. Not yours. I wouldn’t tell you that you shouldn’t have given it to me in the first place, so why pass make this my dad’s fault?”  
  
“Oh, shut up already with the ‘dad’ thing.” She pointed right at Rick. “He’s not even your actual dad.”  
  
Sophia looked almost murderous. “He’s been more of a dad to me in the last month than my actual dad was to me my entire life. Rick is my dad and if you say otherwise, I swear to God—”  
  
“You’ll what?” Piper taunted.  
  
“ _Hey_! Both of you. Knock it off,” Jo bellowed at the girls. “Blaming each other for anything isn’t going to help us. We lost the walkie. Life sucks. This isn’t brand new information. We’ll figure something else out. If we have to wait it out here a day or two, then that’s what we’ll do, okay?” Both men and both girls looked back at her almost sheepishly. “Maybe there’s some sort of rooftop access and we can make a jump over to another building that faces a street _not_ blocked by the herd. We could head down into another building and make our way out that way.” Turning her focus primarily onto Rick, she gave him a moment to let that idea of hers roll around in his head before he nodded back at her. “Let’s go check it out.”  
  
Rick looked her in the eye, perching his hands upon his hips as he chewed the inside of his bottom lip. “Yeah, okay.” With a nod, he looked to her to take lead before glancing over at Finn. “Make sure the girls don’t kill each other?”  
  
With a sigh, Finn obliged. “I can’t make any promises.”  
  
Shifting her attention between both teens, Jo pointed at Sophia. “You sit on one side and you,” she pointed next at Piper, “On the other side to chill out until Rick and I get back.” When she received no initial response one way or the other, Jo pressed, “Understood?”  
  
Sophia nodded her head obediently jumped down from the stage and sank down into a chair in the front row of stage left while Piper rolled her eyes and trudged over to plop down into a chair in the front row of stage right; as if she’d been given some strenuous chore to do. With a look toward Rick again, Jo made eye contact with him as she walked down the steps from the stage and joined him to walk up the aisle toward the back of the theatre in silence.  
  
Once they’d slipped out of the theatre and into the narrow, original lobby, Jo looked to their right and gestured toward the curved staircase. She didn’t have to say it out loud that that was where they should go; Rick had become more than attuned enough to her to know whatever comment or point she was trying to make at any given moment without actually having to spell it out, and vice versa.  
  
As her sword was still in hand from her search for the back alley exit with Sophia, Jo instinctively held it up in a defensive stance in case of anything lurking once they made it to the second floor balcony. There wasn’t anything, but at least she was prepared.  
  
After a solid half hour of figuring out every nook and cranny of the upper levels for possible exits, Rick and Jo could determine there wasn’t any rooftop access. Even the doors that said “Emergency Exit” on them didn’t actually lead directly outside. They were just other ways to get downstairs to head out the front, which was blocked by the herd. Heading into the newer building attached to the theatre wasn’t really an option either. There was a museum and gift shop there, but it also opened up to the barrage of dead bodies on the main road, with the added issue of all glass doors. When they had realized they were virtually stuck between a rock and hard place and that they’d have to wait it out at least a day, there wasn’t much of anything else any of them could really do until the herd at the front or the back thinned out and moved along.  
  
They had planned ahead for the likelihood of staying overnight somewhere within the city, just no under these circumstances. Either way, they were prepared enough to have brought extra water bottles and some food, so they wouldn’t go thirsty and they wouldn’t go hungry. If they ate and drank sparingly, they could spread their supply out two days, easily. They’d gone longer with less before. They could do it again. Although, Jo was eating and drinking for two again and that was the deciding factor for Rick to offer Jo his share when the time came to spread their food thinner. She would need it more than him. He could be fine without even less, or nothing at all for a little while longer.  
  
When the couple returned toward the front of the theater, it was decided they would sleep on the main balcony off the second floor. In the event any walkers broke into the theatre, they’d be safer off the ground floor of the theatre, which is where the walkers might enter into. Walkers wouldn’t have the dexterity or common sense to ascend the stairs without provocation. Getting overrun inside the theatre didn’t seem too likely, though, despite the herds on the street and in the back alley. They were all remaining quiet and nowhere near any doors or windows to draw attention to themselves inside the building.  
  
Remaining petty about their minor spat from earlier, neither Sophia nor Piper were talking to each other; the latter opting to take refuge away from everyone else by sulking in the President’s Box where Lincoln had been shot about a hundred and fifty years prior. Finn took a seat in the front row of the balcony so he could prop his legs upon the railing and Sophia sat down beside him with her arms folded and a pout on her face. Rick and Jo had taken up two chairs set against the back wall between two sets of tan, velvet curtains which allowed them to periodically sneak peeks out into the street below to see if the herd outside was moving along at all.  
  
For the meantime, it seemed just the opposite.  
  
The movement and noise from the already gathered herd seem to draw the attention from more stragglers, which kept increasing the size of the herd little by little.  
  
The air inside the theatre was thick with tension.  
  
Each one of them was frustrated by their predicament. Add in the loss of the walkie for communicating with Team One at Georgetown University, and whatever teenage angst was brewing between the girls; they were all fit to be tied.  
  
Rick tipped his head back, letting it rest upon the wall behind him and Jo, as he crossed his arms over his chest, closed his eyes and began to bob his leg up and down due to a nervous energy brewing inside him. He was never one for sitting still and doing nothing, but there wasn’t anything they _could_ do at the moment.  
  
Jo, who had been staring at the backside of the last row of seats in front of them, became distracted by Rick’s bobbing leg and she couldn’t help but feel agitated by it. Reaching her right hand out, she leaned forward and placed it upon his knee to suppress the movement. Sensing the gesture, Rick popped his eyes opened and glanced at her.  
  
“What?”  
  
“It’s annoying me.”  
  
“We’re stuck in here with no foreseeable way out and my _leg_ is what’s annoying you?”  
  
“Well, it certainly ain’t making things better,” Jo replied, removing her hand and sitting back; mirroring Rick by folding her arms across her chest. As he side-eyed her, she looked forward in the virtual darkness toward the direction of the stage below. “Your nervous, jerky leg is making me feel nervous and jerky, and then that’s just gonna make me start to stress out and I really don’t need extra stress right now. My hormones are out of whack on a good day. This,” she gestured with her head at where they were in general, “isn’t making it any easier.”  
  
Rick could feel himself becoming combative, but this wasn’t just anyone he could snap at. This was Jo, his pregnant wife. They had all seen and been through enough shit in the last few weeks, but Jo had been through a bit more recently and she didn’t deserve the attitude he was prepared to give. The fact that he was able to reel it all in pretty quickly before he said something he’d regret faster than he could blink was something he impressed himself with. He’d give himself a gold star sticker if he had one.  
  
“Sorry,” he muttered quietly instead. Unfolding his arms, he reached his left hand out and placed it against the side of her face at first before cupping the back of her head in a soothing gesture. “I just don’t like sitting still. I need to be doing something, but there’s nothing I can do, and it’s bothering me.”  
  
“So,” Jo spoke, turning to look at him. “Why don’t you just walk the perimeter of the theatre? Make sure everything’s okay.”  
  
Moving his hand down to rest on her shoulder furthest from him, Rick nodded. Taking a walk and making a perimeter check was something to do, at least. “I suppose I should anyway.” He looked forward, seeing how Finn was talking to Sophia about whatever, and then he looked back at Jo. “Come with me.”  
  
Catching his eye, Jo considered the offer and nodded. “Okay.”  
  
As he stood up, Rick offered his hand to help her up to her feet. Not because she needed the help to get up, but simply because it was the gentlemanly thing to do. Jo accepted his hand, but didn’t let go of it once she was standing. She held onto it out of comfort.  
  
“Finn, we’re gonna take a perimeter check,” Rick called out to his brother-in-law.  
  
Both Finn and Sophia turned around in their seats and looked at the pair at the back of the balcony.  
  
“Alright,” Finn replied. “If you’re gone longer than an hour, we’ll come looking.”  
  
Neither Rick or Jo could tell if her brother meant that seriously or in jest. It was too dark to see much in the way of detailed facial expressions in the distance between the four of them.  
  
“Got it,” Rick acquiesced as he picked up his backpack and through it over his shoulder, just in case they needed whatever was inside.  
  
Without another word, Rick led the way downstairs where they began to check the outer doors in the original lobby, which they had managed to lock earlier, as well as the checking the door that led into the new building where the modern lobby, ticket office and gift shop were located. They kept it closed as there was no need to go into that part of the structure. They then made their way into the theatre again; down the aisles with Rick’s flashlight at the ready while their respective weapons remained sheathed or holstered.  
  
They wandered up onto the stage and made their way behind the curtain, around partially dismantled set pieces and toward the alley exit, which Rick had quietly and discreetly opened up enough to get a glimpse outside into the alley. Like Jo before him, he pulled his head back and closed the door up just as quietly and discreetly; relaying the fact that the alley was still a no-go.  
  
Casting the light from the flashlight around the backstage area and upward toward the catwalk, Rick felt somewhat at ease they their immediate surroundings were safe inside. There wasn’t really much else they really needed to check, and Jo could see that Rick felt like he needed to still keep moving about.  
  
Newton’s First Law, again.  
  
“You know,” she began, speaking softly. “There’s the museum underneath the theatre. Theatre was that door at the back of the spiral staircase in the lobby. The word ‘MUSEUM’ was above the door. We could go down, check it out. Maybe there’s something we could use down there; an old bayonet blade we can take and bring back with us to the townhouses so Merle can finally get around to making that prosthetic like his for Jen.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah. Sounds like a plan.”  
  
Placing his hand upon her lower back, he let her walk out from behind the red curtain first, following down from the stage. Briefly, they both glanced upward and to their left to check if Piper was still in the President’s Box, which she was, and then upward toward the front of the balcony where Finn and Sophia still remained.  
  
“We’re gonna check the museum downstairs,” Jo informed up to them.  
  
“Want the extra flashlight?” Finn asked, his voice echoing off the walls of the otherwise silent theatre.  
  
“Sure.” Jo moved to stand in the aisle, almost directly under the balcony as she watched her brother stand up and move along the edge so that he was lined up with where she stood below.  
  
“Catch,” he muttered after turning the flashlight on so she could see it fall as he dropped it down to her.  
  
When she caught it, she called up a brief thanks and then turned to Rick as she continued to lead the way back out toward the lobby and, once again, looked to their right at the spiral staircase. But this time they walked just behind it where there was a yellow door with the word ‘MUSEUM’ directly above it, just as Jo had said.  
  
Being the gentleman again, Rick took lead this time; leading the way down the stairs once the door was opened.  
  
If they thought it was dark before when they were in the theater, it was like the bottom of the ocean now in the museum once they reached it. At least when they were upstairs, there were windows from the front of the building that they could push aside the curtains to in order to let light in if they needed. Downstairs there was nothing except the flashlights they had brought with them. With not knowing the layout of the museum they were entering, they were possibly setting themselves up for a bad situation, so keeping their wits about them went without saying. Because of this, they unsheathed their bladed weapons in order to be able to protect themselves and each other at a moment’s notice.  
  
Shining the flashlights around them, they saw there was an alcove to their almost immediate left which stated that was where some bathrooms and elevators to the modern were. In the brief flicker of light as they shined it forward and to the right, they saw figures standing there and both Rick and Jo went stock still; prepared for some sort of fight with the undead. However, upon a second, more thorough inspection, they realized those figures were just simple statues that were part of the exhibit; allowing them to breathe a little easier.  
  
They continued to walk along the outskirts of the museum before, nearly coming full circle to where they’d started when they turned their attention to the center of the museum.  
  
“This would be a hell of a lot easier if we had candles to light and set up around here,” Rick grumbled.  
  
Jo paused. “Wait, we do.”  
  
“We do?”  
  
“Yeah, Sophia packed them in our bag this morning before we left, just in case.”  
  
Rick smirked, although Jo couldn’t see it because neither flashlight was pointed near his face. “Remind me to find her a working MP3 player full of music teenagers like.”  
  
Jo chuckled as she shifted her flashlight toward him as she heard him shrugging his backpack off his shoulders. Holding his own flashlight up, he saw there was a desk in a section designed — badly — to supposedly look like Lincoln’s office in the White House. Setting the bag down upon the desk, Rick held his flashlight in one hand while simultaneously unzipping the bag before aiming the light inside the bag. Rifling around for a moment, pushing aside a couple of canned goods and one of the extra water bottles, Rick found a few votive candles, which he cupped into his free hand and held up for Jo to see.  
  
“Well, I was expecting pillar candles, but beggars can’t be choosers,” he remarked, setting the votives down on the desk. Shoving his hand back into the bag, he tried feeling around for a box of matches to light the candles and removed a butane lighter instead.  
  
There were six votives in total. Lighting each one, Rick managed to carry two in each hand. Behind Jo and him were two benches, so he set two votives on opposite ends of each bench. Off to the side as another bench against a partition situated behind the exhibit statues, so he set the remaining two votives there. The light it cast gave them a glimpse toward the direction they’d original came from.  
  
“We shouldn’t burn the candles too long. I think those are all we have and we don’t want to waste them. We might need them later tonight if the batteries in our flashlights run out and we need to find our way around the theatre to use a bathroom or something,” Jo commented.  
  
Rick turned toward her; the faint orange glow from the candles flickered at knee level, but shined enough that she could more easily see that handsome face of his. She watched as he walked over to the desk and picked his flashlight back up and then promptly switched it off before gesturing for her to do the same. It became a bit more darker when those lights went out, but at least they could still see, and the light was more evenly distributed. Taking his flashlight and hers from her as well, he set them side by side on one of the benches behind them, between the votives and then back toward the desk. Standing with his back to Jo, he went about lifting the backpack up and setting it down upon the ground, but then he just remained standing there, not facing her, as he braced his hands on the sides of the desk.  
  
“What’s wrong?” she inquired. “Besides the obvious issues that we’ve been dealing with or are _currently_ dealing with.”  
  
Rick turned his head but didn’t look over his shoulder to make eye contact with her. “Beside from the obvious issues, nothing’s wrong,” he assured. “Just thinking.”  
  
“About what?”  
  
“How we get out of here, for one.”  
  
“That would be one of the current issues.”  
  
“Yeah, but in thinking about that, and how we _can’t_ get out of here at the moment, and this time we have to kill…” Rick’s voice trailed and he straightened his postured slightly; his shoulder blades and the muscles in his back flexing as he did so.  
  
“Yeah, waiting around like this is kinda boring,” Jo remarked. “But I’d rather be bored, sitting around doing nothing than outside fighting for my life in that herd. It’s better to wait it out as long as we can manage. We’re no good to anyone if we end up dead, and I don’t want to risk Sophia’s life.” She sighed, stepping up behind Rick; placing her hands upon his hips and her chin between his shoulder blades. “I know she can handle herself for the most part, but I think I’m regretting bringing her and Piper along. Or, at least, I’m regretting bringing just Piper. The girl is turning into the younger, female version of Milo.”  
  
“I don’t think she’s turning into him so much as we haven’t actually spent this much time with her to realize how annoying she is, just like Milo.”  
  
Jo chuckled into his back. “Probably.”  
  
“She sure knows how to push buttons, though.” Rick shifted around until he was partially sitting on the desk, facing Jo. Her hands remained on his hips and now they were able to look at each other. “I thought they were friends, but the way she acts with Sophia is pissing me off. I mean, compared to us, Piper’s still just a kid, even if she is, like…sixteen or seventeen—”  
  
“—Spring chickens we are not anymore—”  
  
“—and I hate saying this about girl that young, but…Piper’s kind of a bitch.”  
  
Jo chuckled again, a smile spreading upon her lips. “Hey, you said it, not me.”  
  
Dragging his hands up to Jo’s arms and smiled back at her. “I suppose going through puberty isn’t exactly easy during the apocalypse.”  
  
“Very true. It was hard enough in the world before,” she agreed. “Add in the undead trying to eat you, the living trying to take whatever they can from you and kill you, and the lack of feminine products when Aunt Flo visits…I suppose I’d be just as horrid if I were Sophia and Piper’s ages.”  
  
“You had to bring up Aunt Flo, didn’t you?” Rick snickered.  
  
“It is not easy dealing with it nowadays. Tampons and pads are becoming more and more hard to find, pain medication is just as scarce, and that doesn’t even take into account how tired it makes you and how irritable you become, and it’s nothing we ladies have any control over. And just when it finally subsides and goes away, it returns the next month, and the month after that, and the month after that, forever and ever until we reach our forties and fifties. Then come the joys of menopause.”  
  
“Oh, for the love of God.”  
  
“Are you sure you know what you signed up for when you decided you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me?” she teased.  
  
“These are the same issues I knew I’d have to deal with someday when I married Lori, and I will see them through with you. I just gotta put more of an effort into making you as comfortable as possible, since there’s really no chocolate I can soothe the aches and pains with.”  
  
“Well, fortunately for both of us, I don’t have to worry about Aunt Flo for at least another seven or eight months, depending on when you knocked me up.”  
  
Rick smacked his lips together and shook his head as he eyed her up. “As if it was a one-way street,” he remarked. “I seem to recall you were there, too.”  
  
“Oh, I was there alright,” she nodded, grinning happily up at him.  
  
Studying her gaze, Rick bit down on his bottom lip as he dropped his hands from her arms and began to snake them around her back instead, pulling her up against him. “So, we have this time to kill, right?” Off her nod, he smirked. “And something else I recall is me owing you a pillow fight.”  
  
“Yeah, but for when we made it back home to the townhouse.”  
  
The smirk faded from Rick’s face slightly. “That ain’t home. The prison was home. Every place since then has simply been a waystation. A stop on a map until we fine Hope.”  
  
Jo’s smile faded somewhat as well. “And when we do, we’re gonna need someplace to live and the townhouse is as good as any. In fact, it’s pretty ideal. We have room to grow there. We have the rooftop where we can grow food. That room just inside has all those windows looking out onto the deck and can act as a greenhouse during the winter months. The location is pretty damn great, hidden up off the main road in that cul-de-sac. Walkers and the living alike wouldn’t exactly be a threat to us there. Not to mention how close we are to the river to get water for cooking, bathing…”  
  
“No, I know that…it’s just…I don’t feel like it’s home.”  
  
“Well, when we get Hope back, and Shane, too…it will,” Jo insisted, wrapping her arms around him as well. “It’s not the house that makes a home. It’s the people in it. Wherever our family is, _that_ is home.”  
  
Rick let out a sigh. “You’re right, I know. I just can’t shake that feeling as all. Call it pessimism or intuition…whatever. It’s just how I feel.”  
  
“Well, I don’t want your pessimism transferring to me right now when we have enough shit to deal with, so turn that frown upside down and suck it up, buttercup.” Jo smiled again as she brought her hands up and placed them on either side of her bearded face. “Stop thinking of where we’re going for a little while and focus on _coming_.”  
  
Rick pulled his face back to eye her knowingly. “Did you just make an orgasm pun?”  
  
Jo nodded and giggled. “I did. You like?”  
  
Sliding his hands down from around her back to cup her ass, Rick responded by hoisting her up and spun her around so that the small of her back was pressed up against desk.  
  
“I like,” he affirmed.  
  
Claiming her lips with his own, Rick kissed her deeply; taking comfort in how soft she always felt in his arms. Reaching his hands between their bodies, Rick undid the top button of her jeans, followed by sliding the zipper down. All the while he refused to break their kiss. Just as she leaned more flush against him, he took half a step back as he pushed her pants down over her hips, along with her underwear. And, just like that, Rick all but dropped to his knees before her as he placed his hands on her thighs while her fingers moved to grip onto his floppy, brown curls.  
  
As Jo looked down at him with anticipation, he looked up at her with an impish smile. “Never mind the pillow fight,” he remarked, winking at her as his thumbs massaged her inner thighs. “How would you like a free beard ride?”  
  
“Oh my God,” Jo muttered, tipping her head back as highly amused laughter bubbled out of her. Then, as Rick leaned forward as pressed his mouth upon her entrance and began to suckle at that sensitive little bud of hers, Jo’s knees buckled and her legs nearly gave out from underneath her. “Oh. My. _God_.”  


* * *

  
At some point, Rick and Jo had ended their tryst in the museum below the theatre and made their way back up toward the balcony to rejoin the others. Thanks in part to the darkness within the theatre, the “we just had sex” glow was absolutely unnoticeable. Because of their current predicament, the fact that their clothes and hair were disheveled wasn’t something that warranted any attention when Sophia and Finn eventually looked their way. Despite the older teen’s sullen mood, Piper was easily coaxed over to join the rest of them in order to have a little bit to eat before they decided they would all call it a night.  
  
There wasn’t much of anything else they could do, and sleeping would pass the time. Hopefully the hours that would slip by would end with the hordes of walkers blocking any or all of their exits would either thin out or disperse altogether. The second option was obviously preferred, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. So, lying down on the floor near the back of the lower balcony, huddled close to one another, the group of five closed their eyes and did their best to allow sleep to consume them.  
  
Rick, out of habit, found it harder to fall asleep. His mind was too wired, for one. The last, nearly two years of living in this world had gotten him too accustomed to somehow functioning on little sleep. When he did, it probably lasted no more than four hours. It was still dark out, so he couldn’t see his watch to check the time, and he didn’t want to turn on a flashlight to check and risk waking anyone else up. Just because he couldn’t sleep any longer didn’t mean they shouldn’t.  
  
He had been curled up on his left side, the big spoon to Jo’s little spoon. Lifting his arm delicately off her waist as not to stir her, Rick rolled onto his back and slowly sat up, looking around to make sure the others were still asleep. Content that they were, Rick got up to his feet and quietly stepped over to a window where he parted the thick, velvet curtains to peer down at the street below. There was no full moon out in the sky to assist, but there was enough starlight that allowed him to determine the herd hadn’t mood. As the sun had gone down, there was nothing to distract the undead and move them along. They became sedentary, lethargic. Nighttime, in general, slowed walkers down. The cooler temperatures seemed to have a calming effect; walkers became slower to react, though they weren’t any less dangerous if riled up.  
  
Rick could put two and two together; that if the herd remained in the front, so did the herd in the back alley. The only way his group was getting away was with a distraction.  
  
Turning and looking back at Jo, the girls and Finn, Rick sighed out of frustration. All he wanted was for them all to be safe and to find Hope. At this point, as horrible as it might sound, he didn’t care if they didn’t find Shane. He just wanted Hope back. If they could just find her, they could all just find some place safe, away from herds and other, potentially dangerous survivors alike. They could all just live again; make lives for themselves, find a community amongst each other. Just…live.  
  
When the sensation of needing to use the little boy’s room gave him a slight chill, Rick stepped away and into the hallway off the balcony, and then down another smaller hallway where he pushed inward against a swinging bathroom door. After he’d relieved himself, he found a bottle of hand sanitizer sitting on the small edge of the sink and used that to clean his hands; wondering if someone had placed it there after the world fell apart and running water became scarce, if not nonexistent. Either way, his hands were as clean as they were going to get and in the darkness of the bathroom he couldn’t see his reflection, and he was fine with that. Most days he didn’t care to see what he looked like anyway. This was no exception.  
  
He took a moment, his mind still reeling with thoughts about what his group would do to get away, before finally leaving the room and making his way back toward the balcony. When he arrived, someone seemed different. He looked around at the bodies asleep on the floor and counted only three when he’d left four behind when he’d gone to the bathroom.  
  
Jo was gone.  
  
Considering what lie in wait outside, he didn’t like the thought of her going off alone even though he knew she was plenty capable of holding her own.  
  
Of course, that was before there were two sets of walker herds ready to pounce and devour a living creature at the drop of a hat.  
  
Peering through the darkness of the theater, he cast his eyes downward at the floor and just listened. Maybe Jo had had the same idea and had needed the restroom and not realized it was in the direction he’d gone.  
  
Then he heard the footsteps; soft, precise.  
  
Jo.  
  
It was coming from below and as Rick stepped forward toward the front of the lower balcony, he could just barely make out the figure belonging to his wife making her way up and aisle toward the stage. Gripping the balcony’s hand rail, he leaned a bit forward.  
  
“Jo,” he called out in as much of a whisper he could manage without waking the others up just yet.  
  
He heard her footsteps stop for a moment, signifying she had heard him, but then he could hear her continue onward up to the stage. Biting his tongue, Rick grumbled under his voice and hurried toward the balcony exit and made his way downstairs by way of the spiral staircase and then into the theater through the double yellow doors. Wasting no time, he made his way down the same aisle Jo had walked down and ascended the stage from the same set of stairs as her. She had already ducked behind the stage curtains by then and when he did the same, he saw the back alley door opened a smidge, allowing some semblance of light to filter in so that Rick could manage to see Jo shoving the blade of her smaller knife into the skull of a walker and then try to yank the corpse inside.  
  
Rushing over, Rick grabbed the walker by hooking his hands under its arms and pulling while Jo shut the door. As Rick dropped the body to the floor, he could feel Jo’s eyes on him before he looked back at her.  
  
“What were you thinking?” he demanded.  
  
“I woke up with an idea. I was going to tell you, but you were gone. I figured you’d gone off to do a perimeter check or something,” she explained, crouching down beside the body as her knife dangled over it. “I couldn’t sit still and wait anymore. I needed to do something. When Michonne and I helped my mother get to her office, before she blew up the hotel, the only way we managed to get that far was because we covered ourselves with blood and guts from a couple walkers. We can do the same thing here. We’ll grab a few more,” she gestured down at the walker with her blade. “We’ll cover ourselves from head to toe, we’ll move through them quietly and slowly, with our scents masked.”  
  
Rick listened, and then he nodded. “Glenn and I did that once, back in Atlanta, the day I met him. As long as it doesn’t start to rain like it did that day, this could work.” Instinctively, he placed his hand against her elbow closest to him. “We can get out of here.”  
  
“Yeah, we can.”  
  
“Normally, I’d say we wait until first light so we can see where we’re going, but if we do this now, before the sun comes up and it’s still cooler out, those walkers might not react to us as quickly if we slip up a little. Going now will work better to our advantage.”  
  
Jo nodded in agreement. “Let’s wake the others.”  


* * *

  
“You want us to what?”  
  
Rick stood with his hands on his hips; the fingers of his right hand tapping gently against the handle of his Colt Python as he looked over at a repulsed Piper.  
  
“We don’t have any other choice. This is our way out of here,” he explained, gesturing toward the back alley door where they were all now standing in front of. “We need to move now before both herds, in the front and back in the alley here attract more and the size of both herds increases.”  
  
“Michonne and I did back at the Commune in Atlanta. Rick and a friend of ours did it once before, too. Both times it worked,” Jo added, giving assurance to the teen.  
  
Piper seemed unconvinced. “Where’s that friend now?” she questioned under her breath.  
  
“Dead,” Jo replied bluntly, “but it had nothing to do with this sort of situation.”  
  
Rick licked his bottom lip and looked across at his brother-in-law. “We’ll bring in four more to go with this one.” He pointed down at the floor, at the body of the walker he had helped Jo pull inside. “We gut them and cover ourselves as much as possible to mask our scents. As long as we move slowly, carefully and quietly, we won’t have a problem.” Turning to eye Piper, he leaned closer to her. “You found a way to survive in this world on your own after you lost your family and before Finn found you. You can do it again now because you have to. We do what we have to in order to survive, and this is what we have to do.”  
  
Finn exhaled a deep breath and then slapped his palms together. “Alrighty then. Let’s get gross.”  
  
Both men moved toward the door and carefully pulled it open. Taking it one at a time, Rick reached an arm out and grabbed for the nearest walker. Leaning his body further outside, he got a better handle on the walker in question and stabbed it in the skull before pulling it inside quickly as Finn shut the door just as quickly. They repeated the process four more times until there were five dead walkers lying limply upon the floor.  
  
There was no point in sugarcoating the situation as Rick wasted no time in crouching down and slicing deeply into the stomach of the first walker. He held his breath as the putrid stench spilled out from inside the undead body, along with all its rotten blood, guts and organs that had already begun liquefying from decay. Knowing the girls would be hesitant and clumsy in properly lathering themselves up, Rick opted to use that first gutted walker to cover Sophia up first.  
  
“Oh God, it smells,” Sophia winced, trying to breathe through her mouth as best as she could.  
  
“Try not to think about it,” Jo urged as she took her knife to the second walker and then beckoned Piper over.  
  
“Easier said than done,” Piper remarked.  
  
As Jo did the same to the older teen girl as Rick was doing to Sophia, Finn then dropped down to his knees and went to town on the third walker. Once they were satisfied how covered the girls were with walker blood and entrails, Rick and Jo brought their attention to the two remaining walkers and did the same thing to themselves. And, honestly, there would never be any getting used to that smell; at least not in the particular situation they were putting themselves into.  
  
As soon as all five were lathered up, each stood and looked at each other as best as they could in the darkness that was only slightly less so due to the two flashlights switched on and propped up on their bases. With their clothing, hair and exposed skin taken care of, Rick and Finn both brought their backpacks over their shoulders and onto their backs once more.  
  
“Holster your weapons for now, but make sure you can easily get to them,” Rick warned. “We’re gonna hold hands so we don’t get separated.”  
  
“I’ll bring up the rear if you want to go first,” Finn commented to the blue-eyed former sheriff’s deputy.  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah.” Mirroring Finn’s earlier gestured, Rick exhaled deeply to psych himself up for what they were about to do. “Don’t let go,” he reminded the others as he turned toward the back alley door and just stared at it.  
  
On the outside, there was slight banging. Plenty of walkers had been alerted because of how they had killed and pulled in five bodies. Riled up walkers were snarling and clawing aimlessly at the brick façade outside which was unfortunate, but there were less walkers in the back alley herd to deal with than the herd in the front, so the back way was the best bet.  
  
Turning slightly, Rick looked over his shoulder and grabbed for the first hand closest to him, which belonged to Jo. Jo reached behind her and grabbed a hand without looking; turning only to see it was Piper. Piper had a faint scowl on her face as she reached her hand out for Sophia to take, knowing by that point it was the only other hand she could hold onto because Finn would be trailing in the back and would hold onto Sophia’s hand.  
  
“On three,” Rick whispered, beginning to turn the door handle. “One…”  
  
Everyone began tensing.  
  
“Two…”  
  
The door opened slowly.  
  
“Three.”  
  
Pulling the door open, Rick paused for a moment as he braced himself for walkers to lunge at him and attack. As he took the initial step forward, he paused again and watched as the walkers nearest him leaned in and smelled the air. When they chomped at air and turned away from him, Rick exhaled another, smaller breath from his lips; this time in relief.  
  
Slowly, he began to walk forward into the alley; discreetly turning his head to the left and to the right to see if their group could go either way. Seeing both directions were dead ends and that they’d have to walk forward approximately one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet toward what looked to be an opening in the alley that would lead to a street.  
  
Rick gave Jo’s hand a squeeze of assurance as they passed walker after walker and she squeezed back; a silent way of letting him know they were gonna be okay and that she loved him. He turned around with the speed of a snail to make sure the others were following and that they were okay before continuing to lead the way. They were barely halfway to their destination when Piper whispered over her shoulder at Sophia.  
  
“Trade places with me.”  
  
“What? No…be quiet. Keep walking,” Sophia urged.  
  
“Trade places with me,” Piper repeated.  
  
“No,” Sophia whispered back.  
  
“Jo’s your mom. You should be holding her hand, not me.”  
  
Sophia practically glared daggers at Piper’s head. “Shut. Up.”  
  
A few walkers began to rile up at the increased murmuring, but thanks to their scents being masked, Piper and Sophia seemed to still be safe as they made the slow, grueling pace through the mass of dead bodies.  
  
“Why do you get to hold onto Finn? Do you want him all for yourself or something?” Piper demanded; her whispering getting slightly louder as she got increasingly aggravated. “Just trade places. What’s the big deal?”  
  
Sophia practically went stock still from fear. She was too scared to open her mouth to reply in case it brought more attention their way than they were now already starting to receive, despite the blood and guts covering them. Instead, she merely mouthed for Piper to shut the hell up. Sophia’s poor heart was beating wildly in her chest at the walkers drawing closer. She could feel her nerves dancing inside her body as if they were on fire, wanting to scream.  
  
“Trade places,” Piper repeated again.  
  
“Hey—shut up,” Finn spoke up this time, glaring at Piper.  
  
When the older teen turned her head and saw the look on his face, she stopped moving altogether and released her grip on Jo’s hand. It took a moment or two for Jo to even realize that it had happened. Piper turned her body around and faced Sophia, squeezing the younger girl’s hand hard, digging in her dirty, untrimmed nails.  
  
“It’s not fair. You have everything and won’t just trade places one time with me.”  
  
“Now is not the time for this, Piper,” Jo hissed when she finally stopped and turned, which caused Rick to stop short and turn around to see what the holdup was.  
  
“Trade places with me,” Piper growled at Sophia, completely ignoring Jo.  
  
“They see us now,” Rick remarked, referring to the walkers. “We need to go.”  
  
“I just want to trade—”  
  
Before Piper could finish her sentence, a walker stalked over to her and clamped its teeth down on her shoulder. From both shock and pain, Piper screamed, which only brought the unwanted attention of virtually every walker in the back alley. Instinctively, Rick reached for his Colt and pointed it at the back of the head of the walker biting Piper and shot it dead. As it dropped, he fired his gun at another walker approaching the girls.  
  
“Move! Now!” he shouted. There was no point in being quiet now. Piper had gone and fucked that up for them. “Weapons out!”  
  
“Let go of my hand,” Sophia was begging as Piper gripped her hand even tighter.  
  
The older teen remained in place, unmoving as Finn tried dragging Sophia away with Rick and Jo. There was no saving Piper; not with where she was bit.  
  
“It’s all your fault!” Piper shouted in Sophia’s face as she began bleeding out rather profusely from her shoulder.  
  
“Let go!” Sophia cried out.  
  
“Sophia!” Jo called out in fear for her adoptive daughter.  
  
Walkers were beginning to descend and the three adults were doing everything they could to kill the approaching threats.  
  
“It’s your fault,” Piper whimpered.”  
  
His nostrils flaring in fear, anger and so many other emotions rolled up into one, Rick pushed few walkers out of the way, hacking into their heads with his machete before stalking right up to both girls. Without missing a beat, he raised the blade and brought it right down onto Piper’s arm. With two hacks, her hand was severed from the rest of her arm and its grip on Sophia’s hand was released. Free to escape without Piper holding her back, Sophia backed up and hurried over to Jo as she and the three adults began their retreat without Piper.  
  
“Don’t leave me!” Piper screamed as walkers began to claw at her and rip at her face and skin.  
  
Sophia was sobbing as Jo began to lead her away while Rick and Finn cleared a path for them.  
  
“We’re sorry, Piper,” Jo called out; feeling guilty over what had just happened even though Piper had brought it upon herself and put them all in danger.  
  
As Piper screamed, walkers began biting into her exposed flesh; no longer deterred by the blood upon her skin that was there to mask her own scent. Once her own blood had been exposed, that was the scent that lured the rest to her.  
  
“C’mon!” Rick urged.  
  
Just as they made it toward the curve in the alley that lead down another, narrower alley which opened up a main road, Rick realized Piper’s screams were drawing in more walkers from that direction. Panicked, he looked around and spied a dumpster propped up next to one of the buildings in the alley that had balconies with wrought-iron railings.  
  
“There!” he gestured.  
  
“Wait!” Sophia cried. As Rick, Finn and Jo continued to hack at the walkers surrounding them, the girl raised her own gun and pointed it at Piper who was being eaten alive barely ten feet away.  
  
It took two shots, but Sophia managed to shoot Piper in the head. As Piper’s body slumped with dead weight to the ground, the walkers fell to their knees to continue to feast on her. The rest of the walkers were making beelines for the others, which forced Rick to grabbed Sophia by the arm and drag her through the slowly thinning herd, which, at the same time, seemed to increase in size due to the new ones wandering into the alley from the street.  
  
Bending at the knees, Rick hoisted Sophia up and shoved her, stomach first, onto the top of the dumpster. He repeated the process for Jo, but made sure she got up there without landing on her stomach. With Sophia’s help, Jo made it up, landing hard on her knees and then they both reached up for the first balcony railing. Finn hoisted himself up onto the dumpster next and assisted Jo up toward the balcony after Sophia had already pulled herself up. Jo gripped the railing, and sheathed her sword as she pulled out her own gun and fired a few shots into walkers getting dangerously close to Rick. Once he maneuvered himself up on top of the dumpster, he gave a swift kick to the heads of a select few walkers that got too close for his liking before bringing his attention to the living. Cupping Jo’s ass and gave her the boost she needed to get her foot up onto the balcony so she could pull herself up and toss a leg over to clamber over the railing.  
  
One by one they each made their way off the dumpster and to the safety of the balcony, where they took a few moments to catch their breaths, gather their wits and take a moment to let what happened sink in, as well as to briefly mourn the loss of the teenager. They couldn’t see Piper anymore, but they could see the clump of walkers huddled together still feasting off her body.  
  
Sophia was sobbing more freely now; half from Piper’s demise and half from being the one who had put her out of her misery instead of just leaving her to die in agony and preventing her from coming back.  
  
Jo pulled her adoptive daughter to her, allowing the teen to rest her face against her chest as Rick caught his wife’s saddened gaze.  
  
It had all been going so well.  
  
They could’ve all made it out alive if Piper hadn’t suddenly lost it and drawn attention to herself.  
  
Now Piper was dead; food for walkers.  
  
Rick gritted his teeth and cursed, shaking his head in anger and frustration. In both a form of release and garnering their now group of four a way off the balcony, he raised his machete and smashed the glass of the sliding glass door after he found it was locked from the inside. After the shards rained down to the balcony’s cement floor, Rick stepped inward first, machete still raised and more than ready to attack anything or anyone that might try and do the same.  
  
Finding what looked to be an empty apartment, Rick turned and ushered the other three inside before he dropped down and sit upon a couch; just needing another moment to let his brain sort everything out and figure out where they’d go and how they’d get out now.  
  
Ever the mother, Jo found a dishcloth in the small kitchenette just off the living room they’d entered into and returned to remove the extra water bottle out of Finn’s backpack that had belonged to Piper. Dousing the cloth with half the bottle’s contents, she brought the cloth to Sophia’s face and proceeded to clean the girl up as much as she could; to bring her some sort of calm. Jo brought the cloth to her own face next before tossing it over to Finn to do the same.  
  
Rick took the cloth and water bottle last, and he was suddenly reminded of the morning after dealing with the Claimers when Daryl had offered him a water bottle and handkerchief to wash his face of the blood from Claimer Joe.  
  
As he washed his face off, Rick thought about just how tired he was of having literal and figurative blood on his hands; wondering if there would ever be a day where this kind of life would stop being the norm and if they could ever find their way back to something akin to the world before. It seemed more like a pipedream nowadays. It seemed like this is all there ever would be, and the dark cloud of pessimism found its way over his head again.  
  
“We need to keep going,” Jo spoke after almost ten minutes of silence between all of them. “Piper’s death, despite her bringing it on herself, can’t be in vain. It provided us with a new distraction. With us inside this apartment, those walkers outside are going to be drawn to her body, or what’s left of it. We get out of this apartment, of this building and make it to the street. We get out of this area, go back to the car and we go back to the townhouse. We clean up and we see how the others are; if their treks into and around this damned city fared better than ours.”  
  
Sophia swallowed a sob, causing Jo to look over at her with a frown and then a nod of thanks as she watched Finn draw the girl into a comforting side hug.  
  
Despite how their short friendship had ended, Jo knew that Sophia was going to be brokenhearted about it and what she’d found the strength to do, regardless.  
  
“We move now,” Jo added.  
  
As she brought her gaze over to Rick, he looked up at her and nodded. “Yeah,” he muttered, pulling himself back up to his feet. “Let’s get out of here.”


	47. Loss

 

 _"_ _Anyone with a heart, with a family, has experienced loss. No one escapes unscathed. Every story of separation is different, but I think we all understand that basic, wrenching emotion that comes from saying goodbye, not knowing if we’ll see that person again—or perhaps knowing that we won’t."_ — Luanne Rice

* * *

  
In silence is how Rick led the others out of the apartment. Personal belongings from those that had lived in the building littered the hallway, creating a slight obstacle course as they made their way to the stairwell. There was one walker pinned to the very bottom steps by a loveseat that someone must’ve tried using as a barricade at some point. It was reaching for the small group of four as they moved around it. Even though the walker was in no position to get itself free and posed no threat to them, Jo still felt the need to end its un-life out of pity. Taking her knife out instead of her sword from the scabbard on her back, she shoved the blade into the walker’s eye socket and watched as all movement and any semblance of life immediately ceased. Wiping the blood stuck to the blade onto the arm of the loveseat, Jo continued out of the stair well with the others and made their way into the apartment building’s main lobby.  
  
Several walkers were there, milling aimlessly around; stuck inside with no distractions until the foursome appeared. Having been dormant for so long, though, a sort of muscular dystrophy had taken hold; causing the walkers to be more weakened and slow to react. The stench and level of decay seemed greater inside the lobby as well; being confined in such a narrow space. With the exception of Sophia, who was still shaken by Piper’s death, the three adults easily put an end to the walkers in their way and carried on toward the doors to head out onto the road.  
  
Slowly and carefully, Rick pulled the door open, leading them out toward the street they had originally walked along the day before. To their left there were plenty of walkers still wandering about, filing into the narrow alley, and beyond that plenty more were still loitering around the street Ford’s Theatre was located on. Their only tangible option was to go right. They had the added benefit of being able to run and get away quicker, so that’s what they did.  
  
Picking up their pace, the foursome darted to their right, just up the road two blocks to put a safer distance between them and the herd before making another right. Although they didn’t run nonstop, they didn’t slow their pace much either. They would sprint almost an entire block and then stop to catch their breath and do a safety check of their surroundings. At the moment, their goal was to just get back to their car and head home.  
  
There were still walkers all over, but they were either solitary roamers or clumped together in groups of no more than five or six; nothing the foursome couldn’t handle if they hadn’t made a point of avoiding any walkers in general. Any that literally stood in their way they took out but, aside from that, they left the rest alone to wander around.  
  
As soon as they reached Pennsylvania Avenue, Jo removed the map from Rick’s backpack; not exactly sure which way they needed to go. From where they were at the moment, all they had to do was continue south another block, turn right and they were back to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. Once there, Jo was able to dictate which way they needed to go next from memory; having always been naturally good with directions. Crossing the National Mall they did at a run because the walkers there had increased in numbers and seemed to have been riled up by something else recently. What exactly, was unimportant to the foursome. With the sun having begun to rise for the day, the temperature also rose, which added to the group’s woes. They were getting hot and sweaty and they couldn’t just stop and take leisurely water breaks here and there. It wasn’t until they’d finally made it to C Street and the Department of Agriculture building where they had left their car that they were able to finally take that much needed break.  
  
Ducking into the second parking lot, she slipped easily into some shade, thanks to the tallness of the building. They leaned and slumped down against the outer wall surrounding the inner parking lot, catching their breaths and passing water bottles around or dumping some of it over their heads to cool themselves down.  
  
Rick looked around the lot, his hands on his hips and just stood there staring straight ahead. His brow furrowed, looking quite perplexed, as he turned around and looked back out toward the entrance to the lot.  
  
“Did we park here or in another bay?”  
  
“Here,” Jo replied, finishing off her water bottle in a deep gulp.  
  
“I’m not so sure.” He gestured to where they had left the car and there was nothing but an empty space. “I think we were one over.”  
  
Jo pushed herself up from where she had sat down and stepped forward, shaking her head. “No, we parked right there. I remember that burned out car in the corner just there.” As a sudden feeling of panic rose in her chest, Jo placed a hand to her mouth and looked around nervously. “How is our car just gone?”  
  
Finn pointed to some broken glass where the car had been. “Someone stole it and hotwired it,” he deduced. Looking to Rick he asked, “You took the keys with you, didn’t you?”  
  
In response, Rick pulled the keys out of his pocket; right where he’d put them the day before. “Shit,” he grumbled.  
  
“Okay, well…we just find another car and hope it has gas in it. We don’t need keys. Finn used to do auto body work. He can hotwire it like whoever took our car,” Jo remarked.  
  
Finn nodded in confirmation. “This city _is_ littered with plenty of abandoned vehicles. We’re bound to find at least one that still works and can get us back to the townhouses.”  
  
Rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand, Rick released a sigh of exhaustion and looked overhead at the sunlight shining down into the lot. The sun wasn’t high enough in the sky yet to blind any of them where they stood, but it was bright enough out that at least they didn’t have to fumble through the streets in any darkness.  
  
It was a silver lining.  
  
They needed silver linings.  
  
Standing off to the side, Sophia seemed distant as she stared at the ground, kicking at some debris with the toe of her boot. It was understandable. The girl had shot dead a girl her own age who had been her friend. As far as either Rick or Jo knew it was the first living human the teenager had killed, even if it was just a mercy killing and not out of malice or a ‘kill or be killed’ situation. Though, in a way, it was somewhat of the latter. Killing Piper had silenced her screams, which helped to deter more walkers from coming into the alley, thereby allowing the surviving foursome to escape more easily.  
  
Still…  
  
Shifting his gaze down toward Jo, Rick waited a moment until she felt his eyes on her and she looked over at him. The expression he gave didn’t say anything in particular and yet so much at the same time, and she seemed to understand it nevertheless.  
  
With nothing left for them in that lot, Rick rallied the other three and led the way out. “We keep our eyes peeled and we stay on high alert,” he warned. “Someone else got here at some point after us and took our car. Whoever they are…they could still be around, and they might not be friendly.”  
  
“I’m gonna hope they were just desperate saps needing a vehicle to get the hell out of here and ours was the first one with enough gas,” Finn muttered quietly.  
  
“Hope is fine, but don’t rest on your laurels.”  
  
Making their way along C Street and then turning right onto 14 th, the group carefully approached the intersection at Independence Avenue. Walkers had come to life, figuratively speaking, with the onset of daylight. They seemed more perceptive of actual life moving about, which meant Rick and Co. had to be especially quick to slip away unnoticed. Or at least just be quick in general.  
  
It pretty much went unspoken that they would retrace their steps on foot while they simultaneously checked cars along the way. Every vehicle seemed a no-go, however. Either they were boxed in by other vehicles, without gas, completely broken down, or contained rotting corpses that had been quite literally baking inside for at least a year, though probably much longer than that. No one wanted to drive in the latter. There would be no amount of rolling the windows down to air it out that would help. The entire time would be spent with everyone throwing up. It just wasn’t worth the trouble.  
  
What should’ve been barely a ten minute walk along Independence Avenue toward the Tidal Basin took double the time. Sweating from all the physical exertion since back at Ford Theatre until now, along with the walker blood and guts that they hadn’t cleaned off yet, the group felt more disgusting than usual. Stopping to take a moment halfway across the road, they looked out across the water; enjoying the pleasant breeze coming off it. On the other side of the basin stood the Jefferson Memorial and it looked more intact than many of the other memorials closer to DC’s center that would’ve been subjected to napalm bombings; the same as every other major city across the globe. Looking at the Jefferson Memorial allowed the foursome to pretend for a moment that the world was as it was before. It was quiet and peaceful and the smell of the cherry blossom trees added a lovely fragrance to the air; something that was uncommon these days with so much death and decay.  
  
Rick was about to say something about the cherry blossoms when the sound of car nearby alerted all of them. They instinctively crouched down where they stood, taking cover behind an abandoned truck that had seen better years, just as they had, and waited to see if it was a car coming near them or would pass them by. Creeping slowly around the back of the truck, Rick stuck his head out; looking up the road and seeing that it was their car that had been stolen. It was being driven along northern branch of Independence Road which led toward the direction they’d just come from. The back window had been busted out, which explained why they’d found broken glass where they’d left the car, and two men were sitting on the back of the car with their legs draped down onto the backseats while they used the roof of the car to prop up the automatic rifles in their hands. Sharpened, wooden spikes of some kind had been shoved into the grill and now looked very _Mad Max_ -esque. There was no denying it was their car, though, but there was also no denying that whoever those men were, they were not to be trifled with and Rick’s group was in no position to fight for the car back.  
  
Waiting until the car had continued on back toward the city and away from the direction they were headed to, Rick led them quickly down the rest of the road over the basin until they found better coverage amidst the now tree-lined route, where they could easily dart and hide in between the trees if need be.  
  
Winded from the sprint and growing nauseous, Jo stopped in her tracks, which Rick became attuned to almost immediately when he felt her presence no longer just behind him. As he turned around and stopped as well, so did Finn and Sophia.  
  
“You okay?” Rick asked, walking up to her and placing a hand on the side of her face.  
  
She nodded slowly, but also shrugged. “It’s been a while since I had to really throw up, but I feel like it’s gonna happen again.” She waved her hand in front of her mouth and then pressed her fingers to her lips. “Just…the smell, the running, the heat, not eating since that little bit last night...it’s just a lot right now. My stomach is feeling sour.”  
  
Rick nodded, looking over her shoulder toward the direction they’d come from and then to the trees on his right. “We’ll head toward the water; wash off a bit. Maybe that’ll help,” he suggested. “I don’t want you getting sick.”  
  
“We have one more can of food in my bag, I think,” Finn remarked, sliding the backpack off his shoulders. As he started unzipping it, he looked over at his big sister. “You should have it. You got a baby zapping enough of your energy and mooching enough of your nutrition as it is.”  
  
“Thank you,” Jo nodded, taking the can of sliced carrots from Finn once it was offered.  
  
Without saying anything else, the four of them wandered away from the road and through the overgrown grass toward the water of the Tidal Basin. As they neared the water, they crossed paths with several walkers, which they were forced to take down. The water’s edge was fenced off at the immediate opening from the pathways, but it was only about fifty feet long, give or take. On either side was all open to the water. However, it was unknown if the water was shallow or deep along the edge of the pathway that curved along the basin.  
  
Dead bodies, both walker and regular alike scattered the pathway and the slight grassy incline toward the main walking path, which the foursome avoided as they found a clear area to crouch or kneel at. Leaning forward, Finn swished at the water with his hand and then held his arm out in front of an eager-to-bathe Sophia.  
  
“Wait.”  
  
Sophia, Rick and Jo each looked at him with curious gazes.  
  
After a moment, he dropped his arm down. “Just making sure there weren’t any floaters in the water before we stick our hands in.”  
  
Rick nodded at his brother-in-law’s smart thinking and then became less enthusiastic about shoving his hands and arms into the water himself. He could just imagine and undead face coming into focus as it breached the water’s surface and tried to grab for him and drag him down.  
  
At a more gingerly pace, the four reached down toward the water and scooped it up in their palms; quick to splash it upon their arms and chests and over their clothes. Their faces they had taken care of back at that apartment after the alley behind Ford’s Theatre. Their hair, though, was another story. It was caked with walker blood and sticky. The guys had it easy with their shorter hair. The girls: not so much. Cupping water into their palms barely did anything to help so they had to lay upon their stomachs, scoot further over the edge and dunk their heads in to rinse it all out. Fortunately for Jo, her she wasn’t far enough along in her pregnancy that lying on her stomach would be detrimental to the baby. Then again, given everything else she’d been through up to this point during the pregnancy, lying on her stomach was the least of her worries. Also in doing so, the guys held onto the girls in case they slipped and helped them to sit back up afterward.  
  
As her wet, blonde hair whipped backward and slapped against her back and her shoulders, Jo gave a shiver. Despite how refreshing it felt, it was an unexpected feeling and a chill was still a chill.  
  
Getting as clean as they were going to get, Rick backed them up away from the water’s edge to keep them out of any potential sightlines in case those men who’d taken their car came ‘round. Tucked away beside some trees, they sat as Rick took out a knife and began to open up the can of sliced carrots that Finn had given to Jo. Once he’d managed to cut the lid open and pull it back without slicing a finger open, he passed it to his wife who pressed her palm over the top and tipped the can over to let the juice spill out onto the grass. He watched the way she dumped some of the carrots into her palm and then tossed them into her mouth with a grimace. Despite it being food and providing nutrition, and despite how thankful she was for it, it would never change the fact that she hated carrots.  
  
Looking toward Sophia, Jo passed the can. “Have the rest.”  
  
Sophia shook her head. “No, it’s okay. You have them.”  
  
“Who’s the parent here?” Jo questioned with a smirk. “If this is all we have where food is concerned until we can find a way back to the townhouse, then I can’t have you going hungry.”  
  
Biting her lip, Sophia relented with a nod and took the can. While the girl mimicked Jo in dumping the carrots into her palm, Jo turned and leaned briefly against Rick.  
  
“You feeling better?” he asked quietly.  
  
“A bit.”  
  
“Better than not at all, I guess.” He sighed deeply, sitting with his knees bent and stabbing at the ground between his legs with the blade of his knife. “I wonder how the others have made out.”  
  
“I wonder if they ran into any herds like us,” Finn added.  
  
“Or those men.”  
  
The three adults looked to Sophia, who shrugged as she shoved the empty can into Finn’s backpack. Despite the ominous feeling that came with what the teenager had said, they didn’t allow themselves to be too overwrought about it. Finn seemed more confused as to why the can was being placed back into his bag and Sophia merely muttered something about reusing it for water or something else.  
  
Wasting no more time, Rick once again rallied the others to their feet and they backtracked toward the tree-lined section of Independence Avenue. After merely five minutes, they’d made it there and continued across the grassy median to the other lanes where they maneuvered around several abandoned vehicles, which they checked and not one was salvageable for their use. A few more walkers had to be dispatched with as they decided to cut across another grassy area toward a circular, open-air memorial for WWI built almost entirely marble. It went without saying that their weapons were out and at the ready, given the walkers they had taken down already, but also to keep their wits about them in case those men in their car circled back this way for whatever reason.  
  
After taking a moment, leaning against the marble pillars, Rick led them out into the open like soldiers treading carefully through a mine field. On the other side of the open area was a pathway which easily viewed the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Choosing to keep to the figurative shadows, the foursome continued along the pathway instead; small handfuls of walkers getting in their way only here and there until they stepped out toward Lincoln Memorial Circle.  
  
They would’ve continued on, to walk keep checking cars and make their way toward the Arlington Memorial Bridge, but movement near the steps of the Lincoln Memorial caught their eye and caused them to stop in their tracks.  
  
Instinctively, they each gripped their weapons tighter and prepared to slaughter more walkers. When Rick realized the movements from the figures at the steps seemed less lethargic and staccato than that of a walker, he raised a hand over his eyes to shield them from sunlight to gaze more properly. He was tense at first, worrying it was indeed those men that had stolen their car, but his shoulders quickly slumped with relief when he realized just as quickly it was the opposite of a threat.  
  
“Rick?” a gruff, southern voice called out from one of the figures that began to approach.  
  
Rick smirked and placed his hands on his hips as he gave a nod of his head. “Daryl?”  
  
“One in the same,” the archer replied. From behind him, two others followed: Tara and Morgan. “Where the fuck you been?”  
  
“Well, it’s not like we could radio you, since you didn’t have a walkie to take with you,” Rick parried.  
  
“We don’t have the other walkie anymore anyway,” Sophia blurted. “We lost it escaping a herd yesterday.”  
  
Tara looked at the teenager, her automatic rifle draped around her shoulder and hanging against her back similarly as to how Jo had her sword strapped to hers. “Yeah, there’s a few of those around here.”  
  
“Listen,” Rick spoke, cutting into the small talk. “Our car got stolen yesterday at some point after we went on foot. We’ll all need to squeeze into yours to get back.”  
  
“That’s gonna be a problem,” Morgan commented.  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”  
  
“We’re gonna need to offer it up in trade.”  
  
Jo mirrored her husband’s look of confusion as she folded her arms across her chest. “Trade for what?”  
  
Daryl grunted and gestured around them. “You mighta noticed Milo’s missing.”  
  
As if on cue the couple and Finn looked around and realized Daryl spoke truth. Their eyes scanned the trio and remembered Milo had gone with them the day before.  
  
“What happened?” Finn demanded, worried for his friend.  
  
“We ran into a group of survivors,” Daryl began explaining. “We thought they might be okay at first. Realized real quick they weren’t. Marauder-types. Take what they want from whoever they want, and they can because they have numbers and they have the firepower. They surrounded us last night, a couple blocks west of the White House. Milo was still insisting we go there and just check it out before we headed back to the townhouse; said we could use binoculars and see if it was claimable from a safe distance. Well, we didn’t get that far. Obviously those others rolled up, blocked us off on either side of the road, demanded our supplies and car and they’d let us go. Milo got trigger happy, but it was justified. This guy was coming toward Tara, trying to make a move on her or whatever, so Milo shot him dead. They were gonna shoot Milo and the rest of us dead in return but Morgan talked them down.”  
  
Rick looked over at Morgan. “So, what happened to Milo?”  
  
“They said we had only one option. They said that because we were so clean, they knew we had to have a place somewhere nearby, that we likely had other people,” Morgan explained. “They told us they were taking Milo as leverage and that we had until sundown today to gather all the supplies we had, our car, as well as the supplies and any other vehicles we had, and give them up. Only then would we get Milo back.”  
  
“We came here,” Daryl gestured to the Lincoln Memorial behind him. “We knew your group would be coming this way because that bridge over here is the way you came into the city, so it’s the way you’d be leaving. But then you didn’t show up last night, so we figured you got held up.”  
  
“So we waited,” Tara remarked glumly. “We knew you’d come this way eventually.”  
  
“Mostly we were gonna warn you to keep going because you had the girls with you and we didn’t want them tossed into the middle of this,” Morgan said, gesturing toward Sophia and then looking around for Piper. “Where’s the other one? Where’s Piper?”  
  
Rick and Jo looked at each other and then both cast their gazes downward.  
  
“We got cut off by two different herds and had to take cover in Ford’s Theatre for the night. Early this morning we made a break for it, covered ourselves in walker blood and guts,” Rick explained, looking back up while squinting from the sunlight. “Piper chose the wrong time and place to have a meltdown.”  
  
“Walkers got her,” Jo added.  
  
“And I shot her in the head so she would stop feeling it, and so she would stop screaming,” Sophia admitted. “She was drawing more toward us. There was no saving her, but we could save ourselves.”  
  
Tara raised her brow in sympathy for what the teenager had done. Stepping forward she placed a hand on Sophia’s shoulder. “Are you okay?”  
  
Sophia nodded. “I’m fine.”  
  
“We gotta go after Milo,” Finn spoke up, suddenly very antsy. It was understandable, of course. Milo was his best friend, like a brother to him.  
  
Rick turned and glanced at the younger man, feeling for his plight. “We will, but we gotta figure out how we’re gonna go about this. We gotta be smart.” Looking back toward Daryl, he gave a nod of his head. “How many of these Marauders do you think there were? Ballpark figure.”  
  
Daryl shrugged. “At least two dozen that we could see,” he answered. “Three or four snipers on rooftops here and there. Fuckers are mobilized. They’ve been building there numbers since the beginning no doubt.”  
  
“No doubt took this city not long after the fallout,” Morgan commented.  
  
Tara shifted her weight around as she folded her arms under her ample chest. There was a slight air of unease to her, likely due to having to deal with the group of survivors that had taken Milo again. “A few of the men seemed like they were former military. It was in the way they held themselves, how they talked to us.” Then, she added, “It was kind of intimidating, and not only because there were so many and they had guns pointed at us. It’s like they were ready to go to war.”  
  
Rick listened to each voice as they detailed the types of people they were up against. “All men?”  
  
Daryl nodded. “Yeah, I think so.”  
  
“So, then we can wager that if they have any women and children of their own, they probably have them somewhere else and want to keep them safe. They send their men out to scavenge, to hunt, and likely even kill, and not just the undead.” Rick nodded to himself and then looked between Daryl and Morgan, and then over at Finn. “It’s possible they won’t think of harming Jo, Tara or Sophia.”  
  
“We can let them stay here and wait for us,” Finn suggested, stepping in front of Rick and eyeing him pointedly. “Us guys will go alone and give these Marauders whatever they want. We get Milo back and we get away from this damned city.”  
  
Rick considered his brother-in-law’s words and then looked to his wife whose conflicted feelings were easily read upon her face. He was feeling the same. They all knew the city was a lost cause. It was claimed by the dead and these Marauders alike. But the whole point of coming here was to find Shane and Hope and they hadn’t achieved that task. The doubt that they ever would crept in suddenly and weighed heavily upon the couple’s hearts and minds.  
  
“So what do we do?” Tara asked.  
  
“Where did they want you to meet them?” Rick asked of Daryl.  
  
“Where they surrounded us,” the archer replied simply. “I don’t remember the street names, but I know how to get us back there.”  
  
“I’ll stay here with Sophia and Tara,” Jo offered. “We won’t all fit in the car to get there and we don’t have the time to waste in getting Milo back.”  
  
“We got till sundown,” Morgan reminded. “We can find another car, find some extra supplies. They won’t be happy if we return with only the stuff they saw us leave with.”  
  
“We don’t have much, though,” Finn informed. “A pair of sneakers for Mika, a bottle of water, a flashlight. We couldn’t find much. What food we had we already ate.”  
  
“So we look in cars around here before we go.”  
  
“If these assholes have had this city since the beginning, don’t you think they’ve already searched the cars around here? We have no leverage. We give them what little we have, our weapons, and we get Milo back.”  
  
“But _how_?” Tara turned to Finn. “You weren’t there. You didn’t see how these guys were. They won’t just hand over Milo without more to trade for. Milo killed one of their own, regardless of whether or not it was justified. They want an even trade, and a few canned goods and some handguns don’t equal the loss of a life. They will take Milo’s as penance if we can’t get them more.”  
  
Rick crouched down, balancing himself by placing his fingertips down upon the paved road as he stared at the ground and thought for a few moments. “Tara’s right,” he murmured. “We gotta find more of anything. We’ll syphon gas from your car and add enough of it to another vehicle to get us to the meet point. In the meantime we have to search the vehicles around here, maybe a building or two. There’s gotta be something of value. We’ll plead to them if we have to. Milo is one of us and we can’t leave him behind.”  
  
“Thank you,” Finn spoke, glancing down at Rick.  
  
Rick lifted his head and met the younger man’s gaze, nodding. “All of us go. We gotta show them we have nothing to hide,” he continued, standing back up and looking around at the others. “We convince them this is all we have in our group; that we’ve been squatting in some vacant house south of Arlington Cemetery so they won’t know to look for the rest of us back at the townhouse. We give up our weapons, we give up all the supplies we currently have and whatever else we find. We do whatever we can.” Focusing on Finn, Rick chose to add, “But if it looks like these Marauders can’t accept what little we can offer up, or I think they might pose a threat to the rest of us…then I’m sorry, Finn. We have to leave Milo behind.”  
  
Clenching his jaw, Finn took his good ol’ time to consider Rick’s words before seeming to understand there really was no other way around it. There was no doubting Finn loved Milo as a brother, but when it came down to it, the life of his actual sibling and her family’s safety took precedence.  
  
“I understand.”  
  
“Do you?”  
  
Finn nodded. “I do,” he insisted with a sigh. “Milo’s always had his loose-cannon moments and this time, even though it was honorable because he thought he was protecting Tara, he brought it on himself. But I can’t just walk away without trying to get him back.”  
  
“And we won’t. We’ll try,” Jo assured, stepping up to her little brother and placing a hand on his shoulder.  
  
As everyone looked around at each other, Rick looked toward the sun and then down to the wrist on his watch. “We do have plenty of time to look for supplies, but let’s not leave it all for the last minute. We’re meant to be at the meet point with everything by sundown, not first leave to head there. We split up. Morgan and I will look for vehicles, hopefully with gas. Finn, take Jo and Sophia up the road to the right of the memorial, heading north. Daryl and Tara take the road beside it heading northeast. I can barely make out that there are buildings there. Check them for supplies of any kind. I don’t care of it’s a bag of thumbtacks. Anything will do. Do it quickly, don’t linger too long. Get in and get out as safely as you can.” Rick stood with his hands on his narrow hips and frowned. “Let Piper be our only casualty today.”

 

* * *

  
“How are you feeling?”  
  
The sun was at its zenith, which coincided with the fact that Rick had mentioned it was just past noon according to his watch, although Jo was sure the battery was dying. It was probably closer to one or two in the afternoon. Either way, the sun was high, there was nary a cloud in the sky and it was hot as hell as Jo walked along the road with her brother and Sophia, peering into cars along the way that had been vacated and yet to contain any supplies they could take. Jo ran a hand along her face to wipe the sweat away before turning to look over at her brother as the heat index increased for the day, making her long for the fall months to hurry up and arrive already.  
  
“Sweaty, but what else is new?”  
  
“No, I mean the baby and…” Finn gestured to his head. “You doing okay with everything?”  
  
“Well, as for the baby, I can only assume everything’s fine. I mean, I haven’t miscarried yet. Plus it’s still so early on that I can’t feel movement yet. I just take the occasional nausea and vomiting as a sign that everything is fine and dandy where baby is concerned,” Jo replied. “I’m assuming you want to know how I’m mentally coping, too?”  
  
Finn nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“I’ve been through worse than what we experienced today. _Way_ worse.” Jo sighed. “More times than I can shake a stick at but I’ve worked on putting it all behind me and that’s where I prefer to keep it. I just want to look forward. We can’t change the past anyway.”  
  
Finn nodded again. “I really wish I’d found you early on. I keep thinking that maybe if I’d gone straight to dad’s and waited a couple days, you would’ve found me there and we could’ve made our way in this world together, like dad would’ve wanted.”  
  
“I’m sure dad would be happy that we're together now, regardless of how long it took us to find each other, and what we’ve had to go through to get here.”  
  
“But then you and Sophia wouldn’t have been taken in by the bastard that kept you like a caged plaything.”  
  
“Again,” Jo muttered. “I wanna keep those things in the past.”  
  
“Sorry.”  
  
“And no matter what happened, good came out of it. Sophia was kept safe all that while, and I got Hope. It put me on the path to meet Rick and a lot of other good things, too. Honestly? I’d do it all over again if it meant I still had Hope, Rick, Sophia, Mika, and this baby.” Rubbing her stomach, Jo turned away from her brother and looked forward at Sophia peering into an empty car. “If you had found me, I’d have none of them and you wouldn’t have Jen. Neither of us would’ve gotten to know our mother.”  
  
“True. Life’s a bitch, though.”  
  
“It certainly has a twisted sense of humor.”  
  
Finn snickered, soon mimicking Jo by wiping the sweat from his brow. “You know,” he began, causing Jo to look back at him, “I knew about how Piper felt.”  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“Her meltdown in the alley? I never knew she would go off the deep end like that, but I knew she had a crush on me. It wasn’t hard to figure out right from the start. Milo would tease me about it back at the Commune; how Piper would follow me around like a puppy dog, as subtly as she could, or look at me like I was the heartthrob from her favorite boyband.”  
  
“Well, you _do_ kind of look like one,” Jo smirked. “Nick Carter, eat your heart.”  
  
“He probably has,” Finn joked. “That is, Nick Carter eating his own or somebody else’s heart out. Fucker’s probably long dead.” Shaking his head, he shifted the backpack from his right shoulder to his left, reminding Jo of when he was little and walking up the sidewalk to catch the school bus at the corner of their street where they grew up. “Point is, I knew about Piper’s obsession, if you will, and I’m guilty of fanning those flames for my own amusement. I thought it was funny, so I innocently flirted back with her. Not like I was going to act on it, because she was just a kid and that would be so gross, but it gave me a laugh afterward. Sometimes I felt like an asshole after the fact, but it’s also not like I purposely gave her the impression that I’d ever be with her once she was old enough. I made no point in hiding the fact that Jen was my girl. I just never realized how infatuated she really was.”  
  
“Well, I doubt your _innocent_ flirting is what pushed her over the edge,” Jo assured with a slight roll of her eyes. “Who knows what horrors she had to experience on her own before you found her that probably messed her up? With you being either the first friendly face or _one_ of the first friendly faces she saw in likely a long time, she latched onto you the strongest. Doesn’t help that you’re a handsome sonofabitch and she was a hormonal teenager who wasn’t in the least bit blind. Not one person handles this world the same as anyone else. In Piper’s case, she went down the Kathy Bates in _Misery_ route. You know, minus the taking you hostage and busting your ankles.”  
  
“Small blessings?”  
  
“ _My_ point is; it’s in the past now. It might sound harsh considering it was only hours ago, but it happened and we can’t change it. We just move on and keep going. Eye on the prize and all that.”  
  
“Get Milo, get home.” Finn nodded. “Then we regroup and figure out where we go from here to find Hope.”  
  
What felt like a lead weight took up residence in the pit of Jo’s stomach. Casting her eyes toward the pavement scattered with dead leaves and the occasional smattering of human entrails, Jo’s heart began to severely ache for the longing to hold her daughter. The feeling wasn’t always so piercing, because a lot of the time she was distracted by whatever shit that she and the rest of the group were going through, or by the stolen moments when Rick and her were able to take the time to be man and wife and let the world fall away and forget the bad, even if only for a few minutes. It was the downtime and the moments before she was able to fall asleep at night that brought her focus back to Hope, and painfully so. Even now, as she walked along with her brother and Sophia, peering into the occasional vehicle, all of which seemed completely empty thus far, that feeling made her want to drop to her knees and cry.  
  
The fear of not finding Hope or never knowing what happened to her was enough to drive her mad.

 

* * *

  
After finding a crowbar discarded in the backseat of an unlocked sedan, Rick used it to pry open several trunks. So far, him and Morgan had found two blankets and one gas can with a quarter of gas still in it. They weren’t about to celebrate their minimal good fortune just yet, though. They weren’t necessarily in the business of wanting to tempt fate and jinx themselves.  
  
“I gotta say, I’m glad you felt the same about doing all we can to get Milo back. We’ve all come from different places and backgrounds, but we’ve been through so much together and that makes us family. You don’t leave family behind,” Morgan commented, sitting in the passenger seat of a Volkswagen beetle where he was shuffling around the glove compartment.  
  
Standing just outside the car with his left hand pressed against the roof and his right hand gripping the opened passenger door, Rick looked around to keep an eye out for both walkers and anyone else that might approach while Morgan was busy. He listened carefully to what the other man said, but frowned.  
  
Unable to keep it in, Rick scoffed, causing Morgan to sit back and look up at him.  
  
“Something about that funny, Rick?”  
  
“No,” Rick shook his head. “It’s just…I’d prefer we left Milo behind.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“I know it makes me sound horrible, given everything you just said, but everything I said a little while ago was pretty much only for Finn’s sake,” he admitted. “Back in South Hill, when we were scavenging houses, and it was just Daryl, Milo and me, the three of us were shooting the shit a little. Daryl and I teased Milo about leaving him behind and Daryl shooting him with his crossbow. Milo made a comment about how if he died, then Finn would be upset and, if Finn was upset, then Jo would be upset, and Lord knows the last thing I want to see is Jo upset. So I said what I said earlier, promising we’d get Milo back, for Finn’s sake. I don’t want to see him get upset because it will make Jo upset, and with her being pregnant and already having gone through so much, I didn’t want to add to it.”  
  
Morgan nodded. “I know Milo isn’t your favorite person, though.”  
  
“I don’t hate him or anything like that. He’s just aggravating sometimes and he’s occasionally reckless.” Stepping to the side, he leaned his hip against the car and then ran the fingers from his right hand through his hair to get it off his face. It was getting real warm out and the sweat beading on his forehead help slick his hair back. Squinting from the sunlight, despite the beetle being parked under a shady tree, Rick continued. “My family—all of us; I’m tired of us being put at risk time and again. This thing with getting Milo back is gonna be one of those situations that’s now unavoidable. I can’t stop and change my mind and say we won’t go get Milo. I can’t demand we all just leave and head back to the townhouse. I can’t leave Milo to die, even though I think the rest of us stand one hell of a better chance getting away unscathed.”  
  
“Doing the right thing isn’t always easy.”  
  
Rick frowned, spying a walker with a missing left arm ambling toward them. Leaning up off the car, he replied, “I’m not entirely convinced this is the right thing.”

 

* * *

  
Two and half hours later, everyone was piled comfortably into three sedans; the red Yaris originally found in South Hill that group two had taken into DC, and two other vehicles that Rick and Morgan managed to find with some fuel still in the tanks. Each vehicle contained some supplies, although not much. There were the blankets Rick and Morgan had found, car batteries, regular batteries, their flashlights, canned goods, the shoes meant for Mika, a first aid kit, some water bottles, group two’s walkie-talkie, and their weapons and ammo. Daryl lead their caravan north up 23rd Street in the Yaris with Morgan beside him in the passenger seat. In the second sedan, which was a rusty golden number, Rick followed with Jo as his passenger. Finn brought up the rear with Tara beside him and Sophia in the backseat.  
  
They drove slow, purposely looking out their windows for any of those Marauders that might be standing on rooftops to act as snipers. In the privacy of their car, Rick shared a fear with Jo that the Marauders had every opportunity to just fire on all of them and take their supplies and weapons after the fact. The Marauders had the advantage of knowing the lay of the city more than Team Family ever would. They knew places to hide for the sake of ambushing. Rick and Jo could only hope that was not what happened as they willingly drove toward their possible demises.  
  
“What if Shane passed through the city with Hope and they have them?” Jo wondered, with worry heavy on her heart.  
  
“If we can get a conversation going with these people, we’ll ask,” Rick replied, casting his wife a brief glance. Taking his right hand off the wheel, he let it drift as he claimed her left hand and gave it a squeeze. “It’s worth a shot.”  
  
Inhaling a deep, anxiety-ridden sigh, Jo simply nodded as she glanced back at him before focusing her gaze forward.  
  
The caravan turned right onto F Street and soon enough Daryl brought them to a stop at the intersection of F and 18th. A red brick home stood on the northwest corner of the intersection and seemed to still be in wonderful condition despite the decay throughout the rest of the city, giving away the idea that someone or an entire group had likely made it their home. A flagpole with a slightly tattered American flag stood tall in the front, flapping from the slight breeze that had picked up.  
  
When Daryl turned off the ignition of the Yaris, Rick did the same, and Finn followed suit. No one moved, however. Everyone sat in their respective vehicles, waiting with bated breath and fraying nerves. Rick looked at Jo, once again giving her hand a squeeze. The thought of Milo or any of them getting killed was the major thought that plagued them, but on a superficial scale, Rick felt pained over giving up their weapons. His trusty Colt Python had been within him since before the outbreak, when he was just a simple Sheriff’s deputy from King County. Jo, too, had just gotten her new sword that he’d found for her. Using it as her main weapon was what she felt most comfortable with, and for her to have to go through losing it again made him a bit angry.  
  
“Shit,” Rick muttered.  
  
“What?” Jo turned, immediately more tense than she already was as she assumed he’d spotted something terrible outside the car.  
  
“Daryl’s gonna have to give up his crossbow,” he replied. “He ain’t gonna be too happy giving that up again.”  
  
Jo eased up slightly and turned her attention back toward the Yaris in front of them. She could see Daryl leaning forward at the driver’s seat, looking around at the intersection. “We should’ve hid some of our weapons by the bridge for when we head back. I doubt Daryl would’ve been able to, though. These people we’re waiting on would’ve seen him with it and find it suspicious if he showed up without it.”  
  
“He could’ve lied; said he lost it while fighting off some walkers. Maybe say it fell into the river.” Rick shrugged. “I suppose we can always try finding another sporting goods store. He’s handy enough with guns and knives. He’ll be able to hold his own until then.”  
  
“We can all manage. We have before.”  
  
Rick nodded and had opened his mouth to say something else when he noticed two groups, at least ten deep, coming from the north and south ends of 18th Street before stopping in the middle of the intersection. Each person was armed to the gills with assault rifles in their hands, and machetes and handguns strapped at their hips and legs. They looked like soldiers and to say they were intimidating was an understatement.  
  
Amid the approximately two dozen Marauders standing there, a man in his late forties or early fifties, who was built like a brick shithouse, stepped front and center before the Yaris and beckoned at Daryl to step out.  
  
Rick watched with anxious blue eyes as his grip around Jo’s hand tightened while Daryl slowly and cautiously opened his door and stepped out, hands raised.  
  
“Step away from the car,” the lead Marauder demanded; his brusque voice wafting in through the open windows of the second car; allowing Rick and Jo to hear him clear as day.  
  
Movement from up high caught their attention. Just as Daryl had described earlier, snipers were atop several of the buildings and in windows, aiming their guns at the caravan. The group in the intersection was only a fraction. There was no telling just how many of these Marauders there were, or how dangerous they could be. Then again, all it would take was one person with an itchy trigger finger and this meet could go south real quick, just as it had the day before for group two when Milo shot one of the Marauders when he thought Tara was in danger. They couldn’t let something like that happen again, especially not with Sophia so near.  
  
Rick and Jo’s priority was her before anyone else, which was why they wanted her traveling in the backseat of the third car, so that she was further back if shit went downhill fast.  
  
“Everyone else out, too,” the lead Marauder called out, glancing at Morgan in the Yaris and then over the top of it toward Rick and Jo in the rusty, golden sedan. “Slow, with your hands up like your shaggy friend here.” As he gestured toward Daryl, two other Marauders walked over to the archer and began patting him down for any hidden weapons; removing a knife from inside his boots, a knife from his belt and a gun tucked into a back pocket, hidden slightly under his shirt and leather vest. “Be careful with that one, boys. He looks like a feral dog that’ll bite and give you rabies. Though, I suppose rabies is the least of our worries these days, isn’t it?” His last comment came with a laugh and his gaze shifted from Daryl to Rick.  
  
As Rick stepped out of the car at the same, slow pace as Jo and their hands raised, Rick locked eyes with the man and, despite his better judgement, his gaze was unmistakably defiant. His head was held high, his lips pursed together in a tight line, his jaw clenched and his eyes squinted, and not because of the sunlight.  
  
“You’re the leader of this group, aren’t you?” the lead Marauder deduced, stepping up to Rick with a bit of swagger in his step.  
  
“What makes you think that?” Rick questioned, somehow able to fake confidence with a defiant tone.  
  
The head Marauder snickered, watching as the others in his group paired off and began to pat down everyone. Standing there with his hands on his hips, he responded, “Let’s just say it takes one to know one.”  
  
“You got a name?”  
  
“Do _you_?”  
  
Rick chewed the inside of his cheek and instinctively tense under the hands of the Marauders patting him up and down for hidden weapons. Removing his beloved Colt Python from its holster, they set it down on the hood of the rusty, golden sedan before stepping away and aiming their own weapons once more at everyone.  
  
“Rick,” he replied. “Now you.”  
  
The lead Marauder smirked and nodded at Rick’s boldness. “I’m Sarge.”  
  
“Let me guess: because you were a sergeant in the military before all this?”  
  
“You’re a smart cookie, Dick.”  
  
“It’s Ri—”  
  
“Alright, here’s how this is gonna go,” Sarge interrupted. “You’re all gonna stay away from the vehicles while some of my men, and women — as I am an equal-opportunity employer, so to speak — are gonna search for the supplies we demanded as part of the penance for your man killing one of ours.”  
  
“Where’s Milo?” Finn demanded loudly.  
  
Jo was standing on the same side of the street as Morgan, who was to her right, and Tara and Sophia to her left. Looking across the street, toward her brother, she felt her hair on her arms stand straight up with goosebumps.  
  
_Don’t goad the man, Finn_ , she thought as she shot him a withering look.  
  
“Your trigger happy friend, you mean?” Sarge responded. “McGill, bring our guest front and center, will ya?”  
  
One of the several soldier-types stepped away from the group and disappeared up into the brick home on the northwest corner of the intersection while Sarge kept his gaze between the members of Rick’s group.  
  
“Now, no sudden movements,” Sarge warned. “My people can get trigger happy, too.”  
  
Gesturing to the remainder of his people not flanking Team Family, Sarge indicated they begin searching the three vehicles to see what weapons and supplies were tucked away. With narrowed and curious eyes, he scanned the members of Team Family who had all since lowered their raised hands and just stood there waiting for whatever might happen next.  
  
“We didn’t have much in the way of supplies. That’s one of the main reasons we came here. We were low on food, water…we decided to give the city a shot,” Rick reasoned, trying to open some more communication between both parties.  
  
“How far did you come? You sound more Southern. The Carolinas? The Virginias? Georgia?”  
  
“Georgia. Just a ways outside Atlanta.”  
  
“Why’d you leave? Why risk coming all this way north? For the less blistering hot summers?” Sarge chuckled and held a hand out as he gestured to the buildings. “The historical sights?”  
  
“We had a place that got attacked. We lost it, as well as some of our friends. Our group ended up scattered for a while. We’ve lost others on the road here.”  
  
“But why here? Why DC?”  
  
“Our daughter.” Rick pointed across to Jo. “A friend of ours got out with her and we haven’t been able to find them yet, except for a few messages left behind on the road, telling us they were headed to DC.”  
  
Sarge stepped around the front of the Yaris and made his way over toward Jo. He kept his rifle down at his side, which was strapped over his shoulder. Shoving his hands into his back pockets, he approached Jo more slowly as he gave her a considerable onceover and smirked. “How old’s your daughter? Maybe I’ve seen her,” he asked Jo.  
  
“She’s still just a baby. She’s eight and a half months old now.”  
  
“And when did you last see her?” Sarge seemed genuinely curious.  
  
“A month ago.”  
  
“And your friend, what did he look like?”  
  
“About my height,” Rick spoke up. “Dark hair, brown eyes, probably a beard by now, strong build.”  
  
Tapping a finger to his chin, Sarge nodded thoughtfully. “That description sounds real familiar.”  
  
Jo and Rick immediately shot looks across the road to each other, their hearts fluttering with anticipation; wondering if Sarge would be able to tell them that he’d seen Shane and Hope and knew where they’d gone.  
  
“Have you seen them? Our friend and our daughter?”  
  
Sarge turned away from Jo and walked back toward the intersection. His Marauders had successfully perused the vehicles and were all back to maintaining their weapons’ aims on Rick’s people. Scanning the faces of his own people, Sarge turned back around, facing Rick, and winced guiltily. “Well, therein lays a bit of good news and bad news.” Before either Rick or Jo’s hearts could give out from anticipation, Sarge looked between the pair and continued, “The good news is that I’m about ninety, ninety-five percent certain I saw the very man you described as your friend. I mean, I didn’t catch his name or anything. I only saw him from a short distance away.”  
  
“The bad news?” Jo inquired, finding her voice before her throat went dry with dread.  
  
“The bad news, darling, is that your friend was kneeling over a very small grave and he looked absolutely beside himself with grief.”  
  
“Oh God!” Jo cried out, a sob quickly echoing from deep in her chest as she dropped to her knees. Morgan was at her side to brace her while all Rick could do was stay put as the Marauders prevented him from going to his wife. The ache in Jo’s chest and heart was so painful and the tears burning at her eyes prevented her from being able to see straight. She could barely even hear the continuing conversation due to the grief taking up residence within her.  
  
As Rick began to react more with denial, despite his own tears which he was unsuccessfully blinking away, he watched as Sarge threw his weight around as he paced a little in the intersection.  
  
“It was such a sad scene, really. Your friend, kneeling beside the grave he no doubt had just dug himself with his own hands, sobbing like a child,” Sarge continued to detail. “I was about to call out to him when he raised a gun to his head and pulled the trigger, blowing his brains out.”  
  
His brow raising and knitting together, Rick’s chin quivered as he finally dropped to his knees like Jo. He couldn’t see her anymore at that level with the cars between them, but he could hear her sobbing and Morgan doing his best to console her where Rick could not. As he had when he thought Jo had perished in the blast at the hotel, Rick fell forward on his hands, staring down at the pavement as his tears spilled from his eyes and sobs began wracking his body.  
  
“I feel terrible. Perhaps I shouldn’t have even said anything,” Sarge was muttering. “Perhaps not knowing what happened would’ve been easier for the two of you. Losing a child; I can’t imagine that kind of pain, never having been a parent myself. It’s gotta be pure torture on the soul.”  
  
“Shut the fuck up about it already,” Daryl growled.  
  
“Because of this heartbreaking development, I’ll let that rudeness of yours slide, Shaggy,” Sarge remarked, eyeing the archer. “Honestly, though, I am terribly sorry to be the bearer of bad news, folks. Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined anyone coming into my city looking for the man I saw kill himself over a child’s grave. And to think, it all happened just a week ago.”  
  
Jo began crying harder at that last comment. The knowledge that they’d missed seeing their child and friend by a mere seven days was indescribable.  
  
“My deepest sympathies to you both.”  
  
Daryl made the slow move with his hands raised to show he was only trying to show Sarge and the Marauders that he wanted to help Rick back up to his feet. Morgan was simultaneously doing the same thing on the other side of the road with help from Tara. As Sophia scurried over to Jo as well without much, if any, reaction of the Marauders, the front door to the brick house on the northwest corner opened up and out stepped the McGill leading a blindfolded Milo down the steps toward the street.  
  
As the two men winded their way ‘round toward the intersection, Finn stepped forward, welcoming the happy sight of his best friend amidst the revelation that the niece he never got to meet was dead. “Milo!” Finn called out, watching as his friend looked around for the direction the voice came from as he still couldn’t see anything. “You okay, buddy?”  
  
“Well, I’m alive, so there’s that,” Milo replied, making light of his own situation without knowing what situation had just unfolded moments before he was brought outside.  
  
“Where’s his body?” Rick blubbered, trying his best to compose himself as he stood back up with Daryl’s assistance.  
  
“I’m right here,” Milo commented, clearly confused.  
  
Ignoring Milo, Sarge focused on Rick. “We left him at the grave. The next day there wasn’t much of him left. Some Biters had made a meal of his corpse.”  
  
“Where is he?” Rick asked again. “Where’s his body? Where’s my daughter’s grave?”  
  
“Oh shit,” Milo muttered, finally putting the pieces of the conversation together.  
  
“Across the river, in Arlington Cemetery.”  
  
“Where in the cemetery?”  
  
“Well, I don’t remember the exact location. Have you ever been there? It’s huge.” Sarge sighed very audibly. “Listen, I am terribly sorry about your daughter and friend, but they’re gone and not coming back and I don’t remember where they are. It sounds harsh, but it’s not my problem. You’re here, right now at this moment, because of this blonde dipshit and here he is for you to take home with you to wherever your group has made camp.” Shifting around, he placed his hands on his hips. “Where exactly is your camp anyway?”  
  
“West of Arlington,” Morgan offered up. “We cleared out an apartment complex in Falls Church a few days ago until we could find something better.”  
  
His description was a lie; one that Rick realized immediately and understood the meaning for. Rick knew Morgan didn’t want to give up their group’s real location in case the Marauders decided to follow them back to the townhouses across the river, just north of Arlington Cemetery. Morgan’s reasoning for picking Falls Church as the exact town they were supposedly staying in was probably due to him recalling the name from a road sign as they traveled to DC. Maybe he’d seen it on the map a couple days earlier at the townhouse when they’d plotted this trek into the city.  
  
“That area was overrun just a few months back. How’d you clear it?” Sarge inquired, seemingly skeptical.  
  
“Walkers only stay in one place until something catches their attention,” Morgan replied, turning and holding his gaze with the Marauder’s burly leader. “Something must’ve led them away since.”  
  
Sarge nodded, accepting the answer even though it appeared he had doubts about the lies Morgan gave him. “And all of you here, this is your entire group? You don’t have an army at the theoretical gates that are gonna come back here for a fight, do you?”  
  
“No,” Rick answered, finding his voice again while forcing his tears to back off. “This is all of us. We had one more, but she died early this morning. There was a herd a few of us got surrounded by at Ford’s Theatre.”  
  
“Well, damn,” Sarge remarked. “You’re numbers are just dropping like flies, aren’t they?” He chuckled slightly, under his breath as he walked over to Rick and Daryl, and placed a hand on Rick’s shoulder as both of them stared each other in the eye. “You know, you lot seem capable enough. I suppose I wouldn’t say no to letting you stay with us, here in DC.” When Rick clenched his jaw, Sarge leaned his head back and winked. “But I feel like you’re not gonna want to stay here with so many bad memories just…building up. You’re gonna want to get far away from here and find someplace new to start over. Someplace _not_ here. Catch my drift?”  
  
Rick nodded. He knew Sarge was telling him in a subtle but polite way to get the fuck out of DC and never come back. “Yeah,” Rick gritted his teeth. “I do.”  
  
Sarge stepped back and gestured to Milo as McGill removed the blindfold from his eyes and then the bindings from his hands. Freed from said bondage, Milo was unceremoniously shoved forward and kept on walking until he joined Finn at his side. Both men embraced in a hug and muttered something to each other before turning back to look upon Sarge and the Marauders.  
  
“Now, the deal we had was that you could walk away with your friend in exchange for all your supplies, your weapons and your vehicles,” Sarge began to speak once more, taking his time to specifically eye each member of Team Family, but then always bringing his focus back to Rick as he was their de facto leader. “Considering how shitty the news of finding out your baby girl and friend kicked it is, I’m feeling quite gracious today and I’ll let you leave with your weapons. After all, it’s a dangerous world out there. And you’ve just had your hearts put through the grinder. I wouldn’t want that poor girl there to be left alone in this world because the rest of you had nothing to protect yourselves with,” he added, gesturing to Sophia. “She looks like she’s seen more than enough tragedy in such a short life. I mean, am I wrong?” Looking around at Team Family, he pointed to the gathered weapons his Marauders had set upon the hoods of all three cars. “Go ahead, claim your weapons, but do so with caution. One false move and my roof crews will take you out like fish in a barrel, mark my words.”  
  
Steadying his breathing, Rick stepped forward first, walking to the hood of the rusty, golden sedan. Reaching first for his Colt, he brushed his thumb over the smooth metal of the barrel and recalled the countless walkers and humans he’d used it on since he’d woken up from that damn coma. Coming out of his reverie, he picked the gun up fully, taking in the weight of it in his hands and then holstered it as his side, taking comfort in it being returned to him. He grabbed his hunting knife and his machete next before looking up and gazing across the hood of the car toward Jo where she was forcing herself to get composed, and a laborious task it clearly was.  
  
Jo’s hands were shaking as she slowly stepped forward and reached for her sword and scabbard. The sword was already sheathed as she moved to strap it all upon her back. Tara, sensing the emotional struggle going on was conflicting with Jo’s physical capabilities, assisted her friend in getting the sword and scabbard secured behind Jo.  
  
With a quiet nod of thanks to the brunette, Jo reached for her own knife and gun she’d spotted on the hood. Within moments, their entire group was following suit; stepping up to the other two cars and taking back their weapons. Daryl seemed to practically hug his crossbow to his chest when he picked it up before going about tucking away all his knives and his gun to where he’d originally hidden them.  
  
When their group was packing once again, Sarge cleared his throat to get their attention.  
  
“Alright, I gave you your weapons back, now it’s time for all of you to turn around and head home to your temporary abode in Falls Church.” The way he spoke sounded like he was calling Morgan’s bluff about where they had based themselves.  
  
Stepping between the back of the red Yaris and the rusty, golden sedan, Rick walked up to Jo and pulled her into his arms. He hugged her tight, and kissed the side of her face, but he didn’t say anything about what Sarge told them. There really wasn’t anything he could say even if he could find the words. They were both so broken by it. This was Jo’s first time actually losing a child she’d once held in her arms. Rick understood the pain, having gone through it nearly two years ago with Carl, and now he was forced to suffer that all over again. He needed to make the move to embrace her and hold her close before they continued on, to plant the seed of reminder that they need each other standing together so they wouldn’t fall apart. They had another life growing inside her that would need them.  
  
“Start moving,” a voice not belonging to Sarge bellowed. Upon throwing a look over his shoulder, Rick could see it was McGill.  
  
With an obedient nod, Rick took Jo by the hand and then looked around at all his people. As he and Jo began to walk forward, Morgan and Daryl brought up the rear, and Sophia sidled up beside Jo, but held onto Tara’s hand. Finn and Milo joined in, slipping into the middle of their group as they began walking west down F Street.  
  
They all walked quietly and somberly together, like mourners leaving a funeral. It was almost as if speaking at all would break some sort of spell. Rick and Jo were still in a considerable amount of a daze, and the act of putting one foot in front of the other happened subconsciously as their minds wandered. They tightened the grip of their hands together as if they were afraid the other would float away.  
  
Before the made it to the neck intersection at F and 19 th Streets, a loud popping sound rang out in the air.  
  
Tara stopped in her tracks as something warm and wet hit the back of her neck and hair. As she brought a hand up and touched her fingers to her hair, she began to turn around just as Milo fell to his knees and then dropped face forward onto the ground.  
  
Finn cried out, crouching down faster than he could blink as the others quickly turned to see what had happened.  
  
The back of Milo’s head now encased a sizable, hole which was matted down around the edges with dark, red blood oozing out. As Finn rolled his friend over, there was no doubt the blonde was dead as a doornail. A bullet had pierced through the back of his skull, passing through his brain and exiting out his left eye socket. As it exited, it grazed through Tara’s hair, just missing her getting shot as well; which explained why she alone was splattered with Milo’s blood against her neck.  
  
As Finn continued to cry out, he lifted Milo’s body up and cradled him in his arms so that they were chest to chest. “No, no, no, no, no, no, no…”  
  
Whipping his own head back toward the intersection where the Marauders stood, Rick saw red as he spotted Sarge standing there, looking away from the scope atop his assault rifle and slowly lowering his weapon. Out of blinding rage, Rick removed his Colt and raised it as he began to stalk back toward the Marauders, ready to go guns-a-blazing.  
  
“You killed him!” Rick shouted angrily.  
  
“Careful now, Dick,” Sarge warned. “Don’t give my boys and girls any reason to kill the rest of you. There are more of us anyhow.”  
  
“You said we could walk away with our weapons and just leave our cars and supplies!” He still kept his gun aimed; knowing that, with the slightest amount of applied pressure on the trigger, he could end Sarge’s life. Though, in doing so, it would be condemning the rest of his family.  
  
“I _did_. You _were_ walking away,” Sarge responded. “I never said that makes us _even_.” He stared back at Rick as if he was an idiot. “Your boy killed one of us. You think supplies and a few cars equates to a _life_? Hell no. Blood must have blood, good sir.” Sarge licked his lips, and Rick was almost sure he noticed the man smile. “ _Now_ we’re even.”  
  
“You motherfucker!” Finn growled, leaving Milo’s body on the ground as he jumped up to his feet with his own gun raised to fire back, but Morgan and Daryl were quick to draw him back.  
  
“Stop. Stop, man. It’s done. It’s over,” Daryl hushed. “You fire one shot and they’ll kill us all.”  
  
Rick continued to just stand where he was; his hand shaking as he slowly lowered his gun and holstered it once more. He wasn’t crying over the loss of Milo’s life, per say, but tears were still stinging his eyes regardless.  
  
“Rick.”  
  
Turning at the sound of Jo’s voice, he saw her staring at him with a scrunched up nose and quivering chin. When she held a hand out to him, Rick gave up his desire to retaliate and began to walk back over to his wife, and took her hand in his before bringing his other up to the side of her face. Giving her a gentle peck to the lips, he muttered a quiet “I’m sorry” to her and then turned to look down at Milo’s body.  
  
“Adios muchachos!” Sarge called after them. “Don’t let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya!”  
  
Each of them doing their best to keep their own tempers in check, Team Family focused on just getting out of DC. Daryl helped Finn lift Milo’s body up and carry it away as Finn muttered over and over that they couldn’t leave him there to rot. The whole scene reminded both Rick and Jo of when the prison fell a month ago, and how Jo had refused to leave Maggie’s body to rot the same way; not wanting her corpse to become nothing more than food for walkers. Maggie had deserved a burial then and Milo deserved one now, unlike Piper who they were able to do anything for.  
  
As they continued down F Street, away from the Marauders, the group resumed their silence.


	48. Cardinal

_“Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.”_ — Benjamin Franklin

* * *

  
On weary legs they walked, for a little over thirty minutes and one, solitary mile; together and falling apart. Walkers that dared cross their paths were quickly done away with, and with little to no effort. If anything it helped as a temporary release for their anger and grief, and they had a lot of anger and grief they were trying to deal with. In twelve hours, their group had witnessed the deaths of two of their own, while feeling the loss of four overall. The news Sarge had given them about Shane and Hope was devastating and broke their spirits more so than seeing Piper and Milo’s life leave their bodies. It was hard to wrap their minds around, that all they’d been through to get to Washington, all those they had lost, seemed to have been for nothing. According to Sarge, it had been a week they had missed seeing Shane and Hope by.  
  
One week.  
  
Seven days.  
  
Seven days ago they were traveling by foot, having just made it into Virginia from North Carolina.  
  
They’d never know how long it had taken Shane to get to DC with Hope, or the how and why he’d taken her there. They’d never know if the two had traveled alone. They’d never know why Shane went off with Hope to begin with and not stayed around the nearby areas of the prison to see if anyone else had gotten out or gone to look for Rick and Jo. Clearly, Shane had the sense to assume they might’ve survived, simply by the fact that he had left at least two messages that they knew about. There could’ve been other messages along the way, but Shane might’ve traveled a variated route than they did. It seemed like everyone who survived the prison made it to the train tracks and saw the same signs for Terminus, so why didn’t Shane follow the same path? Why didn’t he reach the tracks and go there?  
  
Then again, it was probably a good thing he hadn’t. No one would’ve wanted Hope to be in that place.  
  
That place was a place where nightmares were made.  
  
Most importantly, they — specifically Rick and Jo — would never know how Hope had died.  
  
Had she been bitten? Had Shane run out of food to give her, so she died of malnutrition? Was it some sort of illness? Dysentery? Did he accidentally drop her while fighting to protect her?  
  
How did she die?  
  
_Why_ did she die?  
  
As the group made it to the roundabout behind the Lincoln Memorial, approximately three hundred feet away from the base of the Arlington Memorial Bridge, Finn and Daryl had to stop walking. Carrying Milo’s literal dead weight for a mile almost nonstop was tiring in itself, and being such a hot day was not helping any.  
  
Everyone was hot, tired, sweating and thirsty. The idea of making their way down to the river’s edge and just jumping right in to cool off and get something — _anything_ — to drink was incredibly tempting.  
  
“We can’t carry him all the way back,” Finn remarked, finally breaking the silence surrounding them all.  
  
Each face slowly turned to look at him. He was the last person they would’ve expected to be the first one to make that declaration.  
  
With a nod to Daryl, the younger man silently alluded it was okay to set Milo’s body down on the ground for the moment. Both men stood up straighter afterward, flexing their shoulders behind to crack their backs and stretch a little.  
  
“We have no shovels to dig a grave nearby,” Finn continued. Pursing his lips in a tight scowl of anger and bitterness, he pointed to the river. “Toss him.”  
  
“Finn,” Tara murmured, knitting her brow together empathetically. Knowing he was hurting over the death of his best friend, she felt the need to physically reach out her hand to him to let him know she was there for him as his friend.  
  
“If you’re tired, brother, me an’ Morgan can carry him for a little while,” Daryl offered, gesturing to Morgan to assume the position to assist him.  
  
Before Morgan could reach for Milo’s body, Finn shook a hand at them both. “No,” he asserted, looking down at his friend. “He wouldn’t have expected anything less.”  
  
Rick, despite the his constant zoning out, seemed to snap out of it long enough to realize what was going on now. He locked eyes with his brother-in-law after a moment and both shared deep, solemn expressions. “I’ll help,” he mumbled, stepping forward and bending at the knees beside Milo. Looking up at Daryl and then over to both Finn and Morgan, he nodded at them. “On three.”  
  
Without needing to be verbally told, the other three men understood what Rick was saying; they would lift Milo up together on the count of three. As soon as the four of them were gathered around the dead man’s body, Rick muttered a quiet count out and they each hoisted Milo up at different locations. Rick and Daryl were on opposite sides of Milo’s body, with their arms outstretched under his back and ass. Morgan held Milo’s legs up and Finn held onto Milo at his shoulders while his bearded head rolled back, causing his right eyelid, which Finn had previously closed, to fall open a bit as if he was staring up at Finn. Finn, however, chose to avoid looking at his friend’s face as all four men carried the body toward the bridge. Tara tapped a hand to Jo’s elbow, coaxing her out of her own daydream, for her and Sophia to also follow behind.  
  
At almost a quarter of the way onto the bridge, the men lifted Milo’s body up to rest upon the railing of the bridge’s stone balustrade.  
  
Standing there, everyone waited on Finn to be the one to say something, but he remained silent; just staring at the water.  
  
“Would you like me to say a prayer?” Morgan asked him.  
  
Finn shrugged. “Sure.”  
  
Licking his lips, Morgan kept his hands braced on Milo’s legs so he didn’t fall over the edge prematurely while he spoke. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”  
  
“Amen,” Tara muttered simultaneously with Sophia.  
  
Daryl, hearing them, felt compelled to do the same; his eyes darting toward them awkwardly. “Amen,” he mimicked, but more gruffly.  
  
“He was drunk when I met him,” Finn spoke up. “I was at this bar with a girl I’d been dating for a few months and they’d had a line-dancing night she wanted to take part in. I wasn’t into it, so I let her do her thing and I occupied a barstool next to the one Milo was sitting on, already three sheets to the wind. Turns out he was dating the friend to my then-girlfriend and he was as bored as I was. He bought me a beer and we began shooting the shit. We hit it off really well and we both ended up single a few weeks later.” A ghost of a smile attempted to appear on Finn’s lips as he recalled the memories. “About a month after that is when the world went to hell. He’d already been crashing on my couch all that week because he’d been kicked out of his own apartment for a reason that’s an entirely different story, so when everything got crazy it just made more sense to stick together. And Milo, he was there for me every damn time, no questions asked. He fought for me, and I fought for him. He was my best friend and my brother, regardless of blood. There will never be another Milo in this world and I’m sorry I couldn’t save him.” Leaning down, with his hands resting on either side of Milo’s head, Finn kissed his friend’s forehead and then brushed some of his hair to the side. Quietly, he whispered, “I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.”  
  
Leaning back up, Milo looked over at Daryl, who then nudged Rick. Catching on, Rick shifted slightly, which Morgan then understood as the cue.  
  
With little exertion, the four men pushed Milo’s body over the edge, watching as he fell and hit the gently churning water with a heavy splash. For a moment, Milo bobbed as the current began to drag him south, away from the bridge, before his entire body began to submerge completely.  
  
Rick stepped away first, running a hand over his face and then began to just continue forward on the bridge a few feet before stopping completely in his tracks. When he turned back around, he could see everyone clumped together, still looking as solemn as ever.  
  
“We shouldn’t go straight home to the townhouses,” he spoke. “They let us go with our weapons, but it didn’t seem like Sarge trusted us enough when we lied about where we’ve been staying. I think…I think if we should…”  
  
“We should head west of Arlington Cemetery, in case they’re following us out of the city, either to make sure we’re really leaving or to see if we were telling the truth or not about where we’re staying,” Morgan finished for him.  
  
Rick nodded in thanks. “Yeah. I don’t want them following us back. I don’t want those people knowing where the rest of our people are,” he continued, his hands resting on his hips while he stared down at the road. “We’ll take the long way ‘round to be safe and throw off anyone possibly following. We’ll take shelter in some cars or an abandoned building for the night and, at first light, begin making our way back up toward the townhouses.” Briefly, Rick cast his sad and tired blue eyes over to his wife who had slipped back into another daydream to help her mind wrap around losing Hope. Closing his eyes for a moment, he let out a shaky breath and then lifted a hand to run his fingers through his sweat-dampened curls. “Alright. Let’s…let’s make the most of daylight.”  
  
The seven of them began moving forward; even Jo who was the most zoned out and despondent. Their feet continued to carry them across the bridge while the sun began its slow descent across the late afternoon sky.  
  
Eventually they made their way off the bridge and headed south along Washington Boulevard which flowed north to southwest past the Pentagon. Abandoned cars were everywhere, as were more walkers. The group once again used their anger and grief to their benefit, putting each ambling corpse down with stabs and slices to the head. There were only a few close calls more on Sophia’s end, being as she was smaller in stature and didn’t have the same body strength as the adults when a walker was coming straight for her to completely defend herself. In those moments, the adults flanked around her and protected her, as was their job; adults protecting children.  
  
Not wanting to head toward any other areas that had been densely populated in the world before and now likely densely populated with the undead and people like the Marauders, the group kept to Washington Boulevard as it curved north, at the base of Arlington Cemetery.  
  
Occasionally they had to stop and catch their breaths, the early evening still hot despite the waning sunlight.  
  
Plenty of times, Rick and Daryl both found themselves looking over their shoulder, waiting to see if anyone was following. Although they never saw anyone, both looked at each other enough times to express they both felt as if they _were_ being followed. It was just a feeling; like a spider crawling up the back of their necks.  
  
After what was nearly two hours of walking at a gingerly and cautious pace, with few stops to rest as well as kill walkers in between, the group came upon a road sign showing that the exit for Falls Church was coming up in a quarter mile. On the chance any Marauders were following, Rick led them forward in that direction. Once they passed under an overpass, they were immediately greeted by the Falls Church exit that would loop around and become that same overpass which would head west. Not really wanting to go that far off course from the direction of the townhouses, and with the sky gradually losing more light, Rick pointed out an apartment complex on the other side of the road to take refuge in for the night.  
  
Several walkers of different levels of decay were scattered here and there across the small lawn in front of the brick building. Daryl took a few out with the bolts of his crossbow while Rick lobbed their heads either completely off or into halves; the two of them leading the way. Finn and Morgan brought up the rear, keeping the girls in the middle with Sophia between Jo and Tara. A bright blue door with dried, bloody handprints streaked across the surface greeted the group as Rick slammed his body against the door to open it up when it wouldn’t open; likely locked from the inside. Finn joined him, both using their combined weight to practically rip the door off its hinges.  
  
Slipping inside one by one, Rick pushed the now-dilapidated door closed as best as he could manage before turning around and gesturing toward the first apartment door to their left. The door there was closed, although not completely. It had been left ever so slightly ajar; whereas there was no mistaking the other three main level apartment doors were fully closed shut.  
  
“Wait out here,” he urged the others as he opted to be the one to clear the apartment first.  
  
Pushing the door open slowly and quietly, with his Colt removed from its holster and raised, Rick entered right away into a living room which looked quite disheveled. Whoever had lived their previously had likely left in a hurry, knocking things over in the process, like the floor lamp laying on the ground with its metal base draped over the corner of a soiled couch. Turning toward the dining and kitchen areas, he found one dead walker face down on the cheap linoleum flooring; a pool of dried, darkened blood around the rotted skull.  
  
Rick brought the back of his hand to his nose and remembered to breathe through his mouth the further in he went to inspect. Down a short hall, there were four doors. Opening the first on the left revealed a linen closet and the first door on the right turned out to be the bathroom, which was empty and would oddly end up being the cleanest place in the entire apartment. The last two doors belonged to the apartments’ two bedrooms. The bedroom on the left had windows facing out toward the road he and the others had just come off of as well as out onto the side street. The second bedroom only had one window. The bathroom, dining room and kitchen had no windows. Rick tucked these tidbits away so he knew all the exits in the event that the front door somehow wasn’t the safest option or just a complete no-go.  
  
With the only issue in the apartment being the dead walker on the dining room floor and the smell, Rick was satisfied the apartment would be fine for the night.  
  
Heading back to the front door, he pulled it open all the way. “It’s clear,” he muttered, scanning everyone to make sure they were all accounted for and physically okay as they passed him across the threshold.  
  
“Should we do something about the body?” Tara wondered; her face souring at the smell.  
  
“There’s a linen closet down the hall. Grab a bed sheet or something. Daryl and I will wrap it up and carry it out into the hall. Maybe find some aerosol or scented candles, open a few windows.”  
  
Morgan placed a hand on Rick’s shoulder and eyed him up. “I’ll help Daryl with that.” He nodded subtly over to Jo, who had sank down onto a dusty recliner with her sword between her legs while she stared aimlessly around at the debris on scattered around the floor. “Be with Jo right now.”  
  
Following Morgan’s gaze to his wife, Rick nodded in appreciation. As he stepped over to Jo, he could see Morgan, Daryl and Tara going about taking care of the dead walker and cleaning up a bit. Sophia had begun meandering around as well, looking for candles or some sort of air freshener most likely. Finn was the one walking around to the windows, opening them up to get some fresh air inside the apartment.  
  
Stepping up beside Jo where she sat, Rick holstered his Colt and placed his hand on the back of her head. When he brushed his thumb along the hairline at her forehead, she looked up at him with doleful eyes.  
  
“I don’t know what to do,” she whispered, half to herself and half to him.  
  
Fresh tears were beginning to line her eyelids as she turned her body in the recliner and let her sword drop to the floor as she reached for him. Her hands touched upon his hips and when she moved to snake her arms around his waist, Rick leaned down and wrapped his own arms around her waist instead, pulling her up into an embrace. He let his beard rub against the side of her face before he turned to kiss her temple.  
  
“I don’t know either right now,” he replied quietly. “We’ll figure it out together.” Leaning back, he brought both his hands up to the sides of her face and stared her in the eye. “Let’s get some rest for now.”  
  
As she slowly nodded back at him, Jo allowed Rick to take her by the hand and lead her away from the living room. She barely heard him telling Tara they were going to lie down for a while in one of the bedrooms, and she definitely didn’t hear Tara reply that it was okay.  
  
The two of them walked side by side down the narrow hallway and into the bedroom with the twin bed pressed up against the wall. It was clear the room had once belonged to a young boy, what with all the Tonka trucks on the floor and football decals on the wall. Also the photograph of a boy around the age of seven or eight posed with his two parents was a dead giveaway. Briefly looking at said picture actually made Rick wonder if the dead walker that had been on the dining area’s floor had been the father.  
  
Leaving the bedroom door open a hair, Rick brought Jo to the bed and let her lay down first, facing the wall on her side. Sitting down beside her with one leg bent on the mattress and the other still planted on the floor, he stared around the room a bit more before slowly sinking backward on the mattress.  
  
He wanted to talk to her, but he had no words to say.  
  
He wanted her to talk to him, but he didn’t want to force anything out of her.  
  
He just wanted to close his eyes and pretend the last twenty four hours had only been a dream.  
  
If only he were Superman and could turn back time by forcing the earth to turn spin backwards, Rick would have the redo he wanted. Better yet, he would turn back time by a month so he would be prepared for the Governor’s attack. Of course, in that delusional fantasy, he would somehow retain the knowledge of the present to take back with him to the past.  
  
Rick reached the hand closest to Jo out and set it down upon her hip to let her know he was there with her while she tried to sleep. As for him, as exhausted as he was, all he could do was stare blankly at the ceiling; fighting the back the ache in his heart and the urge to break down crying again.  
  
He needed, wanted and had to be strong for Jo.  
  
So he would be.

 

* * *

  
Rick still hadn’t managed to fall asleep once night had completely fallen. Even when he had closed his weary eyes, he couldn’t stop his mind from keeping him up. He kept thinking about everything that had happened, all their losses, all the things he would have to do or needed to do, and about where there entire group stood now that their sole purpose for coming to DC was kaput. He wondered if he should take Jo to Arlington Cemetery once everyone was back to the townhouses; just the two of them in search of a small makeshift grave where Shane had buried Hope. In thinking about that, he wondered if Shane’s body or whatever might be left of it would still be there. Maybe walkers had dragged it away. Was there any sort of grave marker with Hope’s name on it? Did Shane ever assume the possibility that Rick and Jo would make it to DC? If so, wouldn’t he have assumed that the couple would want to find their daughter’s grave? Then again, why would he have assumed they would need to be looking for a grave and not their daughter, alive and well?  
  
Rick opened his eyes and stared through the darkness at the ceiling. He could hear Jo breathing steadily beside him, still lying on her side and facing the wall, but he couldn’t tell if she had fallen asleep or not. For all he knew she was staring at the wall or the gap between the mattress and the wall. Either way, it was too dark for him to see and he wasn’t about to lean over her and get in her face to make sure. If she was asleep, he didn’t want to wake her up. He wanted her to rest.  
  
Pulling himself up into a sitting position, he continued peering through the darkness of the room until his eyes began to adjust. Rick twisted his body so that both feet were firmly planted on the ground before continuing onward to stand. Flexing his shoulder blades and arms backward, he could easily feel and hear his back cracking, and he let out a small sigh of relief over how good the sensation felt to his tightening back muscles. Rubbing his eyes with his fingertips, he slowly stepped toward the door which he pulled open all the way. Sticking his head out, he looked left; seeing the slight flicker of minimal candlelight coming from the direction of either the living or dining areas.  
  
Lethargically, he walked down the hallway; careful to keep his footsteps light and quiet as he moved. In the living room to his right, Daryl was stretched out across the couch with his crossbow propped up against the upholstered base border beside him, likely for easy access if he needed to grab for it quick. Sophia was curled up in the recliner with a homemade afghan draped over her body while she slept. Whether or not she was comfortable remained to be seen. Stepping further around the living spaces, Rick didn’t see Morgan, Tara nor Finn, so he backtracked down the hall and poked his head into the other bedroom and saw Tara was asleep on the bed with her rifle resting against the nightstand.  
  
Knitting his brow, Rick ducked back into the hall just as the bathroom door opened and a figure stepped out toward him, causing him to get defensive. However, it turned out to only be Morgan, carrying a small pillar candle so he could see in the bathroom with the door closed.  
  
“Did I scare ya?” Morgan questioned in a whisper.  
  
Rick shrugged it off. “Just wasn’t expecting anyone to be in there.”  
  
“World might’ve fallen apart but it didn’t stop turning,” Morgan remarked, the sound of a small smile in his voice. “Toilets might not necessarily flush like they used to or at all, but people still need to shit and piss.”  
  
Despite his sullen mood, Rick couldn’t help but find amusement in his friend’s statement.  
  
“True.”  
  
“D’you get any sleep?”  
  
“No,” Rick shook his head. “How long’s everyone else been asleep? And where’s Finn?”  
  
“The others began settling in for the night not long after you and Jo went in there,” Morgan gestured to the smaller bedroom. “Sophia fell asleep listening to Daryl talk about funny memories from the prison. I covered her up with the blanket. The days may be hot, but the nights are much cooler; especially with us being near the river.” Nodding up the hall, Morgan had Rick follow him out toward the living areas again and to take a seat across from him at the dining table where he sat the pillar candle down beside the other one. “Finn’s outside. Keeping watch, I suppose. He said he couldn’t sleep, so he might as well keep himself busy.”  
  
“I know the feeling.”  
  
“I’m sorry about today; about what that man said.” Morgan shook his head and quietly smacked his lips. “When I lost my wife, I was broken. But, I had my son and I had to live for him. But I wasn’t as ready to live in this kind of world as I thought I was. I wasn’t prepared to do the things I had to do for us to survive back then and, because of my hesitation, it cost my son his life. When you and Jo found me in that apartment, I was gone. I wasn’t in here,” Morgan pressed an index finger against the table’s surface as the candlelight flickered off both faces. He studied Rick’s face as Rick gazed down at Morgan’s finger and the table, and then back up at him with tired eyes. “I was alive, but I wasn’t living in this world. I was living in some daydream created by my grief that had broken me. I lacked any real purpose, but you and Jo…you gave that back to me. Now, losing Jenny was painful, but losing a child is just different. Losing a wife is like falling down a flight of stairs. Losing a child is like falling down a flight of stairs and then having a grand piano land on top of you. Both can break you, but losing a child crushes you. I will never get over losing my son, the same way you will never get over losing _your_ son. We’ll always kick ourselves and go over and over in our heads all the things we could’ve done different to prevent our boys from having to die, but it won’t bring them back. We just tuck them away in our hearts and our minds and we think about the good memories and how they ain’t suffering anymore, how they’re at peace.” Folding his hands together, Morgan leaned forward while Rick instinctively leaned back; processing all Morgan had just said and knowing it would come to a point soon enough. “You’ve been healing from that piano drop for nearly two years, and today another piano fell; fracturing those wounds all over again. The thing is, though: you’re familiar with this pain. You know how it feels to permanently lose a child, but Jo doesn’t. Jo is going through what we’ve been through for the first time and what is worse is that she carried that child inside her. She suffered through months and months of darkness and her daughter was the only light she had. And then she had you. She had you and she had Hope, and her darkness was cast aside. You brought light and love and Hope into her world. Right now, I know you are both in serious pain over what happened today, but I can’t stand by and let the two of you get swallowed up by that darkness again. I don’t want to see either of you living as brokenly as I did all those months.”  
  
Rick had been picking at the edge of the table, listening to all Morgan was saying. He had become so engrossed in Morgan’s voice that he hadn’t been expecting it when he stopped talking. Looking up at his friend, he stared him solemnly in the eye and frowned. “It’s hard to mourn Hope without seeing a body or knowing what happened. It’s conflicting, too, because Jo’s pregnant with our child. It’s like we have this second chance, but it’s hard to feel happy about that right now. How can I find joy in becoming a father again when I’ve just lost another child? How does one do that?” Rick folded his hands together on the table in front of him and then leaned forward. “How do I help Jo do that?”  
  
“Show her love. Never let her forget she has you. You’re gonna need each other more than ever now.”  
  
“Something happened back on that bridge when we tossed Milo over. I didn’t realize it until just now, listening to you speaking,” Rick spoke quietly. “My heart is broke. I’m not refuting that. But right now? I am furious. I can feel it under my skin. When I sit still long enough or stop moving long enough, I can feel it burning and tingling.”  
  
“You can feel what?”  
  
“Rage. Pure, undulated rage. I’m beyond angry or upset,” he remarked, practically snarling; though not at Morgan. Just in general. “I want to make the world suffer for how much it’s made me and the ones I love suffer. Right now I feel like I will fucking eviscerate anyone who looks at me the wrong way, and I hate feeling like this. It’s like bathing in toxic fucking waste; burning me alive but keeping me alive to change me into something harder and stronger. Everything that’s happened since the prison until now is changing me into something I never wanted to become. I keep trying to force it down, but sometimes it slips out.”  
  
“I suppose it happens to all of us at some point nowadays,” Morgan commented with an understanding nod. “Some people let that anger turn them bad. We must rise above that.”  
  
Rick shook his head. “You don’t understand. I’m not talking about turning bad. I’m talking about my anger, my rage, forcing me to become something frightening. Something that terrifies even the worst of humanity in this new world.” Propping his elbows on the table, Rick pressed his face into his hands and sighed a shaky sigh. “The things I’ve done up until now to protect the ones I love would scare the old me so bad he would end up in the psych ward. But there are worse things brewing inside me. Every time something happens to us, or is done to us, or when we lose someone, this façade of a decent man chips more and more away.” Dropping his hands down, he gestured to himself. “I think, pretty soon, there won’t be anything left of the man. A dark, violent abyss is all there’ll be.”  
  
“I suppose the only remedy for that is Jo,” Morgan shrugged. “Let her be your harness. Let her presence in your life as the woman you love be all you need to keep the man around and the abyss at bay. Considering how far and how hard you’ve fought to make it in this new world, and how much of it you did for her and your children, I’d say you, the man, stand a better chance of winning over the abyss.”  
  
“I’d like to think so, but more and more I’m feeling like it’s more of a losing battle.”  
  
“Exactly. It’s just a battle,” Morgan smirked. “Not a war.”  
  
“Tomato, to _mah_ to.”  
  
“Keep your face always toward the sunshine and shadows will fall behind you.”  
  
Rick knitted his brow together. “Who said that?”  
  
“Walt Whitman.” Off the questioning look Rick gave him, he clarified, “There was a book of his poetry at the prison I may or may not have kept to myself in my cell. That particular line just seemed fitting right now.”  
  
“Alright, but what happens when the shadows are all around you? Where do you look then?”  
  
Morgan shrugged and pointed toward the ceiling. “You look up.”  
  
Rick’s gaze followed upward, and then scoffed quietly at the other man’s meaning. “God?” he questioned rhetorically. “There’s no God anymore, Morgan.”  
  
Pushing his chair back, Rick stood up and blew out the candles on the table.  
  
Suddenly, he wasn’t just angry or full of rage as he had claimed. He was pissed off.  
  
“Don’t bring _God_ into this,” he spoke again, leaning down with his palms on the table as he stared at Morgan in the new darkness. Two wispy plumes of smoke from the wicks billowed upward between their faces. “If there was a fucking God none of _any_ of this shit would’ve happened to us. This fucking world wouldn’t have become what it’s become. Our children would be alive and well. Our friends would not have lost their lives so brutally. This world would be a better place and it’s not. It’s a fucking sack of fucking shit and it’s never going to get better. It’s gonna get harder and worse and we’re all just bidding our fucking time till we’re all in our graves, and that’s if we’re lucky to get one.” Rick’s temper began to flare as he stood up straight and acted out his bubbling aggression by kicking over the chair he’d just been sitting in, which startled both Daryl and Sophia awake.  
  
“The fuck…?” Daryl could be heard grunting from the couch, half asleep still.  
  
“ _Fuck_ this world. _Fuck_ it,” Rick continued to rant before pointing at Morgan. “And _fuck you_ for trying to sugarcoat it with a few lines from a _fucking_ poem.”  
  
Turning around, Rick growled under his breath and ran his hands through his hair. He was beyond overtired at this point. He was running on fumes and rage as he began stalking around the living room with his hands on his hips, trying to get his mind straight. The door to the apartment opened up and in walked Finn, looking around to see what the commotion was about while Daryl had already woken up fully and gotten to his feet to try and calm down Rick, who looked like a walking time bomb that was ready to explode and take everyone out.  
  
Poor Sophia was still curled up in the recliner and was now hugging the afghan tight around her as she look up at her surrogate father with nervous eyes. She never liked seeing Rick like this because it reminded her of her real father who she loathed, and she never wanted to see Rick in that light.  
  
“Rick, brother, calm down,” Daryl urged, placing his hands on the backs of Rick’s shoulders. “You’ll pop a vein or something.”  
  
When Rick shrugged him off, he turned and looked around at the archer, glaring daggers. “I _am_ calm!” he barked; absolutely nothing calm about the tone of his voice whatsoever.  
  
He was breathing heavily and shaking his head, and as Tara staggered tiredly into the living room with Jo trailing sleepily behind her, Rick seemed to visibly weaken. He set his eyes on Jo and the dispirited expression she still wore and all he could suddenly picture was her holding Hope for the first time after the little girl had been born, and then the day Jo had asked him to officially be Hope’s father. He recalled the way Hope would quiet down for him when she was in a fussy mood, and he recalled the last time he held Hope in his arms in C Block the day the prison fell.  
  
Rick saw Hope in Jo and then Rick fell.  
  
His entire body swayed from a mixture of exhaustion, rage, grief and likely also intense hunger, as his legs buckled underneath him. Rick’s eyes drooped shut and the room went completely dark on him as he tumbled unconsciously to the floor before Daryl or any of the others could prevent the fall.

 

* * *

  
Something soft, yet firm, was brushing against Rick’s forehead, stirring him slowly out of the darkness. He couldn’t be sure how much time had passed, but when his eyes reopened and he saw daylight was beginning to filter in through an opened window, he knew a couple hours had gone by, at the very least. The last thing he had remembered was darkness and shadow, getting angry and shouting. And then, nothing.  
  
Blinking away the last remnants of sleep, Rick allowed his eyes to better adjust to his surroundings and found that the soft yet firm object against his forehead was Jo’s thumb as she sat there on the ground, cradling his head in her lap while staring off toward the wall.  
  
Despite how tired, dirty and emotionally drained she appeared, to him, she still looked so utterly—  
  
“…Beautiful,” Rick managed to mumble, his voice cracking from his grogginess. As he cleared his throat, he watched at an upside down angle as Jo stared down at him. Slight frown lines appeared around her brow, even though she was making an attempt to smile at him while he woke.  
  
“Hey,” she greeted simply, brushing hair behind his ears.  
  
“Did I pass out?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Sorry.” Slowly, he began to sit upright and rubbed his stiff neck. Flexing his shoulder blades back, he waited and breathed a sigh of relief when he heard and felt the crack along his spine. Tipping his head from side to side, he cracked his neck as well, and then shifted around on the floor to look properly at his wife. “Did you get any sleep?”  
  
Jo nodded. “Before the yelling and for a little bit after you passed out.”  
  
“Sorry again.”  
  
“It’s okay.”  
  
“It really isn’t.” Rick could tell by looking around that they were alone in the immediate vicinity of the apartment. That is, from what he could see, there wasn’t anyone in the living or dining rooms, and he could safely assume no one was hanging out in the kitchenette. It was possible the others were either sleeping in the two bedrooms or outside already. “I shouldn’t have gone off like that on Morgan. He was just trying talk with me about what happened yesterday, and what’s been happening for all of us for a while now.” Rick sighed deeply, letting his gaze drop to the stained carpet. “I just couldn’t handle any of it anymore. I’m tired of everything going wrong for us. I’m tired.”  
  
“I know. We all are.”  
  
Rick reached a hand up and cupped the side of Jo’s face, watching as her own gaze drifted away from him and to the floor as well. “I’m sorry yesterday happened,” he remarked. “I wish we could redo it; pretend it didn’t happen, and go on believing we stood a chance at finding Hope and Shane alive.”  
  
“Tara asked me if I believed that man; if I believe what Sarge told us. I mean, we have no physical proof to go on that Hope died and Shane killed himself. But what reason could he have to lie about something like that? He may have killed Milo, but it was obvious he wasn’t an unreasonable man, as megalomaniacal as he might be. He let us leave with our weapons. That’s gotta stand for something, right?” Jo brought her eyes back up to Rick and stared him in the eye, as if looking for reassurance. “He knew we were good people, and he let us go taking us at face value that we didn’t really have an army of people waiting to come back to retaliate against him for taking Milo’s life. What reason could he possibly have for lying to us about Hope and Shane being dead? If he simply wanted us gone and to never come back to DC, and wanted to lie about it, he could’ve appeased us by saying he saw Shane and Hope passing through the city, heading in any direction. And you know we would’ve followed whatever bread trail he left for us. We would’ve accepted anything and gone anywhere to find them, but he didn’t. He told us they were dead. Both of them.”  
  
Pulling his knees up to his chest, Rick nodded solemnly. “He said a man matching Shane’s description was crying over a small grave and then shot himself dead,” he spoke, recollecting what had been said to them. “It feels off, I’ll admit. I mean, we can always head into Arlington Cemetery and check for ourselves to be sure. That’s where Sarge said he saw Shane. I know the place is large, but we could take a day to do it before we figure out what next. No matter what we were told, we shouldn’t take _that_ at face value until we can prove some truth to it.”  
  
Jo nodded in agreement. “Tomorrow,” she muttered. “We’ll go tomorrow. Today we head back to the townhouses, check in with the others, get cleaned up, eat something and get proper rest. Tomorrow morning we go to Arlington and look around for Hope’s supposed grave and whatever is _supposedly_ left of Shane.”  
  
“Okay.” Rick studied the way Jo’s green eyes went vacant as she talked about these things; causing his heart to ache as painfully as it had been for a while now every time terrible developments came about in their lives. Watching the way Jo reacted to it all and how he knew she felt was worse to him than how he felt about it. Reaching out again to her, Rick took one of her hands in his and gave it a squeeze. “Tomorrow at dawn.”  
  
“And if we find anything that points to Sarge having been truthful, we leave this place. We leave the DC area altogether, for good,” Jo continued. “We’ll go back to Georgia if we have to. At least we’re familiar with the area. Maybe we can head to Woodbury and stay there if it’s still standing. Or we find someplace new.” Glancing at Rick and holding his gaze again, she added, “If they’re dead, we move on. We stop searching aimlessly for clues of life. We start over and rebuild our lives for the rest of our children, all of our family. Okay?”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“Okay,” Jo repeated, as if trying to convince her own self.

 

* * *

  
After checking on everyone at the start of the new day, and making sure everyone was okay, Rick seemed to ignore the elephant in the room that was how he ended the night before more or less throwing a tantrum and passing out. He was either oblivious to the slight awkward tension in the air in regard to how everyone was walking on eggshells around him or he was actively choosing to ignore it as water under the bridge.  
  
In truth, it was the latter. He knew each person was unusually quiet and avoiding eye contact or other forms of communication with him, as if he might fall to pieces or snap at them. In a way, he appreciated that. As guilty as he felt over his outburst, he wasn’t particularly in the mood for much conversation at the moment to address said elephant. He did, however, feel the need to seek out Morgan in the near future and pull him aside to apologize to him personally for how he shouted at him. Morgan had only been trying to help, after all. He hadn’t deserved how Rick had acted, even if Rick hadn’t merely been beset with a toxic combination of grief, anger, hunger, dehydration, heat and exhaustion. Then again, so was everyone else.  
  
After a few, brief verbal exchanges with Daryl in the hallway outside the apartment, Rick had gathered that their group had already scoured the entire building for supplies and taken what they could use. Forced to rally everyone together so that they could continue their trek back to the townhouses, Rick finally spoke up once everyone was standing around, waiting in the apartment’s living room; silently waiting for Rick and Rick alone to let them know it was time to leave.  
  
No matter what, they would always turn to him for guidance on where to go and what to do next. Even if he when he was at wit’s end.  
  
With as few words as possible, he told them to gather up the supplies they’d all foraged for and to fall behind him as they made their way out of the building, single file, with Daryl hanging back to bring up the rear.  
  
After pushing the broken door aside, Rick peered outside with his Colt raised; stopping momentarily with his left hand raised as he looked around for any walkers. A few were ambling along on the road barely fifty feet away as Rick then began to step fully outside with the others in tow. With their movement, as quiet as it may be, the walkers were still alerted to their presence and began to shuffle rigidly toward them with worn shoes scuffing the pavement and almost completely unhinged and decaying jaws chomping instinctively at air.  
Having speed and agility on their side, Rick withdrew his machete and hacked into the skull of the closest walker while Daryl shot a bolt into another’s head and Tara grabbed onto the shoulder of a third, holding it back from her at a safe enough distance while she drove a blade into an eye socket. The fourth and last walker Rick also took out with an upward swing of his machete, resulting in half the walker’s head slipping away as all four of the undead bodies dropped lifelessly to the ground like burlap sacks filled with stones and kindling.  
  
Heading up the road with a slightly more rushed pace, they cut across to a winding residential street surrounded on either side with more apartment buildings. Without a compass and without any maps, they had to rely on the path the sun took in the sky in order to make it back to the townhouses, given they were unfamiliar with the area. Were they inclined to take a more leisurely pace, they might’ve veered off course and checked out a few of the buildings for supplies, but they just wanted to get to the rest of their people. There were plenty of abandoned vehicles along the way, several of which had opened doors, so those they did check for keys or gasoline. The common theme no matter where they went, though, seemed to be the lack thereof of both keys and gasoline, and these vehicles they were checking at this particular moment were no exception.  
  
Wandering along the road with the apartment buildings felt a little unsettling. The random walkers here and there aside, Rick felt like they were being watched. He couldn’t tell if there were survivors at the windows, watching them go by, or it was something or someone else, but it made him quietly urge everyone not to dally. Spying a main road if they turned right, Rick led the others that way. More and more scattered and abandoned vehicles greeted them on what was Route 50, which was three lanes on either side, separated by a grassy median. They were well aware that they were headed toward the heart of some sort of business district just outside Arlington, what with the moderately looming buildings up ahead, but there was really no other way around. Well, they could literally go around the area, but they weren’t sure how far off course or how much longer it would take them. They could take some comfort in the fact that the roads they were taking seemed to be quite dead with activity. This particular area they were approaching felt as much like a ghost town as the smaller country towns they’d passed through in weeks prior.  
  
As they reached the buildings and veered to the left up North Courthouse Road, it appeared that a majority of the buildings were actually apartment buildings, condos or hotels, which of course meant the potential for survivors holed up; and if there were survivors that meant the potential for assholes like the Sarge and his Marauders. No one had to be told to keep an eye out for anything. Each person held onto their weapons and kept their eyes trained upward at the windows of each building they passed, when not looking around for walkers, of which there were several. Buildings housing businesses and former government offices soon came upon the group. Between the blocks of 14th and 15th streets, there stood an AMC Theater to their left and the Arlington County Jail to their right.  
  
The walker count grew exponentially around there and the group was forced to duck into an alcove and wait it out for about twenty minutes. When a small herd of walkers began to clump together and seemed unmoving, Daryl grunted impatiently. Raising his crossbow, he shot a bolt into the head of one of the nearest walkers. As soon as it dropped, the others in the herd seemed to become alerted to that particular movement and began to continue to move, as if that had been the swift kick to the ass they’d needed. When the immediate threat of those walkers began to slowly dissipate up the road, Daryl turned to the others and gave a silent nod specifically to Rick; signaling for everyone to stay put for a moment as he darted out toward the road with the stealth of a cat. Without missing a beat, he crouched down, with his crossbow slung over his shoulder and resting on his back, and removed the bolt out of the downed walker’s head. Keeping his eyes peeled on his surroundings, he gripped the bolt in hand and then grabbed the walker by the wrists and began dragging it over toward the alcove. Pulling it behind the stone barrier that shielded the others from the road, Daryl dropped the walker down and withdrew a hunting knife.  
  
“Them walkers are heading north. Too many of ‘em for us to avoid, so we do what we did before,” he spoke low and gruffly. “We disguise our scents.”  
  
Remnants of walker blood and guts still stained the clothes and skin of Rick, Jo, Finn and Sophia from their escape from Ford’s Theatre, so doing it again didn’t seem to faze them, or Daryl who had just suggested it this time. Morgan and Tara grimaced, but they said nothing; knowing it needed to be done to get home as safely as possible.  
  
Daryl did the honors of opening up the walker who, fortunately for the group, had been a very large man in life, so there was plenty of his blood and guts to go around without the need of dropping another walker and running the risk of alerting any other of the ambling corpses to their hidden whereabouts before they were all covered. Once they were each lathered with a considerable amount upon their shirts, arms and faces, the group returned back onto the road, and brought up the rear to the small herd taking their good ol’ time.  
  
It took a while longer than they would’ve preferred but the group was able to eventually separate themselves from the rear of the herd and veer off to the right, onto another street as soon as the North Courthouse Road neared its end. By this point they were able to move at their own, quicker pace. Once again, they found themselves on a more residential route, and once again Rick developed the feeling of being watched.  
  
More than one time he had to stop and look around. He felt increasingly unnerved and, instead of continuing on the main road they were on, signaled for the group to take a detour through the fenced in quad between several more apartment buildings.  
  
“Where are we headed?” Tara inquired after a silent few minutes. She looked over her shoulder and around at the tree-lined path they were on, keeping a careful eye out, as they all were.  
  
Rick came to a stop again and this time he spoke up to divulge his beliefs. “I think we’re being watched,” he whispered, catching the way Sophia’s eyes darted nervously toward him. Poor thing was clearly still shaken from the events in DC and he hated making her feel anxious, but he needed to get the feeling plaguing him off his chest. Even if it turned out it was just a feeling and nothing more, it was better to be safe than sorry. “I don’t mean by walkers, either. Ever since we left that apartment building earlier—”  
  
“You think we’re being followed?” Finn asked, cutting in.  
  
Hesitating to answer right away, Rick soon nodded. “I do.”  
  
Tara looked around again. “I haven’t seen anyone other than walkers.”  
  
“Maybe I’m just still tired. Maybe it’s my mind playing tricks on me, but I can’t shake the feeling. It’s like I’ve got eyes on the back of my head, and I don’t mean from any of you,” Rick continued, eyeing each person one at a time; taking time to linger on Jo’s face and how she seemed to be listening, but was a little lost in thought. “If we are being followed, I’m trying to give whoever it might be the shake. Throw ‘em off course.”  
  
“Ya think it might be them Marauders, tryin’ to see where we’re really camped out at?” Daryl questioned. His tone wasn’t skeptical like Finn’s and Tara’s were. Daryl was always there as Rick’s wingman; the loyal soldier ready and willing to take Rick’s word at face value.  
  
Slowly again, Rick nodded. “I think it’s a strong possibility.”  
  
“Sarge didn’t seem too believing of us when Morgan said we were staying in Falls Church, but he didn’t contradict us either,” Jo finally spoke up for the first time since her conversation that morning with Rick. She snapped out of whatever daydream she appeared to have been having and looked directly at him. “It’s entirely possible he sent someone to follow us to be sure we weren’t full of shit.”  
  
“Which we were,” Finn quipped dryly.  
  
Stepping closer to Daryl, Rick leaned in and spoke primarily for the archer’s ears only, but he wasn’t bothering to hide what he was saying either. “If we really are being followed, we can’t let whoever it is follow us back. They can’t know where we are so they can just go scurry back to Sarge and let him know.”  
  
“They’d have walkie-talkies, no doubt.” Finn rested his hands on his hips. “If someone’s following us on that asshole’s orders, who’s to say they haven’t been reporting back all this time, giving a damned play by play of the direction we’ve been heading.”  
  
Being able to flesh out his feelings with the group about being followed made Rick feel less paranoid and more justified. He nodded at his brother-in-law’s good point. Wiping away the sweat beading at his forehead with the back of his hand, he squinted as he looked forward at the direction he’d been leading them all, and then back at the direction they’d come from. Looking straight ahead once more, he gestured with a nod. “Up ahead, there’s a lot of tree coverage. We know how to move around in that. We’re from the heart of Georgia, after all. We’ll have that upper hand against one of Sarge’s men. As tough as nails as they looked, they also looked like city boys to me.”  
  
“And girls,” Tara commented, pointedly. “There were girls in his group, too.”  
  
Rick looked back at her and nodded apologetically. “Yes, and girls.”  
  
“Girls can be anything these days, you know,” she continued, a slightly impish smirk at her lips. “Doctors, lawyers, world leaders, gun-wielding thugs in a post-apocalyptic street gang…”  
  
“Anyway,” Rick spoke, bringing them back on point. “We head through those trees; we don’t walk in straight paths. We zig-zag. We gotta reach a road again soon enough, because this area is still an urban area, and when we do we step aside and take cover, and then we wait. Whoever might be following will come out the same way soon after, if I’m right, and try and determine which way we’ve gone to keep up but maintain their distance without knowing we already caught their scent, so to speak.”  
  
“You think we should split up and throw ‘em off a bit?” Daryl suggested.  
  
Rick shook his head adamantly, looking around at everyone. “No. We stay together.”  
  
At the end of the quad, where there was a narrow, down-sloping road to their right, Rick instead led the group left toward the fuller tree coverage. In under a minute, they were slipping quietly through the trees, about fifty feet away from another sort of apartment building that stood several more stories taller than the complex they’d just finished passing through. Their shoes crunched dead leaves and snapped fallen branches; the sounds unavoidable to hide, which gave them reason to take pause and look around for walkers. Satisfied that the coast for clear for the moment, they ventured forward, careening right; holding onto tree trunks to keep from slipping and possibly injuring themselves as the gradient grew steeper.  
  
“Careful,” Jo whispered when she eyed Sophia momentarily slide when her foot hit a muddy patch of soil.  
  
The teen caught herself without requiring anyone’s assistance and righted her body as she took a moment to figure out where next to step. The way she slipped, though, brought back the memory of Sam slipping over the edge of that ravine and taking Jo with her. She tried avoiding thinking about anything they’d already experienced and just look forward, and she’d made her peace with that particular moment in their lives already, but it still brought forward a pang of sadness regardless.  
  
At the bottom of the wooded incline, Rick pushed aside the overgrowth in his way and found himself having to step over a guardrail. As the others quickly began appearing behind him, he assisted each in guiding them over and onto the awaiting sidewalk. On the highway they’d come upon, which was mere feet from an overpass, they all found it to be littered with abandoned cars, not unlike so many other highways they’d already traveled along up until this point.  
  
Holding a finger to his lips, Rick made sure they remained quiet as he let his eyes peruse the immediate area and found some overgrown greenery across the road to his liking. “Tara, take Sophia and hide in there. It goes without saying to be quiet about it. Daryl, that RV just there,” he said, pointing to the large vehicle under the overpass, “Get inside and make sure it’s clear, then hunker down. We might be able to take it after all this. Everyone else, duck behind a car, facing the opposite side of the road. Crouch down beside the tires, though, so no one coming out this way can see you if they look under the vehicles.”  
  
“What about you?” Jo asked.  
  
“Just find cover.” Rick looked her in the eye and cupped the side of her neck, brushing his thumb up along her jaw. “Don’t worry.”  
  
With nothing more than an obedient nod, Jo and the others did as Rick advised; heading to their designated hiding places with barely a shuffle of their feet to cause any unwanted noise. For the moment there were no walkers in the immediate area, which gave them the time to settle into where they would remain until their suspected followers appeared.  
  
After a few minutes, however, low groans began to drift on the air, causing their attentions up the road, just beyond the overpass where the small clump of the undead were lumbering along like a bunch of teenagers forcing themselves to get ready for school in the morning.  
  
Crouching beside the back driver’s side tire of a navy blue sedan with her sword draped across her lap, Jo’s legs began to feel the burning sensation caused by remaining in her current position for longer than her body preferred. Ideally, she would’ve shifted around and sat down or knelt on at least one knee, but she didn’t want to make any sort of movement that would bring attention from either the living or the dead her way. She turned her head to the right, and locked eyes with Morgan, who offered her a reassuring smile. She saw the way the muscles in his thighs flexed; giving her the impression he was feeling that same ache in his knees and feet as well.  
  
The waiting game for their supposed followers was starting to feel pointless. After ten minutes of nothing coming out into the open other than the gradually approaching walkers, it almost felt as if maybe there wasn’t a threat after all and Rick’s mind really was just playing tricks on him. On the plus side, if the only immediate threat that faced them was the walkers, their group stood a fine chance given that they were still covered in walker blood from back along North Courthouse Road. The oncoming walkers might not even register they were there if they stayed still and quiet. The walkers might just keep on walking along the road, completely and utterly oblivious.  
  
After ducking down beside the same vehicle with Morgan, Jo had glimpsed Tara and Sophia make it safely across the road and hide within the overgrown shrubbery up the slight embankment. Even though she knew where they were, she couldn’t see them in the slightest, allowing Jo to breathe easy. She’d breathe even easier, though, if she knew where Rick had gone off to. She knew Finn was two cars over and closer to Tara and Sophia’s side of the road, crouched the same as her and Morgan, and that Daryl had easily slipped inside of the RV without issue; the mobile home clearly void of any obstacles in the form of hungry undead.  
  
Rick was the wild card. She knew he’d said not to worry, but that was like telling the earth to stop turning. If she knew where he was hiding, she wouldn’t be feeling this nervous fluttering in her stomach that she knew was too early to be the life within her moving around.  
  
Jo almost gave in to the ache in her feet and knees. She almost moved to find some physical respite a different position would offer. But then two gunshots rang out into the air and her entire body tensed in its current position, as if even taking a breath would result in her immediate death.  
  
_“James, you dickstain,”_ a deep voice hissed. _“You know the orders. No gunfire. We’re not supposed to draw attention.”_  
  
_“Them fuckers clearly didn’t go this way. We’re not gonna draw attention to ourselves,”_ The second voice, belonging to ‘James’, retorted. Three more shots rang out. _“Do you see anyone else around here ‘side from these biters?”_  
  
_“Just because they might not’ve gone this way, doesn’t mean they aren’t nearby,”_ the first voice replied. _“It might send them running, and we’ve already lost their trail. Don’t know why Sarge sent us anyway. They hardly seemed like a threat, and we ain’t exactly trackers.”_  
  
‘James’ smacked his lips. A solitary gunshot rang out. _“We’re expendable.”_  
  
_“You’re wasting bullets. You’ve taken down two biters out of what—eight? With six shots? Now you gotta reload ‘cause_ your _dumb ass thought bringing a revolver was smart.”_  
  
_“I like the way it feels in my hand.”_  
  
_“That’s what your mother said last night.”_  
  
_“Joke’s on you, dipshit. My mother’s dead.”_  
  
_“Whose isn’t?”_  
  
Another, solitary gunshot rang out, but this one garnered a different reaction out of the two Marauders.  
  
Or, at least, one of them.  
  
_“What the fuck!”_ It was ‘James’ doing the exclaiming.  
  
_“Thanks for making it easy for me to decide which of you to kill first.”_  
  
That next voice belonged to Rick.  
  
Feeling it was safe to come out from behind the navy blue sedan, Jo shifted her weight; twisting at the waist and using the side of the vehicle to help push her up to her feet. While still gripping her sword, she was quick to grab onto her handgun and point it across the trunk of the car in the direction Rick and the Marauder’s voices had been coming from.  
  
James the Marauder, a skinny redheaded man in his early forties with a deep but old scar along his left cheek, turned to look briefly at Jo when he saw her pop up. A few feet away Rick was standing with his Colt aimed point blank at James. Rick allowed his own eyes to follow briefly over to his wife, but was quick to bring his focus back to the man. Jo let her eyes trail to the pavement, a few more feet further away from both Rick and James, where the body of the other Marauder lay; blood seeping onto the ground from the obvious gunshot wound Rick had given him to the head.  
  
“Your friend outed you as the one without bullets. Taking him out first meant eliminating the immediate threat, since he had the means to retaliate first. You? You won’t even be able to reach for a single bullet to load into your gun before one of mine enters your brain.” Rick was clenching his jaw tight when he wasn’t speaking. His nostrils flared as he focused on what he was doing. Without a gesture of his gun’s barrel, he pointed downward. “Toss the gun, put your hands up and get down on your knees.”  
  
The others in their group began to either stand up or come out of their hiding spots when it became clear they were not being immediately threatened, aside from the now-agitated and very closely approaching walkers.  
  
Finn stepped out from behind the car he’d been crouched beside and walked in between the other abandoned vehicles on the road to make his way toward said walkers. Instead of using his gun, he smartly brandished his axe to take out the first few of the remaining six walkers that came nearest to him. When he needed, he kicked them in the stomach to give himself a safer gap with which to work with. Daryl slipped back out of the RV and shot two bolts expertly into the heads of two of the walkers. Morgan removed a crowbar he had hanging through a belt loop on his pants, coming around the front of the navy blue sedan and jamming the straighter end into an eye socket missing an eyeball.  
  
As James threw his revolver to the ground at Rick’s feet and dropped obediently to his knees with his hands raised like a criminal about to be arrested, Rick sauntered over and stepped behind him; pressing the end of his Colt against the back of James’ head. “How much does Sarge know of where we were headed?”  
  
“He doesn’t know a thing,” James assured, his hand shaking somewhat at the feel of the loaded weapon upon his scalp.  
  
“You have walkie-talkies strapped to your hips.”  
  
“That was in case me and Bobby got separated while we followed you. The walkie’s reception doesn’t reach far enough back to Sarge.”  
  
“Bullshit.” Lifting his left foot up, Rick knocked the toe of his boot against the side of the walkie-talkie strapped to James’ hip. “I worked in law enforcement before this world became what it is now. I handled all sorts of handhelds like that then and now. I know the kind of range you can get in different terrains and conditions. There might be some tall buildings around us on either side of the river, but we’re only about—what—two miles from where we left Sarge and the rest of you fuckers yesterday? Average reach is three miles on a good day, and that was in the world before when there wasn’t any other interference. The point I’m making is you’re full of shit and you have one chance to tell me the truth and I’ll give you a quick death. One where you won’t come back.”  
  
“What kind of motive is that?”  
  
“The only one you got,” Rick replied, ignoring the questionable glance from Morgan. Daryl and Finn seemed unfazed by Rick’s ultimatum. Jo wasn’t sure what she felt. “You either die quick like your buddy, or I’ll shoot you in the lung and leave you here to die a slow and agonizing death from blood loss and suffocation, and then let you come back as a walker to roam this earth so you never find rest.” Rick gave a harsher shove of the end of his gun to the back of the man’s head. “What choice are you gonna make?”  
  
“I-I have a son back in DC,” James pleaded.  
  
“So did I,” Rick retorted. “And a daughter. I got two other daughters that need me and another child on the way and Sarge sent you and your friend after us, to follow us, so he could come after us later.”  
  
“I d-don’t know what he wanted to do. He just told me and Bobby t-to follow y-your group and tell him where you were going; t-to see where you were staying and how…and how many more of you there are.”  
  
“What did you tell him so far?” Rick repeated, pressing harder against James’ head, pulling back the hammer and lowering the barrel to James’ back at an angle aimed for James’ lungs for added effect to show he was serious. “Do I need to count to three?”  
  
“Our last check in with him was this morning,” James blurted, his voice shaking. His eyes drifted to the movement on the side of the road where Tara and Sophia had finally come out of hiding. “We told him you were headed north up the 50 instead of west toward Falls Church like you told him. He said to check back at noon.” He glanced at the watch on his right wrist. “About right now, actually.”  
  
“Slowly reach for your walkie. Call Sarge and tell him you and Bobby lost us when you got cut off by a herd, but then found us again. That we turned off on a road heading west. What other areas are west or northwest of here?”  
  
“Uh…Tysons or McLean.”  
  
“Which of the two would’ve been the least populated in the old world?”  
  
“McLean.”  
  
“Tell him we were headed in that direction.” When James hesitated, Rick brought the gun back up and this time pressed it to the back of James’ neck. “Did I stutter?”  
  
“O-okay.” Carefully, James lowered his left hand at a pace that was acceptable to Rick. He covered his hand over the walkie and slowly brought it up to his mouth.  
  
“You say anything other than what I just told you to say and I will shoot you through the throat instead.”  
  
“Okay.” James nodded, assuring he understood. Clicking on the two-way, he called across the static, “Cardinal calling Big Bird. Come in, over.”  
  
As they waited for a response, Rick raised an eyebrow. “I get the Big Bird, but why Cardinal?”  
  
“’Cause of my hair.”  
  
Rick nodded, inspecting the short ginger locks. “Makes sense.”  
  
Without further hesitation, the walkie crackled to life with a voice on the other end. _“This is Grey Goose for Big Bird. What’s your twenty? Over.”_  
  
The voice didn’t belong to Sarge, but Rick could easily assume Sarge was either nearby listening in or would be informed of what was said across the radio soon enough.  
  
“Just before George Mason University, heading toward Virginia Square. Over,” James lied, though his voice seemed to waver during the process.  
  
There was more static as they waited for the voice on the other end to respond. Then, _“Big Bird wants to know which direction the baby ducks wandered off to now. Over.”_  
  
Shifting his aim, Rick lowered the gun again and pressed it between James’ shoulder blades to ensure he followed his orders.  
  
“We lost the flock a while ago when we got cut off by a herd of biters. We were able to find them again, flying northwest toward McLean. Over.”  
  
_“When did you last see them? Over.”_  
  
“We have eyes on them now. They stopped for a few minutes to rest their wings. Over,” James continued to lie and could sense Rick was content with his adlibbing.  
  
There was more white noise as they waited for another response. After a few more seconds, the walkie once more came to life. _“Keep after the baby ducks. Report back in two hours. Over.”_  
  
“Understood, Grey Goose. Over and out.”  
  
Taking his thumb off the push-to-talk button, he held the walkie out at his side, unsure of Rick would allow him to return it to his hip or if Rick wanted to take it for himself.  
  
Whistling over James’ shoulder, Rick nodded to Finn, who walked over and took the walkie from James instead and strapped it to his own hip and then stepped back. The others seemed to gather around but gave Rick and James a wide berth.  
  
“I appreciate your compliance,” Rick muttered.  
  
“Like I had a choice,” James grumbled, looking down at the pavement.  
  
“No, you didn’t.” Bringing his index finger to hover over the trigger, Rick let out a small sigh. “It’s nothing against you personally. You were just doing your job.”  
  
“Some job.”  
  
“How old is your boy?”  
  
“Sixteen.”  
  
“You got any family back in DC to look after him?”  
  
“Just my brother. My wife died at the beginning.”  
  
“Well, we’ve all lost people. At least you can die knowing your son won’t be alone.”  
  
“Not much of a comfort, but yeah I guess.” James remarked, his shoulders slumping.  
  
His time was up. _He_ knew it. _Rick_ knew it. _Everyone_ in Rick’s group seemed to know it as they just stood there waiting with bated breath for the Marauder to meet his end.  
  
“Couldn’t you maybe just leave me here without my weapons? I didn’t hurt you or pull a gun on any of you. I just followed you. You don’t have to kill me,” James begged in a last ditch plea for his life. “Lock me in one of those trunks if you want. I won’t know where you’re going from here on out. I won’t be able to tell Sarge where you went next. I could tell him the truth, that I lost your group.”  
  
“Yeah,” Rick shrugged. “I could do that.”  
  
The split second that James seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, Rick pulled the trigger and shot James in the back of the head. His entire forehead seemed to burst as blood, chunks of bone and brain matter sprayed out before him on the pavement. His body dropped forward a moment or two later.  
  
Lowering his Colt, Rick ran his thumb absentmindedly along the hammer before taking a step back from James’ body and looking up at the others who were staring back at him with blank faces.  
  
“What?” he asked them.  
  
Without waiting for a reply, which didn’t come anyway, Rick crouched down and felt around into James’ pockets for his extra ammunition and then picked up James’ discarded revolver. He tucked the gun into the back of his pants and shoved the bullets he’d found into one of his pockets before he took a few steps backward toward Bobby’s body and began to strip the man of his discarded weapons and extra ammunition as well.  
  
“Rick,” a voice finally called to him.  
  
Rick looked up and saw Morgan had stepped closer to him, gesturing toward James with his crowbar. “What, Morgan?” he asked, already mentally prepared for whatever the man had to say.  
  
“Was that necessary? We could’ve locked him in a trunk without weapons or ways to communicate back to DC like he said.”  
  
“Your bleeding heart doesn’t belong in this world, Morgan,” Rick retorted, standing back up as he tucked Bobby’s gun into the back of his pants beside James’ gun. Approaching Morgan, he pointed at James and added, “Don’t you know by now that it’s kill or be killed? He posed a threat, alive or not.”  
  
“Then why not let him _live_?” Morgan questioned with a hint of agitation in his voice.  
  
“Because.”  
  
“Because is not an answer, Rick.”  
  
“It’s my answer. You don’t have to like it, you just have to accept it.” Casting his blue eyes around at the other faces staring at him and Morgan, Rick stepped away and began to head up the road toward Daryl. “Is the RV clear?”  
  
“It is,” Daryl replied like a good little soldier, but not in a way that made him mindless. His eyes gave away that he wasn’t one hundred percent down with what had happened, but he could live with it. In the end, it was an “us or them” situation. And the “us” was more important to him. “Keys in the ignition. Not sure on how much gas, though.”  
  
“We can syphon some, I’m sure,” Rick replied, holstering his Colt and placing his hands on his hips. “We lost two vehicles yesterday and we shouldn’t continue on foot anymore. When Big Bird realizes Cardinal hasn’t checked in two hours from now, he might send others to this side of the river and we need a vehicle large enough to carry as much supplies and people in it away from this place.”  
  
“Aren’t we staying in the townhouses anymore?” Tara called out, her voice sounding downtrodden. “I was liking it there.”  
  
“It was never meant to be our forever home,” Rick answered, not bothering to look back at her. “It was just a stop along the way to find Hope and Shane, and now they’re gone, so we got nothing holding us here. All we have is the loss of two more of our own and an immediate threat across the river that will likely make a play to come after us.” Eyeing both Daryl and Finn, he added, “Start looking for gas canisters we can syphon gas into.”  
  
Both men nodded and moved to check inside the abandoned vehicles on both sides of the four-lane highway while Tara approached the RV with Sophia in tow; both females quietly disappearing up inside the vehicle while Morgan solemnly stepped past Rick in an effort to comply and not cause any more waves among their group at the moment. As he busied himself with assisting Daryl and Finn with searching the nearby vehicles, Rick turned and looked to Jo, who was sheathing her sword into the scabbard on her back and had holstered her gun at her side. Casually he approached her and placed a hand on her arm just above her elbow.  
  
“As soon as we get back to the townhouses I want everyone to pack up. We’ll hit the road before nightfall,” he spoke to her. “I don’t want to stay anywhere around here another night if we can help it.”  
  
Clenching her jaw and pursing her lips together, Jo stared at the ground and pulled her arm away from Rick, albeit gently. “Yeah, okay.”  
  
“Jo,” he muttered, sensing she was upset about something. “Are you mad about those two?” He gestured over his shoulder with his thumb at the bodies of James and Bobby. “I made a decision I felt was—”  
  
“—I don’t give a shit about them,” Jo cut him off. “I just thought we agreed, just this very morning at that apartment, that we were gonna spend one more night at the townhouses and early tomorrow morning we were gonna go check out Arlington Cemetery for Hope’s grave. Guess not, huh?”  
  
“That was before I realized for sure we were being followed.”  
  
“But you didn’t know for sure we were being followed,” Jo snapped, her voice raise as she glared at Rick. “You had a _feeling._ You didn’t have solid proof.”  
  
“Well, my feeling proved right.”  
  
“Congratulations.”  
  
“Jo, I’m sorry.” He reached for her arm again but she took two steps back so that his reach fell short. Letting his arm fall, so did his shoulders. “The sooner we get enough gas in the RV, the sooner we get back to the townhouses, and the sooner we get packed up. The days are getting shorter, which means the amount of daylight we have is becoming limited. The faster we get this shit done, we should have a few hours to spare this evening to look around the cemetery before we get on the road. We can still do it.”  
  
“No,” Jo shook her head. “No, that’s alright. Hope and Shane are dead, so why bother driving the nail into the proverbial coffin that is our hearts by having to witness our daughter’s grave? It’ll probably just make this grief feel worse, right? How could it possibly make it easier to live with? We’re better off just forgetting the whole thing and getting out of here like you said. We got the rest of our people to think of. Paying our respects to our daughter’s grave which we might not’ve been able to find anyway just makes no sense. It’s okay. Whatever.”  
  
As Rick stepped forward, he reached for her again; finding short-lived success when he was able to grip gently onto her arm again. However, as stated, it was short-lived. The second his hand found her arm, she yanked it harshly away and reacted further by shoving him back from her. Undeterred, Rick stepped toward her again and reached for her hands this time, only for her to retaliate by lifting her right hand and slapping him hard across his face.  
  
The action garnered the immediate attention of Daryl, Finn and Morgan.  
  
Rick, stunned, just stood there; making no other move to reach for her as both his face and the palm of her hand both stung something fierce with the force with which she’d hit him. He avoided looking her in the eye for a few moments as they both just stood there in silence.  
  
As she shifted slightly, he finally tried speaking again to her. “Jo—”  
  
“ _Don’t!_ ” she bit out, stepping further back from him. Her chin quivered and tears were burning at her eyes, but this was not the moment she wished to let him see her cry. She wanted to be strong. She wanted to appear as uncaring and indifferent about this argument as he had been in regard to the Marauders he’d just killed. Pregnancy hormones didn’t quite help her in this area, and she was aware her resolve was faltering. So, Jo turned on the heel of her boots and stormed off as indignantly as she could muster as she escaped into the RV to be away from him right now.  
  
Rick was left standing there alone, feeling awkward; knowing the other three men had witness what had just transpired between husband and wife. The last time he’d had a public squabble with a significant other was with Lori, back when their original group had found those self-storage units to stay in during two winters ago. But, even then, that argument had also involved Shane and Andrea and was mediated successfully, to an extent, by Hershel.  
  
Rick wasn’t sure how to act now, but he knew Jo needed space away from him at the moment and he would give it to her. He didn’t need Finn attacking him as a way of being the brotherly knight in shining armor to his big sister. Plus, Rick didn’t want to cause Jo anymore grief, and he was too tired to anyway.  
  
Daryl, ever the good guy who hated awkward, touchy-feely moments anyway, found he was perfect in breaking the awkwardness in the air by forcing a change in subject, so to speak.  
  
As casually as possibly, he sauntered over toward Rick and nudged him with his elbow. “Yo, we found some gas cans. You wanna help me fill one up? I got a hose, too.”  
  
“Uh, yeah.” Rick blinked, shaking his head slightly and snapping out of his daydream, and trying to not think too much on anything else than the task at hand Daryl was presenting him with. “Yeah, let’s do this.”  
  
From outside the RV, Rick was oblivious to the goings-on inside of it.  
  
He was unaware of how Jo had stormed inside and immediately sought refuge in the bedroom at the back of the RV, or how Tara and Sophia had quickly followed after her to see if she was okay, or how she easily found comfort in being able to literally cry on Tara’s shoulder while Sophia hugged her from behind. He was unaware that she didn’t say anything about anything, and that all she did was cry and nothing more.  
  
He _was_ aware that he hated how he upset her and how he was feeling over it all, and how Morgan and Finn were occasionally staring at him.  
  
He _was_ aware that when they’d finally determined they’d had enough full and then some gathered up to get them back to the townhouses, that the pleated folding door separating the back bedroom from the rest of the RV was closed and neither Jo nor Sophia was present in the front of the vehicle aside from Tara who was sitting shotgun, staring at him when he climbed inside with the extra gas canister.  
  
Tara made no move to talk about it, and he made no move to broach the subject. Tara swiveled around in the passenger seat and propped her legs up on the dashboard as Finn, Morgan and Daryl found seats around the fold-down dinette table.  
  
Rick found some solace in how no one was speaking. In fact, he rather welcomed it.  
  
Turning the key forward in the ignition, the RV’s engine sputtered and he gave the pedal a little gas. Rick sighed and turned the engine off, but then repeated it once more. On the second try, the RV came to life and the engine began to rumble normally as it idled in park. Shifting gears to drive, Rick somehow managed to move the RV forward up the road between the abandoned cars, weaving in and out here and there when required.  
  
While keeping his eyes on the road for the most part, he stole a few glances up into the rearview mirror as if he would see Jo’s reflection staring back at him.  
  
Such was not the case, so Rick focused on just getting them all back to the townhouses as soon as possible, and in one piece.


	49. Goodbyes, Part II

_“_ _Oh I've finally decided my future lies,_  
_Beyond the yellow brick road”_  
— Elton John

* * *

  
  
It wasn't the easiest drive back, but they managed to maneuver the unfamiliar roads without a map—and yes, they checked the RV for one, but found none. Twice they hit road blocks formed by abandoned vehicles in their path, which meant getting out of the RV and physically pushing any car or truck they could to clear the way. There was also one small herd, and Rick did his best to avoid running into them but, when he did, he wasn’t too concerned. The RV was built sturdier than the dead were.  
  
Approximately forty-five minutes after first driving off in the RV, they managed to make their way back up the road leading up to the townhouses. A trip that, had there been no physical obstacles and had they known the way, would’ve taken less than five minutes by car and only ten minutes if they’d stayed on foot.  
  
As soon as the RV came to its final destination, Tara let out an elated whoop of relief and was first to jump up out of her seat before the mobile home had even came to a complete stop. While the others began to follow after Tara and begin to head out, Rick just sat there in the driver’s seat still; even after Jo and Sophia had come out of the back bedroom and left as well. He leaned forward, gripping the top of the steering will and watched out the windshield as everyone from the first group that had gone off to George Washington University came out of the main townhouse to greet the returned groups, or what was left of them. He watched the way the first group scanned the faces of the others, looking around for Milo and Piper, and then he watched how they grew solemn when Daryl stepped forward as the one to give the cliff notes version of what happen.  
  
Jen and Mika were among everyone, and Jen had begun to cry when she likely heard the news of Milo’s demise. As Finn’s girlfriend, his best friend had been a close friend of hers, too.  
  
Rick watched the way Finn embraced and kissed Jen; happy to see her again while trying to console her over something he’d already had a day to live with. Rick also watched the way Mika smiled brightly to see Jo again and how she threw her arms around Jo’s waist, and then repeated the process for both Sophia and Tara before looking over toward the RV, probably asking where Rick was. Tara was muttering something and Mika’s smile faded slightly, but her spirits remained up as she nodded and turned away to head inside the townhouse with everyone.  
  
The only one who remained outside was Tyreese, who began to saunter over to the RV and politely knocked on the door instead of just barging right in.  
  
“Door’s open,” Rick called out, leaning back and dropping his hands into his lap.  
  
As the door swung open, the entire vehicle lurched slightly to the right as Tyreese’s girth entered inside. He momentarily looked around and then focused his gaze forward at Rick and helped himself to occupying the seat Tara had just been in moments before.  
  
“So,” Tyreese began. “What happened?” When Rick didn’t reply right away, Tyreese continued. “The rest of us got back yesterday morning. We spent the night in some old medical lab. We found a lot of good meds and equipment Nicole said we can definitely use.” The larger man practically beamed. “We even found a sonogram machine. If we can find a generator to hook it up to we can get it working in no time. Hell, if we find a generator somewhere we can do a lot more than just use a sonogram.”  
  
“That’s good,” Rick muttered.  
  
“So…you gonna give me the specifics of what the hell happened in DC? All Daryl said is that Milo and Piper didn’t make it and that we gotta pack up everything. What’s going on, Rick?”  
  
Letting out a deep sigh, Rick backtracked in his mind to recount everything. “My group got surrounded by a herd and spent the night in Ford Theatre. When we tried to make our escape, Piper freaked out for reasons that aren’t important anymore and she got attacked. She’d been holding onto Sophia’s hand and wouldn’t let go, and Sophia would’ve been walker food next, so I cut off Piper’s hand and the rest of us left her behind. Sophia shot her in the head to put her out of her misery. We got back to where we left our car eventually, but it was gone. It was taken. So, we started walking, and eventually we found Daryl’s group at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, waiting for us. They explained they ran into this group, these Marauders who had taken Milo as leverage because Milo had killed one of the Marauders to protect Tara. The head Marauder, Sarge, decided the only way they’d get Milo back was if they gave them everything they had. He told Daryl they had until sundown yesterday. They wanted our food, our weapons, our cars, any other supplies. _Everything_.”  
  
“Shit.”  
  
“So, we start scavenging for anything extra we can find because none of us had found much. We found some gas and hotwired some extra cars and we made the drop-off just before sundown. While we waited for Milo to be brought out, he made us get out of the cars and made us give up our weapons. When we asked if they’d seen Shane and Hope, Sarge said he did.”  
  
“Holy shit. Really?”  
  
“A week ago,” Rick nodded. He bit the inside of his bottom lip as tears began to sting his eyes. “He said he saw Shane over a small grave in Arlington Cemetery, crying, and then Shane shot himself in the head.”  
  
Tyreese slumped and tears formed at his own eyes as well; the only difference was his never fell while Rick couldn’t hold his in anymore. A sob escaped his lips and he hunched forward, once again gripping the steering wheel as he pressed his forehead against it.  
  
“Rick, I’m sorry. I am so damn sorry. Did…did that guy, Sarge, say how Hope…how she…you know?”  
  
Rick sucked in a few steadying breaths and leaned back upward, wiping the tears away as he shook his head. “No,” he mumbled. “He only saw Shane and the grave. Then Milo came outside and Sarge let us take our weapons back, but then he told us to get the hell out of DC and never come back,” Rick continued to speak; doing his best to get back on track. “We, uh, we started walking away and this gunshot rings out and Tara’s got all this blood splatter in the back of her neck and then we see Milo falling forward. I look and I see Sarge aiming this rifle with a scope on it. He said a few cars and some supplies didn’t equal losing one of their own the day before. Milo’s death made us even. Blood must have blood, he said.” Swallowing back his grief for the moment, Rick revealed anger. “We tossed Milo’s body into the river as we left the city. It was Finn’s idea. And then we needed to find someplace to stay last night. We couldn’t be wandering unfamiliar roads in the dark, not on foot anyway. So, we found an apartment.”  
  
Both men fell quiet for a couple minutes, letting everything Rick said sink in.  
  
“When did you find this beauty?” Tyreese inquired, patting the dashboard.  
  
Rick shrugged. “Little over an hour ago, maybe.” Lifting a hand up, he wiped more tears away. “We got back on the road this morning, but I had a feeling we were being followed. I tried giving whoever it might be the slip by going off the main roads. When we reached a highway pretty near here, I had everyone hide and we waited and, sure as shit, these two guys come out of this wooded area we’d just come out of not ten minutes before. Heard ‘em talking; they mentioned Sarge, so I knew he’d sent them to follow us and see exactly where we were going.”  
  
“What happened to them?” The question didn’t really need an answer. Tyreese could safely assume the men were dead.  
  
“I killed the first one. The second one had used up an entire round of bullets on two walkers. The first guy posed the greater threat with a loaded gun, the second guy didn’t, so I used him to communicate back to his people and tell Sarge he was following us somewhere else. Then I shot him, too.” Rick cleared his throat and looked out the windshield toward the townhouse. “Morgan’s pissed with me ‘cause I didn’t let the guy live and simply lock him in some trunk or whatever without any weapons. I just didn’t care about the guy. He posed a threat, either way. He could’ve gotten out if I put him in a trunk and somehow managed to radio back to his people and tell him where we really went, which is why I need us to pack everything up and get away from this area as soon as possible. When that Marauder doesn’t radio back to his people soon, they might send more this way to find him and if they do, they might come after us. If I’d left him alive and they found him in a trunk, the same thing could happen and I can’t risk that.”  
  
“Understandable,” Tyreese nodded. “We got our women and our children’s safety to think about first. I suppose I might’ve made the same decision as you in a moment like that; scared, running on fumes, grieving.”  
  
Rick shook his head. “I would’ve made that decision if I was feeling a hundred percent,” he admitted. “I didn’t even care when he told me he had a sixteen-year-old son back in DC that I’d be orphaning. Stepping back from the situation, I can see how I’m the bad guy in all this and he isn’t. He _was_ only just following us. He didn’t hurt us, but he could’ve.” Rick shrugged. “And Jo’s angry with me. She slapped me and won’t talk to me.”  
  
“How come?”  
  
“We’re both messed up over Hope and Shane; mostly Hope. I promised her this morning we’d stay one more night here and take tomorrow morning to look around the cemetery for Hope’s grave, but then all that with those two Marauders following us happened and I just don’t think it’s safe for us to stay around here anymore. But I told her if we packed up quick enough, we could spare time to go look this evening before nightfall and she got angry and told me to forget it and she slapped me…” He turned and finally looked directly at Tyreese. “And that pretty much brings us to now.”  
  
Tyreese nodded and looked around. “Okay,” he remarked simply. “Let’s get our shit loaded up then.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Standing up, Tyreese reached over and gave Rick’s shoulder a tight squeeze. “All hands on deck,” he spoke. “That means you, too.” When Rick looked up at him, he added, “C’mon. If we’re gonna make it to Arlington Cemetery before dark, we gotta do this now.”  
  
Rick tried to smile and ended up failing miserably at it. “I’ll let Jo know,” he nodded. “If she’ll talk to me.”  
  
“She will.”  
  
With a slap to Rick’s shoulder with his opened palm, Tyreese turned and exited the RV without another word; leaving the door open for Rick to follow him out.  
  
Taking another moment to collect himself, Rick wiped away any remaining tears at his eyes and pulled himself up to his feet. Merle was already exiting the townhouse to the left with a duffel bag full of supplies; heading toward the passenger van with it as Rick came ‘round the RV.  
  
“Sorry about your kid, Rick,” Merle called over as he opened the back doors to the van. “That’s some real shit.”  
  
All Rick did was nod a silent thanks for the sympathy as he continued on his way and entered into the main townhouse. Ascending the stairs, he reached the first floor where Karen was helping Tara pack up all the canned goods into reusable shopping bags. On the second floor, Sophia and Mika were finishing up packing up what little supplies they had already and whatever else they wanted to lift from the bedrooms they’d claimed for their own during their short stay in the townhouse. Continuing higher, Rick reached the top floor where he found the master bedroom’s door ajar.  
  
Pushing it open more to allow him to slip more easily inside, Rick looked at the bed and recalled the wonderful moments he had created in it with Jo. The bedsheet was as disheveled as they had left it days before and the way the sun shined into the room and bathed over the bed just made everything seem beautiful and as if everything was fine.  
  
Hearing movement to his right, Rick looked down the corridor between the His and Her closets and saw Jo stepping out of the master bathroom with a small bag filled with toiletries they could use on the road, like soap, shampoo and toilet paper.  
  
“Jo,” he called to her.  
  
She looked up and then looked away, not answering him as she turned and opened one of the closet doors and began to yank out several articles of women’s clothing that had been left behind by the previous owners.  
  
“Tyreese wants to get us to Arlington Cemetery, and I still do, too,” he pressed. “I know you’re pissed with me and you don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to, but I’m just letting you know we’re gonna go there. I made you a promise. I won’t break it.”  
  
Stepping back from the closet door, Jo looked up at him again and simply nodded before she moved past him and tossed the clothes in her arms down onto the bed.  
  
Rick sighed. “I thought I’d at least get an ‘okay’ out of that.”  
  
Jo turned around and immediately glared at him. “Do you want a pat on the back or a ‘job well done’ while we’re at it?”  
  
Rick clenched his jaw. “Listen, we’re both grieving here, and I was an asshole earlier, but I didn’t mean to be an asshole on purpose. I’m tired and I’m scared. I’m scared _all the time_. I’m barely hanging on most days to keep this group together and alive, and I can’t even do that right. I’m doing the best I can, but I’m not the bad guy. I’m your husband, and I lost the same daughter, too. You’re acting as if me going to the cemetery is some chore I’m obligated to do. I’m grieving for Hope the same as you.”  
  
Jo threw the bag of toiletries down on the bed and stepped defiantly up to Rick. “You are _not_ grieving Hope the same as me,” she spat. “ _I_ am the one who created her. _I_ am the one who felt her grow inside me for almost nine months. _I_ am the one who pushed her out of my body. _I_ am the one who nursed her. She was of _my_ flesh and blood, Rick. It’s _not_ the same grief. Don’t you dare say it is! You didn’t lose her like I lost her!”  
  
His chin quivering, tears came back to Rick’s eyes as he stared back at Jo, who suddenly looked so small and broken in front of him. “My grief might not be _exactly_ the same, but it is _not_ any less painful than yours,” he insisted; failing to maintain his composure. “I _delivered_ her. I _loved_ her the second I held her and I _never_ stopped loving her. I loved her as if she _was_ my flesh and blood. And you seem to forget that this is the second _fucking_ time I’ve had to lose a child. I _know_ this pain because I’ve already lived through it before! I lost my son, a child I _did_ help create, that _was_ my flesh and blood, and this pain now feels exactly the same, so don’t school me on the loss of a child, Joanna.”  
  
Turning his back to her, Rick took a few steps away from her and then leaned against the wall. Hunching forward, he pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and index finger as he began to sob so deeply it became an ugly cry. Feeling his knees shake and weaken, he slid down the wall and sank to the floor with a gentle thud.  
  
Jo just stood there, watching him and feeling the weirdest mix of emotions. Part of her was angry at him, while part of her felt like a monster for undermining his grief by playing some sort of loss trump card. But then it was her grief that allowed her to push aside her anger, as easily as tucking away a pair of socks into a dresser drawer. She couldn’t find it in herself to be angry at him and grieve at the same time. He didn’t kill Hope. Her death wasn’t his fault. He was not responsible for any of this and neither was she. They had had no control over what happened. This had all been beyond their control in this fucking, horrible world that seemed out to get them at every turn.  
  
“I’m sorry,” she whispered as she began to cry along with him. Walking forward, she drop down to her knees and then inched a bit closer toward him before placing her hands on his arms and resting her forehead against his. “I’m sorry.”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Don’t,” he muttered. “Don’t apologize to me.” Slowly lifting his face so that their noses brushed each other, Rick’s wet eyelashes blinked through the tears that still persistently fell. He brought his own hands up between her arms to touch her face; brushing his thumbs along both sides of her jaw. “I’m sorry she’s gone. I’m sorry we lost her.”  
  
Jo’s heart felt like it was being twisted around in preparation to be yanked out of her chest and crushed altogether. “I don’t want to go to the cemetery,” she blurted as a salty tear rolled over her top lip and slipped into her mouth. “I can’t wander around looking for her grave. I can’t do it. I don’t want to see it.”  
  
Rick attempted to steady his breathing, licking his own lips free of the salty tears that were drying there. The occasional tear was still falling, but he seemed to be settling down a bit now. “We have to,” he insisted. “We’ll regret it if we don’t.” Holding more firmly onto the sides of her face, he nuzzled her nose and placed a gentle kiss upon her lips, before speaking against them, “We need to say goodbye.”  
  
When he leaned back from her face, Rick watched as she drew her eyes up from staring at his lips to looking in his eyes. She took a moment or two to consider what he said and, begrudgingly, she nodded. She didn’t say anything further about it all. Instead, she merely inched her body closer to his and moved her hands onto his shoulders as she clambered to sit in his lap, facing him.  
  
Rick wasted not a second in welcoming her into his arms, which he wrapped tightly around her back. She straddled his lap as she sat there; their chests pressed together and her head resting on his shoulder.  
  
“We’ll need to get moving soon,” he muttered quietly.  
  
“I know,” she acknowledged. “But first, just this.”  
  
They let their tears slowly dry up, their heartbeats mellowed, and they sat there together, not budging from their embrace.

 

* * *

  
  
Both the passenger van and the RV were packed and loaded up within the hour, the entire group working in tandem and quickly at that. With the extra room the RV provided, it meant extra room for both people and supplies to spread out for travel without feeling cramped up. And, having two vehicles instead of three, it would keep them all closer together.  
  
The sonogram machine Tyreese had mentioned had been lifted into the RV and placed into the back bedroom where Nicole had fashioned as a hospital room of sorts in case they had to live strictly out of the mobile home for a while until they found something more permanent miles beyond the nation’s capital. Canned goods and water where shoved into the kitchenette cupboards and the non-working refrigerator, toiletries into the cabinet under the bathroom sink, and clothes left in duffel bags scattered between both vehicles. Any other incidentals everyone either kept on them or near them as they began figuring out who would be traveling in which vehicle.  
  
Daryl offered up driving the van and his brother took shotgun. Despite being a hard-ass who often gave off an air of not giving a shit about anyone but himself, over time it became clear it was merely a tried and true defense mechanism and that Merle actually did give a shit about the others. In his time with them since leaving Woodbury and joining them at the prison, the group had grown to feel like the family he and Daryl had never gotten to have with each other and their parents when they’d been growing up. Merle didn’t say anything about it, but he had been worried about his brother when he didn’t arrive back to the townhouse the same day his group had. He had been tempted to go off into the city and find him, and had even packed a new bag to do so, but then decided against it at the last minute when he heard Daryl’s voice in his head, telling him, “I’m fine. Stay and keep the others safe.”  
  
But now his brother was back and he was gonna stay by him, because he never knew if that next time they parted ways for another run might be the last time he saw him.  
  
After all, family was everything; especially nowadays.  
  
Tyreese got behind the wheel of the RV and Karen rode shotgun; never far from him, the same as Rick and Jo were when they traveled. Because of the tense air still between them, Morgan chose to travel in the passenger van with the Dixons while Rick chose to be in the RV with Jo and the girls. Their family crowded around the dinette table while Tara and Nicole sank down onto the small couch situated immediately between both the dinette and Tyreese’s driver’s seat. Finn and Jen also opted for being inside the RV, but headed back to the bedroom, while Michonne decided to keep Morgan company in the van to balance out the numbers.  
  
With more than enough fuel in both vehicles, everyone seemed to peer out the windows at the same time as Tyreese made the laborious task of maneuvering the beast of a mobile home backward down the narrow road, which seemed to curve quite a lot. Driving it up into the cul-de-sac of townhomes had been one thing, but driving it back out was an entirely different thing. Eventually, Tyreese was given the option of backing out onto one section of an intersecting street and then turned left so he could finally continue forward going straight. It cut into their travel time by only twenty minutes, and Daryl was stuck at a snail crawl waiting for them to get moving before he could follow behind with the van. By then they were all able to drive on at a normal pace.  
  
With a map spread out over her lap in the passenger seat, Karen dictated to Tyreese where to go so they could reach Arlington Cemetery. As she told to turn here and merge there, Rick had slipped his arm around Jo’s shoulder and pulled her close. They saw quietly as Sophia and Mika began to play a simple card game of Go Fish with each other. Aside from their young voices, and Karen and Tyreese talking back and forth to each other about directions, the drive was relatively quiet.  
  
As the RV and the van passed under the Arlington Memorial Bridge, the memory of tossing Milo off of it came back. It also made Rick and Jo’s heartbeats begin to pound with the realization that they were so much nearer to the cemetery. And, after the RV led the way in veering right onto and off-ramp, the road looped around and came upon Memorial Avenue. The only two options to go was either right, which led across the Arlington Memorial Bridge and back into DC, which wasn’t an option at all, or left, which led directly toward the cemetery, which was the goal. Tyreese turned the wheel left and Daryl mimicked the move behind him.  
  
Given just how large the cemetery was, to say it would be a guessing game to figure out where Shane would’ve buried Hope was an understatement.  
  
Driving all the way down to the end of the road and then turning around to face the vehicle toward the direction of DC, Tyreese then backed the RV up onto one of the other, narrower roads. He looked over his shoulder toward where Rick was as he turned off the ignition.  
  
“I figured I’d park here, behind some tree cover. If any of those people y’all dealt with drove up across that bridge out of the city, they shouldn’t be able to see us.”  
  
“Good thinking,” Rick replied, tapping Jo’s shoulder so that she would slide out of the booth so they could both stand up.  
  
When she acquiesced to his silent request, they both moved to secure their weapons, or at least retrieve the ones they weren’t presently carrying on their person; namely Jo’s sword and scabbard, and Rick’s machete; both of which were being stored in a small coat closet near the bathroom. Once strapped with blade and gun alike, and packing extra ammunition to be safe, Rick made his way for the door first, with Jo directly behind him.  
  
The others in the RV began to move around as well with the goal of joining the couple, but Rick turned and held up a hand to stop them.  
  
“No, stay here with the girls,” he advised. He gestured between Jo and himself. “We need to do this alone.”  
  
“It’s not safe wandering around this place alone, just the two of you,” Tyreese pressed.  
  
“We’ll be alright.”  
  
“I want to say goodbye to Hope, too,” Sophia spoke. “I helped take care of her at the prison. She was a little sister to me.”  
  
Jo nodded and reached a hand out to the teen. “Okay.”  
  
“Can I come, too, then?” Mika asked hopefully.  
  
“No, stay here where it’s safer,” Rick insisted. “We’re not excluding you on purpose, honey, but Sophia’s older and can defend herself, and she needs to say goodbye as much as we do.”  
  
“Okay,” Mika pouted, slinking back within the depths of the RV.  
  
Daryl sauntered over with his crossbow slung over his shoulder, having parked the van across the end of Memorial Avenue from the RV. “Which direction y’all gonna head in?”  
  
“We haven’t decided that yet?” Rick replied, turning to greet the archer. “S’pose it really wouldn’t make a difference; the size of this place and all.”  
  
“Hey, I’m coming with you.”  
  
Everyone turned to see Finn pushing by Tyreese as he stepped down out of the mobile home with a gun strapped to his hip and his axe in hand.  
  
“Finn—” Rick began.  
  
“She was your daughter. I get that. And you,” Finn looked at Sophia, “were basically her sister. I get that, too.” He turned his eyes over to his own sister then. “But she was my flesh and blood, too, Jo. She was my niece, and I never got to meet her. So I want to at least say goodbye to her if I can’t say hello.”  
  
“I suppose that’s fair,” Jo agreed. “After all, you didn’t get to say goodbye to our mother, either. It’d be selfish of me not let you come.”  
  
Finn shrugged and threw an arm around Jo to give her a brief side hug. “You have every right to be selfish. Like I said, she was your daughter. That kind of trumps any of us. I mean, you and Rick go on a head. Sophia and I will keep our distance and give you a bit of space.”  
  
“Yeah,” Sophia concurred.  
  
Tyreese unhooked the gun holstered at his side and passed it to Sophia. “You’ll need this.”  
  
Sophia lifted her shirt slightly and turned to reveal she already had a gun tucked into her pants. “I’m already carrying.”  
  
Smirking, Tyreese nodded and returned his gun to his side. “Well, alright then.” With a look over at Rick and Jo, he gave them a knowing look. “You be careful out there. Holler if you need us.”  
  
Rick nodded back, turning to look across the road at the van where Merle was still sitting inside with Morgan, but Michonne had stepped out to stand beside it like some sort of sentinel. Tyreese exited the RV, and was followed a moment later by Tara; the both of them automatically assuming the same role as Michonne while everyone else not going on the grave hunt retreated inside the RV until the others came back. Daryl, too, remained; heading over toward the van to keep watch.  
  
Slipping his hand in Jo’s, Rick led them back along the road the RV had parked onto, to make their way inside the cemetery. There were sidewalks on either side of the road initially, but they soon disappeared to give way to simply just roads that had been meant not entirely for any vehicle but only foot traffic. They had the option of going left, going straight or going right when the road forked.  
  
“Where do you think Shane might’ve buried her?” Sophia asked from several paces behind.  
  
Rick shrugged. After a moment of considering, he replied with, “Somewhere nice; maybe somewhere near flowers or with a view.”  
  
Jo pointed toward the first lane they were approaching, Weeks Drive. “Up toward the top then?”  
  
“Yeah, I guess.”  
  
The walk was quiet after that, and took less than five minutes as they wove around JFK’s gravesite and past his brother Robert’s gravesite to ascend the grassy hill. Because of the terrain throughout the cemetery, there weren’t many walkers around at the higher points. Up until now, the foursome had yet to take out any of the undead and it didn’t seem as if it would be an issue for them anytime soon; something they were grateful for.  
  
Scaling the remaining hill to the highest point in the cemetery, Arlington House, which was the Robert E. Lee Memorial, the foursome stood and looked around. The first thing they noticed was the view and how absolutely breathtaking it was. They could see for miles in the direction of DC. They could see the tops of the Capitol Building and most of the Washington Memorial, as well as the Lincoln Memorial, obviously.  
  
What they didn’t see was any fresh grave fitting of a child.  
  
Jo sighed and inaudible sigh of relief at having to witness any grave at all be delayed.  
  
“Nothing here,” Finn stated the obvious. “Sarge said he saw the grave and your friend Shane kneeling over it, right? So, where would Sarge have been to see it? I mean, he didn’t really peg me for the sort that comes for long walks around here.”  
  
“Maybe he was at the bottom where we came in,” Sophia suggested.  
  
“But why was he here at all? What would’ve brought him here that he would’ve seen anything?”  
  
“Maybe he has someone buried here he came to visit,” Rick shrugged, stepping across toward a stone walkway. “I don’t know.”  
  
“Maybe they bury their own here when they die,” Jo offered her own two cents. “The Marauders, I mean. A lot of them seemed to be ex-military. Sarge admitted he was. It makes sense this is where they would want their people. This place is for soldiers, former presidents and the like.”  
  
“By that logic, then, he could’ve been anywhere,” Finn remarked.  
  
Jo shook her head. “Not necessarily. We just stop looking for one small grave and keep a look out for several adult-sized ones and we’re bound to find Hope’s nearby. After all, in how hot it gets here during the summer, who would want to carry a body all the way up here when there’s plenty of space down there?” She gestured toward the base of the cemetery, near to where they’d entered.  
  
Turning his body more toward Jo, Rick held his hand out to her. When she realized what he was doing, she slipped her hand into his; entangling their fingers together. Rick led them in the descent down the stone walkway, occasionally finding shade from the different varieties of trees along the way. As they neared the bottom, they paused briefly to note the tomb of a Lincoln relative to their right.  
  
Despite their reasoning for being there, as it was with most—if not all—cemeteries, it was almost overwhelmingly quiet and peaceful. It even smelled amazing from the scent of magnolias in the air. If they wanted to, they could easily forget the dead roamed the earth.  
  
At the base of the stone walkway, they looked to their right and found the van parked. Michonne, noticing movement, spun around with her katana quickly unsheathed until she realized it was just them.  
  
“Any luck?” she called out.  
  
Noticing a few dead walkers along the side of the van that hadn’t been their earlier, the foursome could easily surmise Michonne had kept busy.  
  
“I’d hardly call it luck,” Finn mumbled under his breath.  
  
“Nothing yet,” Rick replied, letting his voice carry over to her.  
  
As he spoke, Sophia had been wandering forward slightly to the stone walkway that continued on the other side of the lane. When she didn’t stop, Jo took notice, and then Finn, as they watched her go but didn’t follow immediately after her.  
  
“I think I see something,” she muttered over her shoulder.  
  
The three adults focused on the where the teenager was looking and began trail slowly behind her. Jo and Rick, specifically, seemed to both feel their hearts leaping into their throats at what they suspected they would find when Sophia stopped.  
  
The walkway curved and sloped downward; but thankfully the walkway was constructed like steps so there was no need to worry about slipping.  
  
About one hundred and fifty feet down the walkway from the top of the lane, and situated to the left, were approximately twenty to twenty-five adult-sized graves that were of different stages of burial. The soil over several of the graves had settled considerably and seemed to have already budded with new grass. The most recent grave looked to be only a week old, which fit in with the timeline of when Sarge would’ve been there. All had grave markers made of wooden planks stuck into the grown with names carved into them.  
  
But then there was one grave, upwards of another eighty feet further and on the right, at the base of a tall tree. It was unequivocally different that the others. It was a third of the size, for starters. There was no marker either.  
  
Feeling as if she was about to have some sort of anxiety attack, Jo practically flew down the walkway and dropped to the base of the small grave when she reached it. With shaky hands, she leaned forward and touched the disturbed soil as if she was touching the dead body buried beneath it. After a few generous heaves, sobs took over, followed by the springing forth of new tears. She was so engrossed in finding the grave and losing herself in her grief once again, that she didn’t even notice the dead body lying a mere five or so feet away amidst the small, white headstones belonging to dead soldiers.  
  
Sophia and Finn hung back, as promised, while Rick staggered forward. He was not as oblivious to the corpse as his wife but, judging by how there was barely anything left of it, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that it posed no threat to them. Instead, Rick came up beside Jo; placing a hand upon her shoulder as she cried her heart out. Slowly, he joined her on his knees and curled an arm around her waist as he pulled her closely against his side. His own tears began to flow and it boggled his mind to think their daughter was buried only a foot or two below the surface. There was no shovel anywhere around the area, so either Shane dug it with his hands or Sarge took it after he watched Shane kill himself over Hope’s grave.  
  
And speaking of Shane, Rick forced himself to look away from the grave and over to the remains to their left. It reminded him of bodies he’d found when they’d took the prison and made their first treks throughout the corridors; discovering rotted remains of inmates that had been picked nearly down to the bone by the carnivorous walkers who had also once been inmates or even guards. Pulling himself up to his feet, Rick wiped his tears away with the back of his hand and stepped closer to what was left of the corpse. The clothing had been ripped at and was covered in so much dried blood and dirt that it was hard to determine the original color of the material. The skull had been picked more or less clean, leaving absolutely no way to see any facial features. The only thing the seemed to remain more or less intact was the left hand, but even then two of the fingers had been bitten off. The midsection was gone, a leg was several feet further away around the tree.  
  
What was saddest was not even that the body had just been left there, but the dried blood splatter that was painted onto the white headstones, coinciding with Sarge telling them the man he’d seen had shot himself in the head.  
  
Rick looked around at the ground and found no gun; something else Sarge had likely taken.  
  
“Do we have a shovel in the RV or the van?” Rick asked, turning a moment later to look back at Finn.  
  
The younger man fumbled over himself to respond; having not expected to be spoken to about anything, but he understood why Rick was asking. “Uh…I’m not sure. I’ll, uh, go check.” Placing a hand on Sophia’s shoulder, he turned and hurried back up toward the lane.  
  
As Finn disappeared from view for the time being, Sophia stepped forward and crouched down to occupy the space beside Jo that Rick had moved from. Leaning over, she wrapped her arms around Jo’s neck and began to join her in crying.  
  
“We can’t leave him like this,” Rick muttered.  
  
Finally, Jo managed to focus on something other than Hope’s grave and cast her eyes over to the rotting remains at Rick’s feet. “Oh my god,” she whimpered. “He took care of our girl. He got her out of the prison and made it this long on his own with her. I wish I could thank him.”  
  
Sucking in a sob and forcing it back down his throat, Rick looked away and nodded. “He knows.”  
  
“Do you think he got bit trying to save her and that’s why he shot himself?” Sophia wondered quietly. “And when she died, he buried her before he turned, and then took his life so he _wouldn’t_ turn?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “Maybe.”  
  
“This is like reading the last chapter to the worst book ever,” Jo mumbled. Leaning forward, she lay down beside the grave and placed her right hand over the center of the small mound. “Mama loves you, Hope. Daddy does, too; and Sophia, and all your friends who loved you, too.” Digging her fingers slightly into the soil, she barely felt Rick as he moved and crouched down behind her and placed a hand on her hip. “We’ll meet again someday.”  
  
“Maybe her soul will be reincarnated into the new baby so that she’ll still be with you,” Sophia suggested sweetly.  
  
Rick smiled sadly. “That’s a nice thought. She’ll be with us no matter what, though,” he remarked. “You can’t lose something that’s always in your heart."  
  
Sophia nodded in agreement; thinking of her mother, Carol, who might never have a grave of her own and was probably nothing more than a lump of body parts now like Shane, but she was alive and well in Sophia’s mind and heart at all times. Sometimes, the teen swore she heard her mother’s voice in her head, and it was usually when she needed to hear it most. What made her saddest, was not that her mother was dead; it was the thought of forgetting what her mother’s voice sounded like as time went on, or worse—forgetting what she looked like.  
  
A minute or two later, Finn appeared with Daryl in tow; the latter insisting on coming to help with Shane’s body. Finn had found a shovel. Tyreese had apparently taken it two from the garage of the main townhouse before they’d all packed up and left.  
  
Rick nodded a silent thanks to his brother-in-law and his brother-by-choice. “Next to Hope. That’s where he should be,” he spoke, pointing to the empty space next to Hope’s grave. He then gave Jo’s shoulder a squeeze to urge her to sit up and step back so Finn and Daryl could get to work at digging. “C’mon,” he whispered to her as she began to stand up.  
  
The two of them stepped away and, as disrespectful as it may have been, they each sat down on a small, white headstone as they watched the two men work. Sophia, on the other hand, wandered over to a sapling that had been planted before the fall and began to pull out two of the stakes that had been forcing the young tree to grow straight instead of leaning any which way. The couple watched as their surrogate daughter stepped back over toward Hope’s grave, careful not to interfere with Daryl and Finn, and mindful of where her feet went so she didn’t step on Hope’s grave. At the top of it, she positioned the first of the two stakes and slowly pushed it into the soil; far down enough that it wouldn’t fall over any time soon.  
  
Turning toward Rick and Jo, she smiled. “They should have markers. Everyone else has one.”  
  
Rick and Jo smiled back, appreciatively, but said nothing.  
  
They wouldn’t have been able to figure out what to say even if they tried.  
  
The tears were already descending yet again, but this time that’s all it was.  
  
Tears.  
  
They didn’t sob or ugly cry. It was a strong possibility that might happen again soon, and would continue off and on for some time, but at the moment, their bodies couldn’t put forth any more energy aside from the tears that fell and the occasional bout of sniffles.  
  
They had enough to deal with from the aches in their hearts.

 

* * *

  
  
Shane had been buried beside Hope shortly after. Daryl and Finn had carried what was left of his remains into the grave they’d dug without any commentary as to how gross it all was or how bad it smelled. Any of that they kept to themselves. Daryl and Finn had also went back to the vehicles, with Sophia trailing after them, to give Rick and Jo some alone time at the graves to pay their respects and say their final goodbyes.  
  
They only took a few moments to do so; both too emotionally drained to linger and it just hurt the longer they stood there.  
  
When they had ascended the stone walkway and made their way past the van, Michonne stopped Jo to give her a sympathetic hug and a gentle touch to Rick’s shoulder before the pair continued to walk across to the RV. Daryl was standing there with Finn, wiping his hands on his red handkerchief, as Tyreese came out of the RV with the map of greater DC area. He flipped it over, revealing the entire state of Virginia mapped out on the other side.  
  
“We’re wondering where we go next from here,” Tyreese remarked as Rick and Jo approached. “With the van and the RV, we can all easily just sleep inside both vehicles for the night without worrying about figuring out someplace to clear for the night. I was thinking we could easily backtrack along the roads we took when we came here, since we already know what areas are clear, without roadblocks. But, beyond that, we’re not sure where you had in mind for us to go.” He looked up from the map and over at Rick. “Any suggestions?”  
  
“There’s always going back to Georgia,” Jo muttered, looking somewhat dazed even though she was still listening to the conversation.  
  
“That would mean passing through the border of Virginia and North Carolina, which is around where we had that run-in with those Wolves,” Finn muttered. “We don’t know how many of them there are or how spread out they are and you already dealt with them once, and once was enough, if you ask me.”  
  
Jo lifted her gaze and focused on her brother. “And neither of those Wolves survived to tell the tale, if you remember,” she commented; a hint of bitterness from the memory plaguing her voice.  
  
“Maybe, but that was two. What if there’s two _hundred_?”  
  
“What if we went north?” Tyreese suggested. “Like, into Pennsylvania, or further west, past the Virginias to Ohio.”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Winter’s a few months away. The further north we go, the more brutal the winter.”  
  
“We could just stay in Virginia.” They each turned their heads toward the doorway to the RV to find Jen standing there. With a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, having possibly been napping in the back bedroom judging by her slightly disheveled blonde hair, she stepped down and joined the others. “When I was in middle school, we took a school trip to DC and surrounding areas. One day we went to Mount Vernon.”  
  
“George Washington’s home?” Finn questioned.  
  
Jen nodded. “That place is stuck in the 18 th century, which is what the outbreak basically sent us back to. It’s equipped for life during simpler times; living off the land, before modern technology took over. There are plenty of bedrooms for all of us, there are gardens for growing food, stables for raising livestock, a cellar for storing food, a cupola for keeping an eye out of any danger approaching the property, and being right on the river means we’d have fresh fish and water we could boil the salt out of for drinking, or to use for cleaning and cooking with.” She focused primarily on Rick, as he _was_ their de facto leader. “I mean, we could be set for life there.”  
  
Rick shook his head and scoffed. “And you don’t think anyone else would’ve thought of that? There’s probably a group of people squatting there already. Maybe they’re worse than the Wolves or the Marauders.”  
  
“And maybe it’s empty.”  
  
“I doubt it.”  
  
“Well, it’s worth a look,” Daryl shrugged, as Rick stared at him as if asking, ‘Et tu Brutus?’ “Listen, it’s not like we have any definite plans anyway, so why not give it a shot and check it out? It could have people already there, sure. But maybe those people are good people. Maybe we could join them. Or maybe it’s empty and we take it for ourselves.”  
  
“And if it’s not empty and it’s been taken by people who aren’t so friendly?”  
  
“Then we get out of there and find someplace else, but at least it’s a start.”  
  
“We can’t be wandering around forever,” Jo remarked. “We need to find something to settle into soon if we want to be able to plant and see any food grow before winter comes. We can’t be wandering aimlessly then. We’ll freeze to death, if we don’t starve.”  
  
With a sigh, Rick didn’t feel like arguing his doubts with Jo. Not now. Not after where they’d just been; at their daughter’s grave and watching the remains of the friend get buried beside her. And he just felt like they’d argued enough for a while.  
  
It was incredibly rate that they _did_ argue, and Rick didn’t like it at all.  
  
“Alright,” he caved after a few moments of consideration. “Alright, we’ll check out Mount Vernon.”  
  
Jen smirked victoriously that her suggestion had been chosen. “Awesome.”  
  
As she ducked back into the RV, everyone began to separate. Those traveling in the RV followed momentarily after Jen, while Daryl walked back across toward the van and let Michonne, Morgan and his brother know what the plan of attack was.  
  
Since they had the map, Tyreese would once again lead the way and Daryl would follow in the van behind them. Inside the RV, however, Rick had asked Karen if she wouldn’t mind him taking shotgun; feeling more at ease over being able to see where they were going and getting a better view of what they’d come upon whenever they managed to reach Mount Vernon.  
  
When he turned around in the passenger seat after Tyreese had returned to sitting behind the wheel, Rick looked upon the rest of his people inside the vehicle. Finn and Jen were now curled up together on the small couch, while Nicole and Tara were playing some sort of card game at the dinette table with Sophia and Mika. Only Jo was unaccounted for, but the slight sliver of movement he’d glimpsed behind the half-closed, pleated folding door to the back bedroom let him deduce that was where she’d went.  
  
“Give me a minute before we head out,” Rick said to Tyreese.  
  
The larger man nodded, and took the map from Rick to study it a bit while Rick stood up and sauntered toward the back of the RV and politely rapped on the flimsy partition.  
  
“Jo,” he spoke before pushing the door aside to step into the room and then sliding it closed behind him.  
  
He hadn’t yet been in the back bedroom yet, but found that it had a single, full-sized bed instead of two twins. The sonogram machine was pushed into a corner to the left of the folding door and a few duffel bags filled with either medical equipment, medicine and clothing were stacked on either side of the bed; leaving very little room to walk around it. Jo was seated on the right side of the bed, staring toward the blinds covering the window as she turned her face up toward Rick with the most forlorn expression he could remember her ever having.  
  
Without saying anything, he sat down beside her. Sliding his left hand over onto her leg, he grabbed for her right hand and then brought it up to his lips so he could kiss the inside of her palm.  
  
Smiling appreciatively, Jo leaned her head and rested it upon his shoulder. “It’s been a day,” she muttered.  
  
“Yeah,” he agreed.  
  
“I can’t wait for it to end.”  
  
“A few more hours. When it gets too dark, we’ll pull over somewhere and call it a night.”  
  
“Should we give ourselves time to clear out someplace to stay?”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Nah, we can all manage in here or in the van,” he replied. “Both the couch and the table fold down into beds. Tyreese and Karen, and Jen and your brother can claim one of those. Tara and Nicole can manage on the floor. We have plenty of blankets to make it comfortable enough. You and I will take this bed and we’ll clear out the sides of these duffel bags and the girls can sleep there, near us.”  
  
“Sounds good.” She nodded, visualizing how everyone would be able to neatly fit inside the RV to sleep that was already in the RV. She wasn’t too worried about the foursome in the van. The Dixons were used to roughing it. She wouldn’t put it past either of them to sleep on top of the van or in a patch of grass somewhere to allow Morgan and Michonne to spread out more comfortably. “Where do we put all these bags?” she asked, looking at the duffel bags against the wall.  
  
“We’ll shove ‘em in the shower stall. I don’t see us using that anytime soon.”  
  
“We could _use_ a shower, though.” Jo made a sour face. “We reek from that walker blood we wiped on ourselves this morning.”  
  
“I think I’m so used to it now, because I barely smell it anymore.” Leaning forward, he unzipped one of the bags that looked lumpy from clothing. Rifling around for a few moments, he pulled out two shirts; both men’s T-shirts, and handed one to Jo while keeping the other. “There. This should help for now. Don’t need you throwing up any more than you normally do.”  
  
“Thanks.” Accepting the T-shirt, a black one, she set it down, but only so that she could remove the soiled shirt she was wearing. “I’m just gonna toss this. It’s beyond saving.”  
  
Rick mirrored her; lifting his soiled T-shirt over his head and balling it up. As they sat there topless, except that Jo still had a bra on, he leaned down and pressed his lips to her bare shoulder. There was no ulterior motive behind the gesture. He just wanted to show her affection before they went forth with putting on their clean shirts. Turning to face her afterward, Rick gathered up both their soiled shirts in his hands and kissed her once more; this time, properly, on the lips.  
  
“I’m gonna head back up front to ride shotgun with Tyreese,” he informed. “I want to follow where we’re going on the map.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Okay.”  
  
“Why don’t you lie down and get some rest? Or try to.” Brushing a strand of hair behind her ear, Rick licked his bottom lip and exhaled a deep breath. “If you need me, shout. I’ll hear you.”  
  
“Or come wake me if there’s trouble.”  
  
Standing up, Rick snickered. “When _isn’t_ there trouble?”  
  
“Good point.”  
  
As he hovered at the folding door, he looked back at her once more. “I love you, Joanna Grimes.”  
  
Slowly, she began to smile more genuinely. She didn’t look back at him; instead she looked straight ahead at the window blinds again, but she was acknowledging his presence by the simple upturned corners of her mouth. “I love you, too, Richard Grimes.”  
  
With a nod, Rick slid the folding door open and stepped out of the bedroom. When he closed it behind him again, he wandered back up toward the front and reclaimed his seat beside Tyreese once more. Taking the map back, he spread it out on the dashboard while Tyreese started the RV up. As soon as there was power surging throughout the vehicle, Rick lowered the passenger window and tossed his and Jo’s soiled shirts out of it and then resumed map duty.  
  
Tyreese was smiling with amusement at him when the two of them looked at each other. “Ready to roll out?”  
  
“I am,” Rick confirmed.  
  
“Alright.”  
  
As the RV lurched forward, turning left back onto Memorial Avenue, dead ahead was a clear view of Lincoln Memorial and DC beyond it. And, although their route forced them to drive all the way down the road, just before the entrance to the bridge, they were able to loop around thanks to an off ramp that led them south along George Washington Memorial Parkway.  
  
On their left was a perfect view of the river, and the further away from city they got, the lighter Rick was beginning to feel.  
  
As heartbroken as he was, and would still remain for some time, the simple act of leaving the place where their nightmares had been confirmed was rather therapeutic; like releasing a helium-filled balloon into the air. You knew it would eventually come back down, somewhere, but, for the moment, it was going away.  
  
“Goodbye yellow brick road, where the dogs of society howl,” Tyreese began to sing quietly to himself. “You can’t plant me in your penthouse, I’m going back to my plough…”  
  
While the general mood inside the RV seemed to pick up, Jo had remained lost in her thoughts. Leaning forward, she had pulled the drawstring to lift the blinds so that she could see out the window as the scenery began to fly by. She could hear Tyreese singing, and she could hear the girls beginning to giggle over whatever card game Tara was now teaching them, but none of them gentle, lighthearted tones seemed to allow her to feel any of that.  
  
Slumping over onto her side and letting her head hit the pillow, Jo lifted her legs onto the bed and then placed her hands over her stomach. As fresh tears began to yet again form at her eyes, she rolled onto her back and glimpsed the blue sky outside the window.  
  
“Goodbye,” she whispered.


	50. Influx

_“We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience.”_ — George Washington

* * *

 

Both vehicles had soon veered off from George Washington Memorial Parkway for a number of reasons. While the scenery was nicer, what with the view of the river beside them, it was a more dangerous route. For one, it was closer to the river and anyone on the other side, in DC, could possibly see them driving by and maybe decide to follow after. Secondly, they were headed straight toward the airport and there was doubt in their minds that that would be a complete clusterfuck of walkers and abandoned cars jamming the road. Third, they were more familiar with the route on which they had originally traveled toward DC.  
  
They traveled at a slower pace because, even though they were relatively familiar with the road they were on, they had still only traveled just the one time almost a week ago and it was already getting late. The day had been physically and emotionally draining and it didn’t take long for them to decide to simply pull over onto the side of the road and call it a night. Judging by the last sign they’d passed, according to the map, they would probably be able to make it to Mount Vernon within a half hour once they woke up the next day and got moving. That, of course, would be if there were no further obstructions, because they would have to deviate from the main route soon enough to reach their destination.  
  
Tyreese had pumped the RV’s breaks to signal to Daryl in the van behind them that they would be coming to a stop. When they did, Rick climbed out first and walked over toward the van where he informed Daryl and the others they were gonna stay right there for the night and would head back out as soon as morning broke.  
  
As predicted, the Dixon brothers, Morgan and Michonne all made the best of sleeping in the van while the others inside the RV managed the same. The dinette table was folded down and the cushions rearranged to make a bed, and the couch was pulled out for the same purpose. To be closer to the driver’s seat in case they needed to leave in a hurry, Tyreese claimed the couch-bed for Karen and himself while Finn and Jen settled easily onto the table-bed. Blankets and pillows were spread out on the floor to make it as comfortable as possible for both Nicole and Tara who were stuck down there. As for Rick, he helped Sophia and Mika lay down extra blankets and pillows for them on either side of the back bedroom’s bed where Jo had, unbeknownst to Rick, cried herself to sleep a short while before.  
  
It didn’t take long after his head hit the pillow for Rick to fall asleep as well. He had been so terribly exhausted from the last few days, he felt like he would be able to sleep so hard that not even a bomb going off would wake him.  
  
He did wake up, however, bright and early.  
  
Because of the window blinds Jo had left open, there was nothing to keep the sunlight from shining into the back bedroom and practically burning through Rick’s eyelids to his retinas underneath. Grumbling, he rolled onto his right side to face the opposite wall and let his arm drop over the edge of the mattress. When his hand hit something hard, yet soft, he let his fingers feel around for what it was he was touching until a hand swatted his away and a voice whined at him.  
  
“Unnh, stop it.”  
  
Popping one eye open, Rick shifted over to the edge of the bed and looked down to find he had apparently been poking Mika’s face. “Sorry,” he mumbled, pulling his hand up and shoving it under his chest.  
  
Muttering something underneath her breath, Mika rolled over, turned her back to him and seemed to easily fall back to sleep. Closing his eyes, finding his own way back into the land of slumber was Rick’s goal. However, the more he focused on trying to fall asleep, the more it kept him awake. His mind began to race with remembering where they all were and what the day would entail, and then the remembering they’d found Hope’s grave and had buried Shane’s remains only the day before began to haunt him. All of that on top of the fact that there was a considerable chill in the air and no amount of curling up underneath the blanket with Jo beside him seemed to warm him up.  
  
With a frustrated sigh, Rick slowly turned over and sat up. Raising a hand to his face, he shielded his eyes from the sunlight coming in through the window so he wouldn’t have to squint. At that angle, it at least allowed him to glimpse the time on his watch without having to move his hand from the shade it provided his face. It was about 7:10 in the morning and he found he was actually okay with being woken by the sun. As much as he wouldn’t have minded sleeping longer, he wasn’t really tired by any means because, doing the math and counting backward, he had gotten about ten hours of sleep. In fact, judging by how quiet the rest of the RV was, everyone else was getting some proper rest, as well.  
  
Doing his best not to wake Jo up as he shimmied down the mattress and stood up, Rick stretched his arms straight up and was easily able to touch his palms against the ceiling. Continuing as quietly as he could, Rick bent forward and reached for his boots which he slid his feet into without teetering and bumping into the wall or worse: falling against the pleated folding door and crashing into the RV’s living space where he might land on either Tara or Nicole. Not only would he end up hurting one or both of them, he’d never live it down, and Tara already witnessed a klutz move of his once before when he’d taken her with him to find fuel for their broken down bus a couple weeks ago. He didn’t want her to have something else she could use to blackmail him with later.  
  
Pushing the pleated door open, gently and quietly, he stepped out of the bedroom and turned to his left where he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the mirror above the sink which sat across from the tiny bathroom; neither of which worked. Shivering slightly, he wondered where his coat was stored and instead just grabbed the last blanket that no one had claimed, that was folded neatly upon of the non-working stovetop. Unfolding it, he threw it over his back and wrapped it around his shoulders as he tiptoed forward, careful not to step on Nicole and Tara as they continued to sleep.  
  
Jen was curled into Finn and, for a moment, Rick’s breath hitched when he thought she was dead, but then he remembered it was just how she looked these days. He was certain that she’d gotten some sort of infection her body had been having trouble fighting off ever since Jo had cut her hand off to save her life. While the infection that turned the living into the undead had been thwarted for Jen, at least at this point in her life, he had a feeling she was dealing with some form of sepsis or gangrene. For her sake, and Finn’s state of mind, Rick hoped whatever medication Nicole now had could help treat whatever was ailing Jen.  
  
Taking one of the water bottles sitting in the defunct sink and wrapping himself tighter with the blanket, Rick crept with little sound as he unlocked the RV door and made his way out. There was no avoiding sound when they happened but he really did try to put an effort _not_ doing it.  
  
Outside the air was brisk. A breeze had picked up and was carried the smell of fall in the air. Overall, it was a complete change from the last couple of days of heat. Granted, even though it had been hot during the days, the nights were considerably cooler, but this day felt like someone had just flipped a switch. It felt like summer had been sent packing with its tail between its legs as autumn arrived, throwing its weight around to show who was boss now.  
  
Removing the cap from the water bottle, Rick took a hearty swig to soothe his mouth and throat which were dry from sleep. He realized, as he stepped around the front of the RV, that he hadn’t grabbed up a single weapon to protect himself with should a threat present itself, but a simple look around showed he would be fine as he was for a little bit. There were no walkers he could see at the moment, even if there were plenty of places for them to be hiding docilely, lying in wait for something or someone to make enough noise to rile them up. Rick faced the opposite side of the road, at a small, business complex of sorts. Housed within it were a few tiny shops, all since abandoned. From left to right, there was an salon, some sort of gift shop that featured metal wall art, an audio and electronics store, an upholstery shop whose sign was missing chunks out of it on the sides, the same as the sign for the Chinese take-out next door, and then, at the very end, a tailor. Beside that building of shops there was a gas station on the corner and, as pointless as it may be, as it usually was, Rick wondered if there was any spare gas around there. The RV still had plenty, same as the van, and they still hadn’t needed to use the back-up canisters they filled up after dealing with those two Marauders, but it never hurt to have more; especially if they found a generator. That would require gas to run.  
  
Taking another swig of water, Rick looked up the road a bit. There was a small, two-story, L-shaped apartment building. All the windows to the ground floor apartments were boarded up with plywood, two of the doors had some sort of white sign stuck to them, and there was a couch blocking one of the other doors. From the distance he was at, Rick could tell what those signs said, but the spray-painted messages over the boarded up windows was clear as day.

  
**ALL DEAD INSIDE**

 

Rick seemed unfazed by it, as he was by most things these days.

Stepping around to the driver’s side of the RV, he inspected it to make sure everything was okay, before doing the same as he rounded to the back. Turning, he looked over at the van and saw Merle out cold in the passenger seat. Morgan and Michonne couldn’t be seen, but that was likely due to them lying down in the van’s back rows. Daryl, who had been driving, was the only one he couldn’t pinpoint.

“You’re up early.”  
  
Speak of the devil.  
  
Rick turned toward the wooded area on their side of the road and saw Daryl sauntering over with his crossbow slung over his right shoulder and two, dead squirrels hooked to the game strap on his hip.  
  
“Not surprised that you’re the first one awake, though,” Daryl continued. “You always have been.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Force of habit, I guess.” Holding the water bottle out to his friend, he offered it to him. “Want some?”  
  
“Nah, I’m good.” Daryl shook his head and began to pull out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.  
  
“I would’ve thought you were out by now.”  
  
“I was,” Daryl mumbled with a cigarette pressed between his lips before he managed to light it. “I got a pack off a guy in the woods.”  
  
Rick smirked. “That was kind of him.”  
  
Chuckling as he took his first drag, Daryl blew a billow of smoke out and mirrored Rick’s smirk. “Not like he had the choice, being a corpse an’ all.”  
  
“Well, if he knew he was dying, he could’ve smoked them all before he took his last breath. Maybe on some level he knew someone would find his body and his cigarettes.”  
  
Daryl nodded and held the pack out to Rick. “Want one?”  
  
“I shouldn’t.”  
  
“That ain’t a no,” Daryl sniffed.  
  
Hesitating, Rick looked at the pack in front of him and sighed. “Okay, just one.”  
  
Turning, he set his water bottle down between his feet and readjusted his hold on the blanket using only his left hand while he slipped out a single cigarette with his right hand. Putting it between his lips, he waited for Daryl to light it for him, and when he did, Rick puffed and inhaled his first drag. He then unceremoniously coughed; not used to the deed. Or, at least, not used to having done it in years.  
  
Daryl chuckled at his expense, but both men fell into a comfortable silence after Rick found his footing, so to speak, with the cigarette. It was like riding a bike, if that bike was a paper stick filled with cancer-causing nicotine.  
  
“How’s Jo?”  
  
Rick expelled a plume of smoke from his lips. Holding the cigarette between his middle and index fingers, he pulled it away as he scratched at the side of his nose with his thumbnail. “Sleeping.”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “No shit. So is everyone else.”  
  
“She’s okay, I think,” Rick shrugged. “We’ve had a month of wandering around, not knowing where Hope is and assuming the worse. I think, to an extent, we were prepared for the worst. We tried not to assume the worst, but it’s hard not to. But no amount of mentally preparing _actually_ prepares you for something like that.”  
  
“I’m really sorry about it. Hope was an awesome baby. I mean, those first couple of months, she had a pair of lungs on her to wake the dead, which isn’t all that hard these days, but she mellowed out. She was a great baby. Rarely cried or whined. It was like she just knew how the world was, and how it was better to keep quiet.” Daryl looked at Rick’s profile. He watched the way, when Rick wasn’t taking a drag, how he was chewing the inside of his lip instead to keep his focus off crying again. “Sorry…”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Don’t be.”  
  
Hating the awkwardness, Daryl changed the subject. “So, how do you think Mount Vernon will be? Lost cause?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “Fuck if I know,” he muttered, taking another drag. “If this kind of weather keeps up, we’ll need to find someplace secure sooner rather than later.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“I think I misjudged the time of year. I was thinking maybe we were in September, but I think we’re in mid or late October.” Rick sighed. “It’s so hard to tell anymore these days. All the days, and apparently months, blend into one another.”  
  
“Well, we ain’t in Georgia anymore. This is Virginia. It gets colder earlier the further north you go.”  
  
“Yeah, I suppose.”  
  
“Maybe it _is_ only September.”  
  
“Maybe it’s _November_.”  
  
Daryl chuckled. “I should probably get started on my Christmas shopping. It’s a nightmare putting that shit off till the last minute.”  
  
Rick laughed at that, and it felt good to do it.  
  
He tried to remember what Christmas shopping was like. He remembered Lori took care of getting everything for Carl well in advance. She’d have all his gifts put on layaway back during the summer and have it paid off before Halloween. She’d even have gifts for Rick and the rest of their family—and that included Shane—taken care of, too, well before December rolled around. Rick, on the other hand, was one of those clichéd fathers darting around Wal-Mart, a day or two before Christmas, depending on what shift he was working, grabbing anything he thought Carl and Lori might like. Sometimes, because he hadn’t consulted with Lori in advance about what he was getting for their son, Carl would end up getting double of something and Rick would sit there on Christmas morning, feeling like a damned idiot while Lori expertly gave Carl some excuse that he had been such a good boy all year long that Santa wanted to give him something extra. More often than not, though, Rick and Carl ended up donating the duplicate, or _duplicates_ —because sometimes Rick unknowingly went that extra mile and bought more than one of the same thing Lori had already got.  
  
It was like another life now.  
  
All that happened a million years ago, and it happened to someone else.  
  
At the sound of the RV door opening and shutting, Rick panicked and tossed his cigarette away like a teenager about to be caught by his teacher behind the school. Blowing out the smoke from within his mouth, he crouched quickly down and picked his water bottle up; taking a swig just in time for Tyreese to round the corner toward the back of the mobile home.  
  
“Hey,” the larger man greeted, adjusting the beanie on his head while simultaneously gripping onto a roll of toilet paper. “I was just gonna go take care of some business. Afterward, I think we should start getting everyone up, have some breakfast and get moving. We should make the most of daylight. The days are—”  
  
“—Getting shorter,” Daryl cut him off. “Yeah, we were just talking about how we think it might be October instead of September.”  
  
“Well, damn, I thought we’d been in August.”  
  
Rick snickered. “Go lay a few bricks. I’ll start rustling up the sleeping beauties.”  
  
“You packing?” Daryl asked. “Don’t wanna be caught by a walker with your pants ‘round the ankles. That’s a surprise you don’t wanna receive.”  
  
“I got my gun.” With an amused smile and a nod of his head, Tyreese patted his sidearm and then turned to make his way over toward the side and disappeared behind the shrubbery.  
  
Daryl began to chuckle. “Lay a few bricks,” he repeated as he took his last drag and flicked the remainder of his cigarette away. “I ain’t ever heard that one before.”  
  
“My dad used to say it,” Rick replied. “Alright, well, I’ll be back out in a little bit to discuss the rest of our route after I get everyone up.”  
  
“Sounds good.”  
  
When Rick stepped back into the RV, he found Karen was already awake, sitting cross-legged on the couch-bed with her hand up under her shirt where she was using some sort of moist toilette to wash her armpits.  
  
“Morning,” she greeted nonchalantly.  
  
“Morning.”  
  
Finn and Jen were stirring already, and Nicole was at the kitchen sink with a water bottle and some sort of pill, making her way over toward Karen when she stopped so she wouldn’t smack right into Rick.  
  
“Oops, sorry,” the nurse muttered with a smile. “Morning, Rick.”  
  
“Morning.” Narrowing his gaze at the pill, he nodded at it. “What’s that?”  
  
“Prenatal vitamin. I found two large bottles for Karen and Jo.”  
  
“That’s awesome. Thanks.”  
  
“Just doing my job,” Nicole quipped. “When Jo wakes, tell her to come take one.”  
  
“I will.” Stepping up beside Tara’s body as she continued to sleep, flat on her back with her mouth wide open, Rick smirked. With the toe of his boot, he gently bumped it against her hip. “Wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey.”  
  
“Bacon?” she mumbled before she properly woke up. Snorting back some morning phlegm, Tara finally opened her eyes and propped herself up on her elbows. “Aww, man, don’t tease me with the thought of bacon like that. That’s just…wrong. _So wrong_.”  
  
“I’ll try not to do it again,” he chuckled as he continued on toward the back of the RV.  
  
Pushing aside the folding door, he was struck by the sight of Mika lying beside Jo, where he had previously been, and how Jo had rolled onto her side to hold the girl to her. Sophia, in typical teenage fashion, was also still very much asleep on the floor next to Jo’s side of the bed. Walking around to where Mika had originally been sleeping, Rick leaned over the girl to touch a hand down upon Jo’s arm.  
  
“Hey,” he whispered. “Babe.”  
  
Jo sniffed as she began to stir. “Hmm.”  
  
“It’s about seven-thirty. We’re all starting to get up now,” he informed in a low voice. “We’re gonna have something to eat and hopefully head on out within the hour.”  
  
“Okay,” she mumbled. Whether or not she actually heard what he’d said was anyone’s guess.  
  
“Jo. D’ya hear me?” he asked, making sure.  
  
“What?” Her green eyes slowly popped open and she looked up at him, squinting at the brightness in the small room as Mika stirred beside her.  
  
“Time to get up and eat so we can head out soon,” he repeated in a more condensed version.  
  
“Oh, okay.” Gingerly sitting up, Jo looked around to remember where she was, and then her face seemed to take on a slight expression of sadness and Rick knew why. She was remembering the day before. “We don’t really have breakfast foods, but canned fruits will probably work best. I’ll get some cans open for the girls.”  
  
“Oh, and Nicole has a prenatal vitamin for you to take.”

"Okay."

Brushing some of her hair off her forehead for her, Rick leaned closer over Mika to Jo and smiled. “Morning, love.”  
  
Jo smiled a small smile. “Mmm. Love you, too.”  
  
Heading back out of the bedroom, Rick began to search for his coat, eventually finding it shoved in one of the duffel bags stuffed with clothes he’d tossed into the shower stall the night before. He also pulled on his utility belt where his Colt was already holstered. While Jo came out of the bedroom and migrated to the cupboards in the kitchen, Rick was trying to remember where he’d left his machete; eventually finding up front alongside the passenger seat. Before long, it seemed everyone was in each other’s way in such a confined space. Karen hadn’t bothered putting the couch-bed back up into just a couch. Instead she was joined by a tired Jen; both women curling up side by side under a blanket to keep warm as the chill in the air was still permeating within the RV as much as it was outside. Tara had also, literally, gotten up and was assisting Finn in putting the table back together, while neither Mika nor Sophia had seemed to stir just yet. But, given all the noise the adults were making already, it was only a matter of time before the pair showed their faces.  
  
And sure enough, not five minutes later, Mika appeared first; rubbing sleep crust out of her eyes. “I gotta pee,” she announced to anyone who would listen.  
  
It was generally a rule of thumb, when they were on the road like this, to go to the bathroom in pairs for safety purposes. While one person went, the other kept point; and then they swapped places. Mika knew she couldn’t just head outside and up into those woods on the side of the road alone. Someone would have to go with her.  
  
Grabbing her gun off the kitchen counter and holstering it into her thigh strap, Tara reached for Mika’s shoulders. “Let me get my boots on and I’ll take ya, okay?”  
  
Mika nodded and then ducked back into the bedroom to find her own shoes as well. When she came back out with her worn sneakers on, she was rubbing her arms. “When did it get so cold?”  
  
Rick, who hadn’t yet put his coat on, handed it to her. “Here. Put this on.”  
  
“It’s too big,” she remarked, taking it anyway.  
  
“It’s just for now. We’ll find warmer clothes for you and Sophia soon enough.”  
  
Slipping the coat on, the girl was practically swimming in it. The sleeves were too long for her hands to reach out the holes and it hung mid-thigh on her. Tara looked her over and laughed before scanning the countertop.  
  
“Where’s the toilet paper?”  
  
“Tyreese has it,” Rick answered.  
  
“Where’s Tyreese?” Finn asked.  
  
“Taking a shit.”  
  
Tara and Mika still headed outside, opting to wait alongside the RV for Tyreese to return and then take the toilet paper for him so they could have their turn in the woods to do what they had to do. Jo was still at the counter, busying herself with opening cans of fruit, of which they had plenty for the time being, and passing them to those up inside the vehicle. When Sophia finally appeared and slipped into one side of the dinette table, propping her head up as she struggled with waking up, Jo slid a can of sliced peaches in front of her.  
  
“Do we have pears? I’m not a fan of peaches so much.” Finn, sitting across from her, slid his can over—which was pears—and took her can instead. “Thank you,” she muttered shyly, looking down into the can and jabbing one of the pear slices with the fork she had also been given by Jo.  
  
The RV had fortunately been already stocked with bowls, plates, cups and utensils, so the group hadn’t needed to take those things from any of the three townhouses they had cleared.  
  
Soon enough, literally everyone was inside the RV having something to eat. That included Daryl, Merle, Morgan and Michonne, too. After eating, and after everyone had taken turns going to relieve themselves in mother nature, they went over the map once more to determine the route from there on out. Being no more than ten minutes away, with a virtually simple path ahead of them to take, there wasn’t too much to discuss except for what they’d do once they arrived, but even that would be decided once they got there.  
  
While the Dixons and Morgan returned to the van, Michonne remained in the RV; taking a seat on the couch-bed next to Jen where she, too, curled up under the blanket with them.  
  
“Too cold in that van last night,” she muttered.  
  
“Didn’t you have any blankets?” Karen wondered.  
  
“Yeah, but I had to open a window to air the van out because Merle’s gas is worse than the dead.”  
  
Tyreese chuckled as he returned to the driver’s seat. Before Rick took his place in the passenger’s seat to play navigator again, he looked around to make sure everyone was accounted for. Karen, Jen and Michonne were on the couch-bed, keeping warm under the blanket and more or less just staring off into space as they waited to get going. Tara had slid into the dinette booth beside Sophia and was pulling out a deck of cards again to play some sort of card game while Finn stared out the window, muttering about how there was no use getting into a game since they’d be at Mount Vernon soon enough. Tara shrugged, saying something to the effect of how it was better than just staring at the wall, watching paint dry.  
  
It was Jo who was missing, and Rick was able to easily assume she’d returned to the back bedroom.  
  
“Give me two minutes,” he said to Tyreese.  
  
Stepping through the RV and into the back bedroom, he found Jo lying on her side on the bed, facing the same window from yesterday. Crawling up the mattress, Rick lay down beside her and threw an arm over her waist; seeking out her stomach where he settled his hand.  
  
“Hey,” he whispered, leaning his head to the crook of her neck and kissed it.  
  
Before he could ask her how she was feeling, which was a question he already knew the answer to, he felt her body tremble. His first thought was that she was just cold and shivering, but then he heard her failed attempts at holding in her sniffles. As Jo laid there, the little spoon to his big spoon, she began to cry more easily when she felt him hold her closer against him.  
  
“I know,” was all he said. “I know.”  
  
Closing his eyes tight, he was able to successfully keep his own tears at bay for once. It was just easier to avoid focusing on his grief and instead on anything else.  
  
“I had this image in my head, of finding Hope alive and us raising her alongside this baby,” she eventually muttered, as she covered his hand with her own and pressed it against her stomach to let him know she was referring to their unborn child. “I was doing the math, trying to figure out how many weeks it’s been since we lost the prison and before that to when I think we conceived this baby, and I think I’m nine weeks pregnant, because nine weeks ago we had a really great day.”  
  
“Remind me,” he urged, bringing his lips to her shoulder and then just resting his chin there.  
  
“I don’t think this baby was a slip-up during one of our shower escapades,” she whispered, not needing anyone in the front of the RV to hear her. “It was that day you took just me on that supply run to that rundown doctor’s office in Greenville. You found that entire box of condoms in the back of a cabinet, but then we realized they were nearing their expiration date and didn’t think it wise to bring them back with us for others to use. We didn’t want anyone to take that risk.”  
  
Rick smirked. “But _we_ risked it.”  
  
“Twice,” she specified. “But the second time, we were so caught up in the moment, we didn’t bother with a new condom, and you had already removed the first one. I can’t remember if you pulled out in time or not, and I’m thinking you didn’t.”  
  
Thinking back on it, and how the first time with the condom, they’d done it on top of a desk and the second time on the floor. “I don’t think I did either.” Realization struck him more fully. “I didn’t. I came, and then I remember thinking ‘oh shit’ and slid out and then we kinda just laid there for a while, talking about nothing important.”  
  
“You delivered Hope in an infirmary and knocked me up in a doctor’s office.”  
  
Rick snickered, noting that Jo’s tears were subsiding for the moment. Moving his hand up under her shirt, he merely brushed his rough fingers against the skin of her stomach. “I wonder where this one will be delivered, and where the next one will be conceived.”  
  
“Normal places might be nice. We have Nicole, so if we can set up some sort of medical room wherever we end up, be it Mount Vernon or someplace else, the birth will actually be ideal. The next one…” Jo shifted around and Rick leaned back to give her room as she rolled onto her back and stared up at him. “It’s strange thinking of a next one when this one isn’t even here, and with losing Hope.”  
  
“I know,” he agreed, sitting up and glancing toward the closed folding door; knowing Tyreese was waiting on him to head back up front. “When I lost Carl I never thought I’d be a father again, and then you came along and had Hope, and then I was. Now we’ve lost Hope, but we have this new child coming in about seven months, or about six if you go early again. For me, it feels like every time I lose a child, I gain one. I’m not liking that kind of cycle. I’d rather just gain the children and then that’s it. I mean, our children are supposed to lose us first, not the other way around.”  
  
“I hope the cycle of losing ended with Hope,” Jo muttered, her face becoming grievous. “I can’t handle another loss like that. I’m never going to get over it to begin with.”  
  
“It gets easier, but it still hurts every day.”  
  
“I’m still sorry about the things I said to you yesterday when we got back to the townhouse. Sometimes I forget you lost Carl, too, and you’re going through all this a second time,” she remarked sadly. “I forget you had a life before me.”  
  
Rick emitted a slight chuckled. “You trying to say my life was nothing until I met you?”  
  
“Wasn’t it?” she questioned with a teasing smile.  
  
Bringing a hand to the side of her face, Rick looked her in the eyes and smiled back. “I’ve missed that smile,” he cooed, leaning forward to give her a kiss. “It makes me feel less sad and angry.” With a sigh as he sat back up, he dragged his hand down to her shoulder and once more to her stomach. He looked almost guilty. “I gotta leave you alone back here for now. I told Ty I’d only be two minutes.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Go on,” she ushered, silently assuring him it was okay to go; that’d she be fine. “Go navigate this ship.”  
  
Leaning down again and giving her one more kiss, Rick forced himself back up and left the bedroom.  
  
Turning her gaze away from having watched him leave and up to the closed skylight in the ceiling, Jo placed her hands over her stomach. She was finding it difficult to look forward to this new baby and be happy about it when she was grieving Hope. All she wanted to do was lie there and cry for days, but that was hard, too, because Rick and her had more or less spent the last month trying to accept the fact that it was likely she was already dead. They hadn’t seen her or held her in a month, and not having seen her die, and not having been able to bury her themselves, made this entire grieving process feel… _incomplete_. Seeing the grave wasn’t the closure they needed, and they would never truly have that closure now.  
  
Maybe it was just better to sweep it under the theoretical rug and simply force themselves to focus only on the future. After all, the past was the past and there was no changing it. There would be no saving the child she lost, but the child growing within her needed her now and she didn’t want to risk its life. If it meant she would stay confined to the RV to keep out of further harm’s way, then so be it. If it meant never letting it out of her sight and becoming an overbearing, overprotective mother once it was born, then so be it.  
  
Jo refused to go through this pain again.  
  
Once was enough, which made her admire her husband so much.  
  
He was going through it a second time and he was managing it better than her.  
  
She wished she had his willpower. She wished she could be as strong on the outside as he seemed to her.  
  
Maybe someday she’d get there.  
  
Right now? Not so much.

 

* * *

  
“Is this it?”  
  
Rick was standing up and leaning forward with his hands upon the dashboard of the RV, staring straight out the window at some sort of four-way intersection near the entrance to Mount Vernon. On the right side of the road, which they were on, countless vehicles were abandoned there, either in the lane designated for parking, or up on the curb. Several yards back there had been a parking lot filled up with plenty of abandoned vehicles.  
  
Rick looked over his shoulder at Finn, who had asked the question, and nodded. “Yeah, I think so.”  
  
“That’s a lot of vehicles and no people,” Tara remarked, leaning on the back of the passenger seat.  
  
Standing up, Jen moved around Finn and stepped between both Tyreese and Rick and get a better glimpse out the window. She was, after all, the only one in their entire group who had been to Mount Vernon before and knew its ins and outs, for the most part. “There’s more parking up ahead,” she announced. “That’s where I remember our bus parked.”  
  
As the drove at a snail’s pace through the intersection, Rick looked out the right side passenger window and noted two gated off entrances; one of which had the word ‘PARKING’ and an arrow pointing forward leading to it. Moving forward, the RV and the van behind it came to a sort of roundabout which some sort of parkway merged onto. On the right was a drop-off lane, while the left was the parkway. As the roundabout continued to curve, the drop-off lane veered off into the parking lot Jen had likely been referring to. However, it was blocked up with too many cars, trucks, vans and buses alike. Looping around a second time, Tyreese brought the RV to a stop on the parkway in front of a white building, designated by a white sign as “The Shops at Mount Vernon.”  
  
Even the parkway, before it merged with the roundabout, was packed with abandoned vehicles, making it tricky for Tyreese when he maneuvered around it.  
  
“Alright, so, we’re here,” Finn remarked, stating the obvious. “Now what?”  
  
“We get out and sightsee?” Tara quipped.  
  
Rick stood up straight and let his right hand hover over his Colt, tapping it slightly. “What other reason could there be for this shit ton of vehicles, and yet no bodies?” he reiterated Tara’s comment from earlier. “I don’t remember seeing even one corpse sitting in a car or a truck parked along the roads. I see no bodies anywhere. These cars and trucks and buses, even; aside from some dust and leaves covering them here and there, they’re immaculate. They haven’t been touched in a long time. It’s like no one has been here since the beginning.”  
  
“Maybe a bunch of people gathered here and got into one of those buses, and then took off together,” Karen suggested, having stood up and began to lean behind Tyreese’s seat.  
  
“Why not just keep on traveling in their own vehicles?” Tara wondered. “This many, and not one had spare gas to syphon from?”  
  
“Maybe it was a safety in numbers thing?” Jen suggested. “Better to travel together in one larger bus than separate in multiple cars.”  
  
“Or maybe they’re all dead.”  
  
Everyone up front turned around and looked at Sophia who was still sitting across the dinette table from Mika.  
  
“Okay, there, Negative Nancy,” Finn teased.  
  
The teen shrugged. “Well, it’s possible.”  
  
“Alright, we’ll take a few of us—and I mean just a _few_ —and we’ll make our way onto the grounds to check the estate,” Rick informed. Turning around, he moved between everyone crowding around the driver and passenger seats and headed back toward the bedroom, where Jo was still laying. After all, even though Mount Vernon had only been a ten minute or less drive from where their small caravan had started out from that morning, it had in turn only been thirty minutes since they’d done so. “You heard all that?” he asked her once he’d pushed aside the folding door.  
  
“Kinda hard not to,” she replied, sitting up. “Who’s gonna go survey the area?”  
  
“Myself, probably Daryl, Merle…maybe one other.”  
  
“Take Michonne. She’s like an actual ninja with that katana of hers.” Jo began to scoot down the length of the bed. As she stood up, Rick placed his hands on her elbows to assist her. “You might need her help if you boys get into trouble.”  
  
Rick smirked, looking down at her as their nose nearly brushed together. “What makes you think we’d get in trouble?”  
  
“Prepare for the worst, hope for the best,” she commented. “Just be careful, and come back to me.”  
  
With a nod, Rick lifted his head and placed his lips upon Jo’s forehead. “I’ll come back in one very alive piece.” Leaning back, the right side of his mouth lifted in a half smile. “You can’t get rid of me that easily.”  
  
“I’d never want to.”  
  
“And you won’t have to.”  
  
Rolling her eyes, Jo gave him a gentle shove to his chest. “Go on, then. Daylight’s a-wastin’.”  
  
“It’s barely nine in the morning,” Rick muttered, stepping backward out of the bedroom. “I think we’re good on that front.”  
  
Within five minutes’ time, Rick had left the RV alone, even after Tyreese started to argue a bit about staying behind. In the end, Karen put her man in his place and to let Rick go; that if Rick needed Tyreese, he’d call for him without a second thought. After gathering the Dixons and Michonne, the latter as Jo had suggested, Morgan went to the RV to be with the others so he wasn’t alone in the van.  
  
Keeping close to one another as they moved slowly and carefully toward the entrance gates where paying visitors would once buy their tickets to get into the estate, Rick was suddenly reminded of how familiar this all was. It was like when he’d been flanked alongside Daryl, T-Dog, Glenn and Maggie as they took the inner courtyards to the prison their second day there. The latter three were just memories in his life now and he could only hope they’d luck out with Mount Vernon the same way they had with the prison. In fact, this was so much like when they took the prison. The lineup of people within their group had changed, but they had come with an RV like before, and Jo was pregnant again.  
  
Rick hoped this worked out.  
  
Silently, they approached the entrance gate, which had been closed shut, but it wasn’t locked. Pushing it open, Rick went first with his machete gripped tightly in his right hand. Daryl, unsurprisingly, brandished his crossbow, while Merle relied on both his prosthetic's blade as well as a bowie knife in his left hand, and Michonne held her katana at the ready. Moving forward, Daryl took his place at Rick’s immediate left, Michonne at Rick’s right and Merle brought up the rear.  
  
Straight ahead looked like some sort of small, fenced-in field or pasture. The grass was overgrown, as was the case with pretty much every single place they’d ever been to in the last—nearly—two years of this new world. To the right, beyond some fencing and minor tree coverage, was a small building that didn’t seem too important to them, while there was a much larger building to their immediate left, billed as the Ford Orientation Center.  
  
Again, that wasn’t something of importance to the four of them. They wanted to see the house and the grounds. Not museums, visitor centers or whatever else. On the other side of the field there appeared to be a gate in the fence. Heading through the tall grass, they kept their eyes peeled at all times for the slightest movement. As they reached the wooden fence’s gate, Rick pushed it open and stepped out onto a path laid with red brick that led in two different directions. If they went right, they’d surely be led back near one of the other entrances. Heading left seemed to lead in the direction they wanted.  
  
With great trepidation, Rick led them further on, noting the dark green signs dictating what was where. And, as soon as the brick path came to an end, and a dark green sign told them the mansion and other key places on the estate were to their left, they began to move forward until all at once they were forced to stop.  
  
First, it was the smell.  
  
It had started gradually when they stepped clear of the pasture and onto the brick path, but now, as they stood more out in the open, it was like they were hit by a wall.  
  
It was the smell of rotting flesh and overall decay, carried along by a brisk breeze.  
  
The second thing that stopped them…was _them_.  
  
“Shit…” Rick muttered. His blue eyes scanned to the right, to the large field peppered with what looked to possibly be hundreds of walkers. “Shit, shit, shit…”  
  
“That’s too many for just us four,” Michonne remarked quietly. “But taking them down isn’t necessarily impossible.”  
  
“Watch my back,” Merle whispered and darted forward before the other three could stop him.  
  
With anxious eyes they watched as the older Dixon crept as silent as the grave along a red brick retaining wall, until he reached the gap in it and looked up toward the direction of the actual house. After a moment, he whipped around and practically ran back to the others. A few walkers in the large field had noticed him despite his seemingly successful attempts at being stealthy and began to meander over, albeit slowly.  
  
“Well?” Daryl egged.  
  
“Crawling with walkers,” Merle replied. “I think there’s more up toward the house than this field here.”  
  
Rick practically blanched at the thought. “How is that—you know what? It doesn’t matter.” He shrugged, keeping an eye on the walkers coming closer. “We’ll just move on. We can find someplace else. Maybe a regular house in a cul-de-sac somewhere; something with a big yard where we can plant crops in the spring.”  
  
Daryl frowned at Rick and smacked his lips. “Fuck that noise. We came here to take this place. We took the prison.”  
  
“That wasn’t crawling with as many walkers. This is four times the amount, and we’re only talking the front of the estate. Who knows what the back of the estate or inside the house is like. The prison was minor league and this is major league. We aren’t prepared for the majors.”  
  
“I think we’ve been through enough to prepare ourselves for shit like this.”  
  
“Lil’ brother’s right,” Merle muttered, stepping back a bit more toward the red brick path with the other three as the walkers got near to them; chomping at air with their rotted arms outstretched. “We can handle the dead. At least this place isn’t already claimed by the living. We can clear this place in a few days. We’ll take out as many as we can, a little at a time.”  
  
Rick looked between the brothers, and then at Michonne who was nodding slightly in agreement. After a beat, he sighed. “If we’re doing this, it’s gonna be all hands on deck.”  
  
“Doesn’t have to be,” Michonne remarked, stepping forward as the first of several walkers got too close for comfort. With a single upward swing, she sliced through its head like a warm knife through butter. As the body and the top half of the walker’s body fell and crumpled toward the ground, the foursome began to back up further.  
  
“Alright, careful,” Rick urged. “Let’s not draw any more of them near us if we don’t have to. We finish off these ones and then we run back to the RV and gather the others. We need to work this out before we move forward any further.”  
  
Walking backward on the red brick path, the walkers straggling after them seemed to have alerted others and the amount of walkers coming after them had grown more than they’d planned on initially dealing with. They hacked and the slashed and they quickly worked up a sweat despite the cooler air. Having speed on their side, they turned and darted in the direction of the field before any other walkers could realize which way they’d gone. They didn’t slow down until they reached that main entrance gate, either, and when they did they shut it. Before stepping away, just to play it safe, Rick had Daryl help him carry a bench over to place in front of the metal gate as an extra deterrent. It was a pointless effort, only in that the gates opened inwardly and if walkers reached the metal gate, they wouldn’t have the dexterity or knowhow to pulled at the metal bars of the gate to pull it open. Had the gate opened outwardly, all they would have to do is push forward with the weight of the bodies.  
  
Catching their breaths, the foursome looked around at each other before sauntering back toward the roundabout where the RV and van were parked. Rick entered first; his curly hair clinging around his face from the sweat he’d already accumulated. The other three followed in right after him and everyone was at attention wondering what the 411 was.  
  
Rick took a seat on the couch-bed beside Jen, leaning forward and still holding onto his machete which was covered in dark, sticky walker blood. After a moment, he sat up straighter and looked around at all the faces staring back at him as he began to explain the situation.  
  
He threw out two options: either they hightail it out of there and keep looking for someplace else to make a home in, or they stay and fight for Mount Vernon.  
  
“We’re already here,” Tara shrugged, leaning the small of her back against the kitchenette counter. “I say we fight for this place.”  
  
“We’re talking hundreds of walkers, and that’s just what we could see at the front of the house,” Rick reiterated. “That’s not taking into account what the surrounding property or inside the house might look like.”  
  
“So we clear a little bit at a time, like we did at the prison,” Jo spoke up, standing there next to Tara with her hands on her hips. “A little bit each day until it’s ours, completely. We’ll stay inside the RV until we can make it to the house.” Eyeing Rick when he looked over at her, she added adamantly, “We need this place. We need a home.”  
  
Holding her eye a little longer, Rick nodded. “Alright. First, we gotta clear that front field.”

 

* * *

  
And that’s what they did.  
  
With the exception of Jen who stayed behind with Mika, as usual, everyone else took part in clearly the front field, pairing up in twos or threes with blades at the ready. Grabbing two benches planted on either side of the end of the red brick pathway, they quickly carried it over to the gap in the retaining wall to help keep those walkers congregated on the Bowling Green contained. Nicole and Karen, stayed with the benches. In the event that any walkers got to close and were about to tumbled forward, blades would end up jammed into a few eye sockets. The rest spread out a bit more, only taking on those walkers that got closest first.  
  
“Let them come to you,” Rick ordered. “Don’t go looking for trouble.”  
  
Finn and Tara kept Sophia by their side, Merle stood with Tyreese, Jo with Michonne, Rick with Daryl, and Morgan seemed to go between pairings where needed. With twelve of them in total to fight off the walker threat in the large field, the task went by quicker than they could’ve hoped for. After almost an hour, they were down to their remaining dozen and no one had had any close calls.  
  
Of course, it was always best to never count your chickens before they hatched.  
  
Allowing herself to find comfort in using the massacre of walkers as a temporary release for her grief and anger, Jo turned and smiled over at her brother and Sophia after decapitating a particularly disgusting walker. Distracted by looking around to see how the others were faring, Jo didn’t see the overweight female walker approach her until it was almost too late. Turning, in the nick of time didn’t entirely work in her favor either. Throwing her sword up, she sliced downward across the walker’s chest, spraying her own clothes with foul-smelling blood. Having not been successfully put down yet and undeterred by the wound to its chest, the walker pushed forward and grabbed onto Jo’s arm. In a frantic attempt to get free, Jo jerked her arm back with enough force to slide her arm out of the walker’s grasp but also with enough force that she fell backward onto the ground like an overturned turtle. Before she could roll away or jump back up to her feet, the walker had dropped down over her and a struggle ensued.  
  
By that time, Michonne had noticed her “slaughter partner” was no longer by her side. When she called out to Jo in fear, Rick turned his attention their way and kicked away the walker he’d been dealing with to give himself some extra room.  
  
With perfect swing, Michonne lobbed off the head of Jo’s offending walker, allowing its body to slump, unmoving, upon Jo. While Michonne stuck the end of her blade into the walker’s skull to end it completely, Jo continued to just lay there as blood seeped from the severed neck onto Jo’s chest, her own neck and her hair. Rick took care of his walker with a simple hack job at its head. Before it dropped to the ground like a sack of coal, Rick had made his way over to Jo to help Michonne move the body off and then pulled Jo up to her feet.  
  
“You okay? Were you bit?” he questioned nervously, carefully looking her over.  
  
“I’m fine,” Jo assured, feeling understandably gross.  
  
“What happened?”  
  
“It just took me by surprise. It came up in my blind spot while I was checking on Sophia.” Noting the way Rick still looked worried, she placed hand on his arm and looked him in the eye. “I’m fine, Rick. Okay?”  
  
Meeting her gaze, he nodded.  
  
As they both turned and looked around at the field before them, the amount of dead walkers lying in the grass was staggering.  
  
“No time to stop now, I say,” Merle called out to any who would listen. “It’s not even midday yet and there’s still more of them fuckers to deal with on the other side of that wall.”  
  
Some had fallen over the wall, given how low it was, but Nicole and Karen had been able to manage to take care of them before they found their way back up to their feet. Surprisingly, both benches remained in place and only three walkers from the Bowling Green had managed to tumble forward over either bench. Again, Nicole and Karen handled those walkers, too.  
  
After they’d lain waste to the last of the field walkers, Team Family gathered together in a clump as they caught their breaths, while physically and mentally preparing themselves for the next jaunt.  
  
Yanking on the side of Jo’s shirt, Rick got her attention. When she looked away from the Bowling Green and up at his face, he moved his hand up to her shoulder and squeezed it. “You’re at my side with me this time.”  
  
With a calm expression upon her face, Jo nodded compliantly. “Always.”

 

* * *

  
After two hours and three temporary retreats, Team Family had taken the immediate area of the Bowling Green. While the Bowling Green was smaller in length and width than the large field, it had openings to other parts of the estate which had brought walkers out of the woodwork to follow the noise and movement. While there were still some stragglers after all was said and done, for the most part, the group could finally catch their breath. There had been no injuries sustained, no one got bit. Finding themselves already tired and sore was the only issue. They had each moved quickly and precisely; never allowing more than two walkers to come upon them at a time. If they needed to, they took steps back to give themselves a wider berth. The three times they had to retreat, all they did was run back out toward the field and waited; letting the walkers spread their numbers thin as they headed for the field as well. Three times the group did this, and three times it allowed them the chance to push back stronger and harder.  
  
Once they’d reached the circular lawn in front of the house, they could see there were two lanes; one on their left and one their right. The lanes ran between smaller buildings that were likely kitchens, or stables or storehouses; places that were important to the running of an estate like this two centuries ago. Two of those buildings were connected to either side of the house by colonnades.  
  
As unkempt as the grounds were, there was no doubting the estate in general was still beautiful and didn’t seem to be in any sort of disrepair.  
  
“We got more coming,” Merle announced, looking toward the North Lane on their left.  
  
“Nowhere near what we just finished taking down, though,” Tyreese added. “Thank heavens for small blessings.”  
  
Daryl sidled up beside Rick. “Let’s check ‘round the back of the house real quick—see if that’s as bad as this shit was.”  
  
With a nod to his friend, Rick looked around at everyone else. “Maintain the front lawn. Keep doing what we’ve been doing,” he told them. “Let the walkers come to you.”  
  
The group broke up into two halves of five as Rick and Daryl darted away toward the colonnade to the right that connected the house to the kitchen, according to a small green sign beside the door. Merle and Tyreese stood side by side directly in front of the North Lane, hacking at the first wave of stragglers that came toward them. Michonne and Finn did the same in front of the South Lane to the right. The rest divvied themselves up around the pair. Jo, Karen and Morgan joined the pair at the North Lane while Nicole, Tara and Sophia joined the pair at the South Lane.  
  
At the colonnade, Rick leaned on the railing and looked out at the lawn on the other side of the house that looked out at the Potomac River. While there were a few dozen walkers standing aimlessly about or trying to make their way toward the ruckus being cause on the front lawn, to Rick, it felt like their group had just moved a mountain. They were nowhere near finished with clearing the estate of walkers, but the bulk of them had no doubt been dispatched with already.  
  
“We could take this all by nightfall,” Rick grinned, slowly moving his eyes from riverfront lawn and over to Daryl. “We’re gonna make all this ours.”  
  
Daryl nodded and grinned back as he patted Rick on the arm. “Well, then let’s finish what we started.”  
  
With renewed vigor, Rick hopped over the railing of the colonnade and sprinted through the overgrown grass to attack every nearby walker; going against his own advice of letting the walkers come to him. Daryl wasted no time in covering him. He’d taken out two walkers with two bolts and then tossed his crossbow over his shoulder in order to make the leap over the railing of the colonnade. Weaving around a few walkers to retrieve the bolts he’d fired, the archer reached for his weapon again backed up against Rick on purpose so that they nothing could come at them from behind.  
  
When they hadn’t returned to the front lawn after a decent amount of time, Jo felt uneasy by the lack of Rick’s presence. She broke away from her group and dashed over to the same colonnade the two men had disappeared over with her sword weighing heavily in her hand while she maintained her gun fastened safely in the holster on her hip at all times. With the autumn sun beating warmly down on them, the brisk morning had given way to a warm afternoon, but the cool breeze off the river seemed to cancel the warmth out on the back lawn, what with no large home to block said breeze. Having worked up a sweat over the last few hours, the air hitting Jo’s face and arms felt refreshing. And, seeing that Rick and Daryl seemed to be faring rather easily with the walkers around them, Jo was able to _breathe_ easily, too.  
  
However, she couldn’t bring herself to just stand there and watch.  
  
Looking back at the two groups finishing up with the walkers coming out of both lanes, and that Sophia was equals parts protected by her group and managing to carry her weight, Jo temporarily sheathed her sword into the scabbard on her back and pulled herself up onto the railing. Climbing over carefully, she swiftly dropped down and hurried over to Rick and Daryl while unsheathing her sword once more in the process.  
  
Glancing over to her, Rick very nearly frowned at first until he realized it was his wife.  
  
He knew that their group had stronger, better fighters than Jo, but he knew that despite that, if he was in a fight to the death with either the dead or the living, she was the one he would want at his side.  
  
“How’s the front looking?” he asked as he created enough of a gap between him and Daryl for Jo to sandwich between them so that, even as a trio now, they maintained their backs to each other.  
  
“It’s looking like you,” she quipped.  
  
“Tired and disgusting?”  
  
“No,” Jo snickered. “It’s lookin’ good.”  
  
Daryl rolled his eyes and smacked his lips. “Get a room already,” he teased, but in a tone that suggested he was trying to be serious. “Fight now, flirt later.”  
  
“Love you, too, Daryl,” Jo remarked, throwing him a brief look over her right shoulder even though he didn’t see it. The way she noticed his cheek move upward slightly, though, meant he must’ve found what she said somewhat amusing.  
  
“Yeah, right back atcha, Mama.”  
  
Being able to leave behind her grief for a while and focus on playful banter and killing walkers felt just as refreshing as the cool breeze off the water. Jo smiled happily as she lifted her sword and swung diagonally at a walker’s head; lobbing it off its neck like she were Arnold Palmer teeing off.

 

* * *

  
  
With the exception of a few stragglers still wandering around the grounds here and there, the main threats in the large field, the Bowling Green, the north and south lanes and the lawn facing the river had been squashed after a total of almost five nonstop hours. Everyone soon gathered ‘round the back where Rick, Jo and Daryl were and found momentary rest upon the wooden Windsor chairs scattered along the piazza.  
  
“I’m so fucking thirsty right now, I just might run down to the river and drink it dry,” Finn commented, slouching back in his chair with his axe draped over one knee.  
  
Everyone seemed to nod in agreement.  
  
“I’ll tell you what,” Morgan spoke, “After today, I will definitely sleep like a baby tonight. My body is not used to that amount of nonstop crazy.”  
  
“All in a day’s work,” Merle quipped as he pulled a flask out of one of the pockets in his cargo pants. Placing it between his thighs, he could only use his left hand to uncap it before lifting it up with the same hand to knock back a swig.  
  
Rick turned and looked over at him with a raised eyebrow. “Where in the hell did you get a flask?”  
  
“I’ve had this baby for ages,” Merle replied. “Never leave home without it.”  
  
“What’s in it?” Tara inquired; the only one not sitting in a chair. Instead she was lying on the piazza, on the flat of her back with her knees bent upward. While one arm rest across her stomach, the other was underneath her head, which she used to lean up slightly to look over at the older Dixon. “Anything good?”  
  
“You consider Jack good?”  
  
“I’d consider anything good at this point.”  
  
“Here.” Getting up to his feet, Merle reached over and handed the flask to Tara.  
  
“Thanks.” As she sat up a little more, she wiped the top off a little on her sleeve and then took a gingerly sip. When her face instantly puckered, Merle laughed. “That’s not Jack.”  
  
“It might be a few other things mixed in.”  
  
“Ew.” Tara handed the flask back and began smacking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Is that Jaeger and…what else is that?”  
  
Merle snickered as he sat back down. “It’s equal parts Jack Daniels, Jagermeister, peach Schnapps and Jose Cuervo.”  
  
“Damn,” Tyreese muttered, and making a face of disgust.  
  
“It was all I could find hidden away at that professor’s office back at that university. I took what little was left in each bottle.”  
  
“All those bottles were in that professor’s office?” Michonne wondered; wiping the blade of her katana with a dirty cloth she’d had sticking out of her back pocket this entire time. “That’s what you were doing while we were ransacking those cabinets in the other room?”  
  
“I found some meds, too,” Merle defensively insisted.  
  
“Yeah, Chloral Hydrate,” Nicole muttered.  
  
Rick glanced at the former ER nurse. “I’m assuming that’s not a good drug?”  
  
“Yes and no. It’s a sedative used for treating sleeping disorders and sometimes to relieve anxiety.”  
  
“Shit, why ain’t we all taking it, then?” Daryl muttered, lighting up a cigarette. “We’re stressed and barely sleep as it is.”  
  
The conversation fell into a lull as they all stared off toward the back lawn, scattered with dead walkers in the overgrown grass. A couple of walkers could be seen nearby in either the locust grove to their left or coming from the direction of the wharf and the gardens to their right. Most seemed obscured by trees. Above them, the sun was already lower in the sky, indicating sunset would already be upon them in just a few short hours.  
  
“We should head back to the RV,” Jo announced; the first to finally broach the subject to calling it a day. “We’ve left Jen and Mika alone long enough without any of us heading back to check in on them or let them know how we’ve been managing.” Standing up, she removed her sword from where she had shoved it into the grass a few feet away to avoid having it strapped to her back while she’d been sitting. “Let’s go back, get cleaned up as best as we can, have something to eat and drink, and then call it a night. Tomorrow we’ll get an earlier start. We have more of these grounds to cover and the inside of this house as well.”  
  
Rick watched her as she stepped up and dictated to the group; every bit the queen to his king. He smiled up at her; a small smile, but full of admiration and love.  
  
At first, everyone hesitated; not on purpose, but because they were so tired and not moving just felt nice. When Rick stood up, he slapped his hands together to draw their attention.  
  
“You heard the lady. Let’s head back,” he spoke firmly. Gesturing at the house, he added, “Depending on how much we get done tomorrow, we might be able to move into this place before sundown if we’re lucky.”  
  
Without any fuss, the group got up to their feet, retrieved any of their weapons they’d set aside for the time being, and then began to walk off the piazza, alongside the colonnade to an opened white gate in the white fence which led directly behind the kitchen building and came out onto the South Lane. At this point, it was easier to head that way than trying to climb over the railing to the colonnade. They were just too tired and achy for anymore unnecessary physical exertion.  
  
The march back to the RV was slow. They walked the path alongside the Bowling Green, paying little attention to the literal hundreds of walkers scattered among the overgrown grass; bodies they would eventually gather up and burn somewhere further away from the house to keep the smell of burning, rotted flesh to a minimum. Stepping through the opening in the retaining wall, and then meandering around the red brick path, they reached the pasture. One by one the climbed over the wooden fence that boxed the pasture in and finally made it back to the entrance gate; quietly trudging along.  
  
Once all twelve of them had approached the RV, Rick knocked on the door first before verbally announcing it was them, as not to give Jen and Mika any cause for alarm.  
  
“It’s just us, Jen.”  
  
A moment later the door unlocked from the inside, allowing Rick to continue with opening it up.  
  
Mika was standing there, more than ready to greet the others with a big smile until she saw how dirty they were; covered in sweat and dried walker blood. “Ew,” she muttered.  
  
“We were starting to get worried.” At the dinette table, Jen sat with her back to the window while appearing to be nursing a can of something. Sitting up a bit straighter, she craned her neck to glimpse the others as everyone began to file inside. “I literally just got done telling Mika, not five minutes ago, that after we finished eating I was going to come looking after you lot.”  
  
“I’m glad we made it back before you went to all that trouble,” Finn remarked, making a beeline for his girlfriend after setting his axe in the sink. Pressing his palms against the tabletop, he leaned forward and sought out a kiss, which she willingly gave. “It was like war out there.”  
  
“Is everyone safe?” Jen asked, growing nervous. “No one got hurt, right?”  
  
“Everyone’s fine,” Morgan spoke in an assuring voice as he stepped up right behind Finn and patted the younger man on the back. “We’re just real tired and hungry.” Without hesitation, he turned away from the couple and began perusing the cupboards. “Now where’s that can of chicken noodle I saw yesterday?”  
  
“Did you kill all the walkers?” Mika wondered, a bit wide-eyed with curiosity, while trying her best to not get in anyone’s way as they all piled into the RV and tried finding a seat.  
  
“Almost all of them,” Sophia informed her surrogate sister. “We’re gonna try and finish tomorrow so we can move into the house tomorrow night.”  
  
Mika beamed at the idea. “Awesome.”  
  
While everyone began to settle down to simply sit down and eat first, with the goal of cleaning up later, Rick hung around outside a bit longer with Daryl. The latter eventually wandered off to go “see a man about a horse.” In other words, he was going to take a piss.  
  
That left Rick, standing outside, hands on his hips as he stared back at the entrance gate before turning to peer off toward the road they driven in on that morning; taking in the sight of just how many abandoned vehicles there were.  
  
“Hey.”  
  
Rick turned again, looking up at the doorway to the RV where Jo was standing, gripping the frame with her right hand while her left rested upon her hip. “Hey,” he echoed, taking in the sight of her.  
  
She had already changed into a new shirt and cleaned off her arms and face as best as she could. With her hair pulled up in a sloppy bun, she seemed more relaxed already. “I set aside a can of ravioli for you,” she said; thankful she no longer had to squint from the sun since it had already become obscured by the trees. “Come inside and eat.”  
  
“I will,” he nodded.  
  
“You okay?” It was a stupid question. They had been far from okay lately, but it was asked as a kindness, because she loved him and cared about him.  
  
“A little better than I expected,” Rick admitted. “I didn’t think today would go as well.”  
  
“Well, you _are_ the pessimistic one in this marriage,” she remarked. When he nodded and smirked at her, she smirked right back. “We already agreed on that once before, if I recall. I’m supposed to be the one with the optimism. I think I’ve slipped up on that lately, though.”  
  
“I think we’re entitled to be as pessimistic as we want. After everything that’s happened, I’m surprised we haven’t been _more_ pessimistic.”  
  
“Guess that makes us human.”  
  
“Guess so.”  
  
The pair stared at each other; the din of forks clinking against the insides of cans and low conversation from within the RV filtering out into the open air. Jo looked over her shoulder at everyone for a moment, and then back at Rick. Casually, she stepped down from the vehicle and, without pause, she placed her hands on either side of Rick’s face and pulled him in for a thorough, lingering kiss as the salt and pepper bristles of his beard and mustache scratched gently at her chin and upper lip. After a clouded moment, he instinctively placed his hands upon her hips and snaked his arms around to her back to pull her chest up against his. Their liplock deepened and, for a second, it felt as if their very sanity depended on this specific moment of intimacy. In that moment, they reiterated what they already knew; that they were there for each other no matter what life threw at them next, and that they loved each other strongly and fiercely.  
  
No matter how many bad things they had suffered through and would likely still suffer through, they would have each other, and that was the best thing.  
  
Aside from all their children, and their family, of course.  
  
When they finally broke their kiss, Jo looked at him with a tilted head and a brief flicker of a memory flashed in her mind that made her feel contemplative and happy all at the same time.  
  
“What?” Rick wondered, noting the look on her face.  
  
“Just remembering the first time you kissed me, back at the prison,” she replied with the smallest of amused smiles toying at the corners of her mouth. “You were so chaste, and then so apologetic about it.”  
  
“You made me nervous. I didn’t know how to feel around you. I was…I was struggling to figure it out still.”  
  
Jo looked down at his chest and nodded. “So was I,” she commented. “I’m glad we got over that awkwardness.”  
  
“Me, too.”  
  
Leaning in, Jo pressed the side of her face against her chest; not at all disconcerted about how soiled his shirt was. Wrapping her arms around his back to give him a brief hug, she muttered, “You smell.” Jo lifted her face and peered up at him. “Go inside and clean up already. Then we can eat.”  
  
Stepping back from her, Rick stood there and sighed in silent agreement as her arms dropped from his sides and she gestured toward the RV as if she needed to compel him to go in. “Ladies first.”  
  
With a roll of her eyes, Jo simply turned her back to him and walked over to the door. Just as she lifted a leg to take that first step up, Rick reached forward and slapped her ass with the back of his hand. Whipping her head around, Jo neither yelped out or said anything in general. She merely threw him a knowing look and gave him another eye roll.  
  
As he moved to step up into the RV, Rick left the door open for when Daryl returned from taking a piss. Looking over his own shoulder, he focused his attention toward the entrance gate and thought about all that was beyond it.  
  
_Today was a good day_ , he thought.


	51. Home

_“There is a house built out of stone_  
_Wooden floors, walls and window sills_  
_Tables and chairs worn by all of the dust_  
_This is a place where I don't feel alone_  
_This is a place where I feel at home”_  
— The Cinematic Orchestra

* * *

  
  
Moving into the house didn’t happen the second day.  
  
Rick woke with the thought plaguing his mind to secure the property as completely as possible at first. Staying in the RV and van felt safer still. In case something went wrong, they wouldn’t have to worry about loading all their things back in to the vehicles or abandoning it all if they had to leave in a hurry. What was worrying Rick the most was that any outsiders could still make their way to Mount Vernon, the same as his group did. Only, this time, there wouldn’t be the same threat of the dead waiting for them. The only threat would be Rick’s group who had fought too hard already for the estate and wouldn’t be able to just let go of it that easily if it came to some sort of fight.  
  
Then again, a fight might not be worth it. Had Rick given up the prison without question, The Governor would’ve likely let them all leave with their lives.  
  
Actually, no. There still would’ve been a fight regardless. The Governor would’ve fought to take Hope from them. Lori would’ve still died. Or Jo would’ve taken her place. Either way, lives would’ve been lost no matter if Rick had given up the prison or not. There was no appeasing men like The Governor.  
  
Or Joe, the Claimer.  
  
Or Gareth, the cannibal from Terminus.  
  
Or _Sarge_.  
  
Lying in bed next to Jo that second morning, before the sun had even risen for the day, Rick was staring at the ceiling with his mind reeling with a million and twenty thoughts, as per usual. He mentally promised himself, the next time he or his family became even slightly oppressed by another man like The Governor or Sarge, he would shoot to kill without a second thought. He would not hesitate. There would be no negotiations, not talking it out. Just swift, merciless death.  
  
He couldn’t think about those things right now, though, and not just because it would give him an ulcer. He needed to flesh out a plan for how to protect the estate from outsiders; both dead and alive.  
  
Sitting up, Rick gently scooted down the mattress toward the end of the bed and reached for his boots. After putting them on, he stood up and grabbed his coat from where he’d left it crumpled in the corner at Sophia’s feet. Throwing the coat on and zipping it up, he bent down and retrieved his utility belt as well. Rick was already walking out from the back bedroom as he began to slip the belt around his waist and fasten it over his regular belt. His Colt was already in its holster, but he took his out and checked to see how many bullets he had in it. He did it out of habit, even though he knew he hadn’t fired a shot since he’d killed the two marauders two days prior, which meant there were only four shots left.  
  
Knowing there were several boxes of ammo still among their supplies they had come to DC with, Rick had to determine where he’d last seen them tucked away when their belongings had been loaded up into the RV and the van. Once he’d found the box of .357 Magnum bullets, he quietly slipped two into the empty chambers, closed the cylinder, and then pocketed a handful of extra bullets for later— _potential_ —use.  
  
Rick looked around at all the sleeping bodies on the dropped-down beds and the floor. It was only slightly more crowded now with Michonne having joined in on the RV campout; unable to take another night of Merle’s gas, especially when his meal of choice the night before had been baked beans no less. Instead, there she lay on the floor, next to Nicole. Thankfully the section where the couch-turned-bed was popped out with a press of a button, allowing a little bit of extra space so Rick didn’t have to actually step on anyone when he made his way to the door.  
  
On his way out, he grabbed his machete, which he had cleaned off the night before and set down upon the passenger seat. Armed and ready for anything, Rick left the RV and stepped out into the dark blue of dawn.  
  
The rays of sunlight hadn’t reached the horizon yet, but Rick could already see easily enough without squinting in pitch black as he would’ve had to mere hours ago had he been awake and outside then. He had begun to walk around the RV and the van, occasionally looking down at the ground as he let his feet take him on a bit of a hike down the road they’d driven up to Mount Vernon. He didn’t go too far, though. He had checked his watch before he started walking and time himself. After walking for five minutes, he turned around and made his way back, but then he veered off into another direction; trailing down a tree-lined, two-lane state road. Again he walked for five minutes. At the end of that five minutes he figured he’d gone about five hundred yards, give or take, when he noticed a broken down metro bus on the side of the road. Curious, Rick made his way over to it.  
  
With a small flashlight already attached to his utility belt, he turned it on and flashed it along the windows. If there were any walkers inside, still figuratively alive, they’d start to also figuratively kicking at the light shining into the bus. Moving back over toward the closed, accordion door, Rick rapped on it and waited. Listening for any sounds within the bus or in within the trees on either side of the road, Rick turned his back to the bus and flashed the light into the trees as well, egging on anything that might be lying in wait to try and eat or kill him.  
  
When nothing happened at all, Rick turned off the flashlight, but kept it tightly in his hand as he began to press his weight against the door to force it open. When he’d managed to pry it aside enough, he climbed up inside; immediately preparing for an onslaught of the confined stench of decay but was met with none. Turning the flashlight back on, he scanned it over the seats and found the bus was completely empty. There were no bodies, there were no keys in the ignition; but the latter didn’t mean the bus wouldn’t run. If there he hotwired it, he could see where the needle pointed on the fuel gauge to determine what he could syphon from it.  
  
Then a thought came to mind.  
  
He was thinking about the bus he was in, and all of the abandoned vehicles and the use he could put them to. Maybe not all of them, but most.  
  
With a contemplative smirk, Rick turned the flashlight off once more and left the bus.

 

* * *

  
  
Rick had a plan, and it was a good one.  
  
The others had even validated its merit when he’d told them after they all awoke for the day.  
  
Armed with their roadmap which was spread out on the hood of a car abandoned closer to the intersection of roads reaching Mount Vernon, Rick circled multiple spots with a red crayon he’d borrowed from Mika. Each spot was another intersection or some other road within a one mile radius of the estate.  
  
“I’m lost,” Nicole commented, her arms folded under her small bosom. Standing on the outskirts of bodies huddled around the hood of the car, it was understandable that she wouldn’t have completely caught on to what Rick had been explaining.  
  
“We take as many cars, trucks, vans, and buses as we can and we drive them to these points I’ve circled. We park them across the streets as a roadblock. But we don’t just block the road, we block sidewalks. We create protective barriers to keep the living and the dead out,” he spoke, poking the map gently as he looked over at Nicole.  
  
“But that far out?”  
  
Rick turned his attention to Morgan this time. The two hadn’t actually conversed one on one in two days, so Rick, rather petulantly, refused to meet Morgan’s eyes with his own. “Anyone starts heading this way to come here with the same purpose we did, they’d be cut off and sent by our roadblocks and turned back around. No road is a direct route here. There are twist and turns, and at any twist and turn that would lead here, there will be a block. Any residential road with homes that back up toward the woods that lead in either direction of Mount Vernon, we block those, too.” Rick dragged his finger along the map to the parkway that merged with the roundabout in front of Mount Vernon’s entrance gate and followed the way it led north and then curved southeast to a point where Virginia became Maryland. It was only, approximately one mile away along that parkway, or about a twenty minute walk, he figured. “There’s a bridge right here. A small one from what I can tell. We block that off, too, on both ends. If anyone crosses that bridge from the Maryland side with the intention of coming this way, that is the only road in.” Rick leaned up and scanned everyone’s faces as they took in everything he was saying. “Not only do we give ourselves a wide berth of protection from the outside world which has already fucked us over too many times to count, we’re giving ourselves free reign over the neighborhoods around here to take what we want, when we want it, without worrying about anyone else scavenging the same spots.”  
  
“Okay, but what happens when we need to head out further for a supply run, to get things not in this area?” Michonne, the next to speak up, asked. “Aren’t we basically painting ourselves into a corner, limiting our resources?”  
  
“The estate has a road that leads out past the field we cleared yesterday and comes out onto the road we drove in on. There are some roads with no blocks around there, and certain blocks that will have vehicles we can easily move out of the way so we can drive through.” Rick grinned. “Don’t worry. This’ll work.”  
  
“Oh, I’m not worried. I’m just trying to wrap my mind around how extensive this all is and just how much time it’s gonna take us.”  
  
Rick shrugged. “It should only take a day or two. At least, that’s my goal,” he projected. “We should be able to finish clearing the rest of the property my mid-afternoon if we get started on it within the next half hour. We’ll start working on moving the vehicles after that. Any vehicles without keys left in them, we just hotwire, and anyone who doesn’t know how to hotwire, I’ll show you or someone else will.”  
  
Jo stood behind Rick with Mika tucked under her arm. Today, she was sitting everything out. She had woken with a sore back and spotting when she went to use the bathroom in the woods with Michonne as her bathroom buddy. After becoming understandably nervous about finding some blood in her underwear, she’d went straight to Nicole who claimed spotting was a normal occurrence during pregnancies, but that she needed to take it easy for a few days.  
  
Upon telling this all to Rick, he’d jumped behind Nicole’s recommendation and suggested that Karen take it easy, too. It wasn’t exactly an all hands on deck situation anyway. Karen, however, had insisted she was fine, but assured she wouldn’t put any unnecessary strain on herself. With this being her first pregnancy and having already hit the age of forty, she was at a higher risk than Jo was.  
  
When the group migrated back onto the estate to remove the rest of the walkers they could find, while getting a better lay of the land so they knew where everything was, Jo sat in the RV with Mika and Jen. The only thing there was to do was play cards or color in the coloring book someone had found for Mika with box of Crayola crayons she had. Mika and Jen seemed burned out by cards, so coloring seemed most appealing. Though, after a while, Jo got bored of that and began to putter around the RV; trying to clean and straighten up.  
  
She wanted to wash some of their clothes, but without a water source, it was impossible. She couldn’t waste their bottled water, meant for drinking, on the chore.  
  
Even though she’d agreed to take it easy and not overexert herself, it didn’t mean she had to just lay there staring at the walls of the RV all day. Instead, she left the RV with only a small hunting knife instead of her usual sword or a gun, and began to wander around the vehicles abandoned along the roundabout and the nearby parking lot Jen had mentioned the previous morning. It seemed that every vehicle was unlocked; as if their owners somehow knew they weren’t coming back to them and so felt it pointless to lock anything up.  
  
Jo searched through gloveboxes, backseats and trunks to search for supplies her group could use; namely food, water, further medical supplies, and clothes. If she couldn’t wash the things they had, then they could at least have something new and clean to wear. She’d found a laundry basket she was tossing anything good she’d found into, and simply taking her time at it. A few vehicles she found cellphones whose batteries had long since died and were useless in this new world without cell towers. She’d found a few iPods that still had juice in them, so she added them to the laundry basket. It was a little sad when she found the occasional picture of smiling faces staring back at her; faces of people that were likely the walkers her group had either put down yesterday or were in the process of putting down.  
  
She wasn’t sure how long she’d been at this particular task; not until she heard Rick’s voice calling her name while she was bent inside the trunk of a 2007 Toyota Corolla.  
  
Leaning back up, Jo took a step to the side of the trunk and scanned for the direction she’d heard Rick’s voice come from when she saw him sauntering around a parked truck with that bowlegged gait of his that she loved so much. In fact, as he got closer, she found herself smiling as the thought about all those times at the prison she would watch him walk away from her down the slope of the yard toward the garden.  
  
“Did you get them all?” Jo asked. She grabbed a crowbar and flannel blanket from the trunk and dropped them into the laundry basket at her feet, and then shut the trunk. Shielding the sunlight from her eyes with her hand, Jo took in the fresh blood splatter donning the shirt he was wearing under his unzipped coat.  
  
“Almost. There’s a few stragglers here and there, but they’re not much of a threat,” he began to reply. Looking down toward the basket, he seemed almost perplexed. “What are you doing? I thought you were supposed to be taking things easy?”  
  
“Opening trunks and rummaging through vehicles is hardly overexertion.”  
  
Rick began chewing the inside of his cheeks, causing his lips to pucker in thought. Narrowing his gaze at her, either from the sunlight or unspoken criticism, all he could bring himself to do was nod. “D’ya find anything good, at least?”  
  
Balling up her fists, she placed them upon her hips as she stood there facing him, arms akimbo. “Water bottles, but no food so far, unless you count one, stale Nutri-Grain bar I found in a glovebox to be food. Mostly, I found minor stuff,” she explained; glancing from him, down to the laundry basket. “Blankets, tools, iPods, some clothing, a few tampons, and bottle of Naproxen prescribed to a woman named Amber Lieberman.”  
  
“Tampons, huh?” Rick smirked, taking a few steps closer to her. Reaching his hands out, he placed one on her waist and the other upon her stomach. “You won’t be needing those for _at least_ another half year.”  
  
“I might not and neither will Karen, but the other ladies will. Tara and Michonne both have their periods right now, in case you were curious.”  
  
Rick’s face soured, and he dropped his hands from her. “No, I wasn’t.”  
  
Snickering at his typical male reaction to the image of female menstruation, Jo also rolled her eyes. “The world we knew might’ve ended, but periods haven’t. And it’s even worse to deal with now.” Patting her own stomach, she crouched down at the basket. “One of the benefits of being pregnant is not worrying about all that for a while.”  
  
“I don’t envy you women. I admire the hell out of you, but I wouldn’t want to be you.”  
  
“Yeah, well, no woman wants to go through that pain and discomfort, especially when it happens for days on end, every month, of every year, for upwards of forty years, give or take.”  
  
“Jesus Christ.”  
  
“Tell me about it,” Jo smirked. “The good news is I’m probably at my halfway point of having it. Poor Sophia only just got it last year, and Mika isn’t even there yet. I can’t imagine first starting out with it in this kind of world. At least I had twenty years with readily available medication, all the personal supplies I needed and as much chocolate as I wanted because my dad was probably terrified of my mood swings.”  
  
Rick chuckled and crouched down beside Jo, placing his hands on the laundry basket. “Can we change the subject away from menstrual cycles, please?”  
  
“You can slaughter the undead and rip out a man’s throat, but a woman’s monthly visitor is where you draw the line?”  
  
“Hey, being surrounded by this many women is still new to me,” he grinned as he tried to make an excuse. Standing up with the basket, his eyes followed Jo as she stood back up along with him. “I had no sisters growing up, and my mom never mentioned anything like that. And then it was only Lori, Carl and me. It wasn’t until a few years after we’d already been married that Lori sent me on my first solo trip to the Food Lion to buy tampons for her and was I so scared shitless, staring at all these different brands and sizes, this little old lady took pity on me and helped me pick something out. I think that made it even worse.”  
  
Jo giggled, stepping around Rick and giving his shoulders a squeeze. “My dad was stuck buying all those things for me all the time until I finally had my license and could just go get it myself.”  
  
The two of them began to walk away from the abandoned cars in the parking lot, making their way back to the RV, as Rick looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “Your dad didn’t even just drive you to the store and wait in the car while you got what you needed?”  
  
She shook her head. “No, see, my dad was what you’d call a _real_ man.”  
  
Catching that teasing jab she made at him, Rick turned to face her and dropped the laundry basket on the ground. “Oh, and I’m not a _real_ man?” he questioned, arching an eyebrow and grinning at her as he began to back her up against the side of some random sedan. Without warning, he placed his hands on her hips and them slid his arms quickly behind her back. With little effort, he hoisted her up and set her down on the hood of the car and stepped between her legs while leaning in toward her face. “I never heard you complain before.”  
  
“Well, this is a new world, and we don’t have the same luxuries as before, so I guess men prove their worth to their women in different ways.”  
  
“Yeah? Like how?” Gently, he brushed the tip of his nose against hers while he refrained from touching his lips to hers.  
  
“Like, saving their lives, protecting them at all costs, and making them feel like a goddess when they’re covered in blood and smell like literal shit.”  
  
“The men don’t always save the women. Sometimes it’s the other way around. _More_ than just sometimes.” Slowly, Rick turned his chin upward and finally brought his lips against Jo’s in a soft but brief kiss; even though he let his lips linger there afterward.  
  
For the moment, he said nothing else, and Jo didn’t speak either. Instead, Jo wrapped her arms around Rick’s shoulders and rest her face against the side of his while he began to pulled her closer against him in all-encompassing embrace.  
  
It was nice sometimes to not have to talk and just hold each other instead. It was like having a deep and meaningful conversation; just without the words. And, really, sometimes the silence was just a welcomed thing. Rick had always been a reserved man who was never big on talking. Jo, for the most part had been the same. Together, though, they could talk about everything and anything for hours if they wanted to.  
  
Sometimes, though, like this very moment, they didn’t need words anymore.  
  
Not to mention, given all the shit they were put through and all the hard work they did just to survive and keep everyone else safe, too; sometimes all they needed was a couple of minutes to just hold on to one another and just enjoy the silence that was peppered only by the faint sound of each other breathing.  
  
“Yo, Rick!”  
  
Jostled out of their moment of quiet, Rick lifted his head and turned to look over toward Daryl. He could tell his friend hadn’t meant to interrupt anything but, at the same time, he the intrusion would quickly become water under the bridge. “Yeah?”  
  
“We gonna move these vehicles or what?”  
  
“Yeah.” Rick nodded and begrudgingly stepped out of his embrace with Jo. “I’ll be to the RV in a minute.”  
  
“Alright.” Daryl said nothing else. He left the couple alone.  
  
Letting their gazes wander toward each other, both smirked.  
  
“I think I’m busier now in the new world than I ever was with a full time job as an officer of the law in the old world,” he quipped; bending down to lift up the laundry basket. “But even when I feel the urge to complain, all I seem to hear is my mother’s voice in my head.”  
  
“Yeah? What’s she saying?”  
  
“A man’s work is from sun to sun, but a mother’s work is never done.”  
  
“Smart woman.”  
  
Rick chuckled as the two of them made their way, side by side, out of the parking lot. “Yeah, I think it was just her way of establishing who wore the pants in the relationship whenever my dad came home from work and would go to sit in front of the TV while she was juggling all the housework, my brother and me, and then getting dinner ready,” he remarked. “He got to clock out from his job and rest, while my mother went from sun up to sun down, day after day. As soon as she started muttering that quote, and she said it loud enough for him to hear, he’d get up and ask if there was anything she needed. She would just smile and tell him everything was fine; that she had it all under control. Of course, everyone under the sun knows when you women say everything is fine, you mean the exact opposite, and my father wasn’t a stupid man. If he believed her, and sat back down…heaven help him.”  
  
Jo smiled, envisioning everything Rick had said; wondering what his parents had looked like, if he looked more like his mother or his father, what he looked like as a child, and what his childhood home would’ve looked like. “I think I would’ve loved to meet your mother.”  
  
“She would’ve loved to meet you, too.” Wincing slightly, Rick added, “I hate saying it, and I hope it doesn’t make me sound like an asshole, but I think she would’ve liked you better than Lori.”  
  
“Why’s that?”  
  
“Lori and I both grew up in homes where our mothers were housewives, homemakers. Money might’ve been tight from time to time, but our families got by easily enough on one income; our fathers’ incomes. My mother would’ve loved a career of her own, and even though the times were starting to change with the women’s liberation movement, it wasn’t in small town Georgia. King County in the early 1970s might as very well still been the 1950s. My mother’s father was a hard ass and a bit of a drinker to boot. He believed a woman’s place was in the kitchen and no daughter of his was gonna be a working woman. She was gonna get married and have a family and that was the law of the land. No ifs, ands or buts.”  
  
“Sounds a lot like one of my uncles.”  
  
“So, my mother followed the path her father set out for her. She met my father, fell in love, got knocked up first and had to hurry up and get married and then I came along seven months later.”  
  
Jo giggled. “Like father, like son.”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow at her. “How so?”  
  
“Did you not knock me up before we married on the side of the road?”  
  
“To be fair, we didn’t know you were pregnant yet.”  
  
“True.”  
  
Rick shrugged. The RV in sight, he paused. The others waiting to starting moving vehicles could wait a few moments longer. “My mother still wanted to work, and she could’ve found something to do once my brother and I were both in school during the day, but her dad was still alive and she still worried about what he thought. Even though she ended up never working outside the home, she brought us boys up to know that women were equal to men and could do whatever they wanted. They could be world leaders and doctors and lawyers, and if we—my brother and I—ever married a woman and didn’t allow her the opportunities to follow her own ambitions, she’d have our balls in a vice. Our wives wouldn’t have to worry about staying home with any children we would have, because she would be there to help whenever we needed. My mother might not’ve worked outside the home, she might not’ve become the nurse she always wanted to be, but she adapted for her family and took care of everyone else. In a way, I suppose she did become a nurse.”  
  
“Okay, so, why would she have liked me more than Lori? What’s the point to all this?” Jo wondered, gesturing between the two of them; in reference to their current conversation.  
  
“Lori didn’t have to make a career or life for herself outside the home. Lori had been crafty and went to college for art before dropping out after only one year, which was when she and I got serious. She did work for a while, before we got married; just little part-time jobs. After we got married, she got pregnant quick with Carl, and I never expected her to start working again right away. We were doing okay financially, but once Carl was in school, my mother started asking me when Lori was gonna go back to work. Lori didn’t want to work. She liked being a housewife. Even though she wasn’t a great cook, she kept our house warm and clean. My mother didn’t seem to understand that not every woman wanted a career. Some, like Lori, were content at home.”  
  
“So, because Lori didn’t have a paying job, your mom held a grudge against Lori?”  
  
“I think my mom was reflecting herself onto Lori, and she was upset that Lori was squandering what she saw as the opportunities she wasn’t allowed. I think my mom resented Lori for that.” Rick looked at Jo, who was already looking back at him with her hands on her hips and a curious expression on her face. “If you would’ve had children with Oscar, would you have eventually gone back to work?”  
  
“Yeah. After my maternity leave was up, anyway.”  
  
“Therein lays my point. You had a career, had the desire to have both a family and work outside the home.”  
  
“That’s kinda harsh; judging Lori just for that.”  
  
Rick tilted his head and shrugged. “Well, there was a matter of the clashing personalities. For as fierce Lori could be in an argument with me or when it came to protecting Carl, as any mother is for her child, Lori was a rather introverted. My mother? Not so much. After her father died, she came further out of her shell and spoke her mind. She was by no means overbearing or mean-spirited, but she was certainly a force to be reckoned with. She was the Queen of her castle with a heart of gold. She was always helping so many people that she earned respect from everyone she met so easily.” Shifting the laundry basket onto his left hip, he brushed his right hand along Jo’s jaw and let his thumb gently brush against her cheek. “They say women fall for men who remind them of their fathers, and men fall for women who remind them off their mothers. That’s why my mother would’ve loved you. You’re just like her.”  
  
Jo made a rather amused face at him. “Please tell me I don’t look like her, too. That would just border on creepy."

“No, you’re good. My mother was blue eyed with curly brown hair, and built more like Lori was; tall and thin as a rail.”  
  
“Oh, I’m not thin?”  
  
“You’re pregnant.”  
  
“And when I wasn’t pregnant?”  
  
“Pregnant or not, you’re perfect.”  
  
Jo narrowed her gaze at him before reaching her hand up to take his hand from the side of her face and kiss his palm. “Nice save.”  
  
“Rick!” Daryl called, tapping his wrist as if there was an invisible watch he was gesturing to. “Chit chat with the missus later.”  
  
Rick looked briefly at the archer and then rolled his eyes when he brought his gaze back toward Jo. “As much as I do love talking with you about everything and anything, I suppose I can’t postpone what needs to be done any longer.”  
  
“Moving the vehicles _was_ your idea, after all.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”  
  
As they stepped up beside the door to the RV where the others were already gathered and very patiently waiting, Rick passed the laundry basket off to Sophia.  
  
“What’s this?” she asked.  
  
“Supplies your mother found,” Rick replied; referring to Jo as Sophia’s mother slipping easily from his lips. The fact that the teenager didn’t think anything of it, either, made it feel more natural. In truth, he didn’t even realize he’d said ‘mother’ instead of ‘Jo.’ Perhaps it was the conversation he’d just had with Jo about his own mother that was still occupying his mind. “Put ‘em in the RV for now. And I want you staying here, too. I don’t think she’s gonna stay put despite needing to take it easy today. You can help her gather some extra supplies from the vehicles still around here.”  
  
“Okay,” Sophia agreed.  
  
“It’s not like it has anything to do with the fact that she can’t drive yet,” Merle quipped as Sophia disappeared into the mobile home with the basket.  
  
“She’ll learn soon enough,” Rick remarked. “As soon as we’re settled, I’ll teach her.”  
  
When Sophia came back out, she sidled up beside Jo. Rick kissed his wife on the lips, Sophia on the forehead and looked around at everyone else. Mika was staying in the RV again with Jen. Tyreese had asked Karen again if she wanted to sit this task out, but Karen insisted that driving in random cars and trucks would hardly be stressful for. Jo hadn’t known if that was a dig at her or not, but either way she let it roll like water off her back.  
  
As Rick retrieved their map, he began to lead the others away to figure out which vehicles they’d be working on moving first. Jo, looking over her shoulder at him briefly, placed a hand on Sophia’s shoulder and both females migrated back to the same parking lot Jo had just left for a bit more scavenging.

 

* * *

  
  
As it would turn out, it would be another two nights and half a day before the group finally got around to moving up into the house. With all the routes and roads to Mount Vernon strategically blocked to keep out any potential passersby as well as walkers that might wander onto the property, and after thorough treks around all five hundred acres to the estate were rid of the last walkers they could find, only then did Rick feel the house was secure.  
  
During the last sweep around the property, he had made his way into the house with Daryl and Finn at his side. Tired and sore from days of overworking themselves, they blessed their lucky stars when they found the only body inside belonged to that of a man who had shot himself in the head and was practically skeletal. The body was sat, slumped backward slightly, at the table in the dining room with walls painted a vibrant green, but also with the dried blood and brain matter caused by the man’s suicide. The dried blood covered only a section of the wall and a framed print.  
  
After a sweep through all three floors of living space, the full basement and a quick inspection of the cupola determined the house was free and clear, Rick knew they would finally be able to breathe easy for the time being.  
  
The move up into the house was interesting. They would need a way to get vehicles in and out of the property for their own purposes, so they had to bring with them the RV, the van, and a few other vehicles they wanted to keep for themselves and not as part of the road blocks. A little over half a mile west of the house, at the base of the property, was a simple white gate that was positioned between two, small brick buildings painted white. It seemed to have been the estate’s original entrance, and it would be theirs, too, from now on. They had already situated several buses along the road to prevent any view onto the property of the living happened there on foot. On the inside of the gate was the RV, ready to move at a moment’s notice, much like they’d done at the prison after The Governor had that bread truck barrel through their outer and inner fences. Outside the gate was another vehicle, with the same purpose of moving out of the way when it needed to be, so that any vehicles they had inside the property could come and go.  
  
And that was how they brought their supplies up to the estate, instead of carrying everything on foot. For one, they would need the vehicles close to the house anyway in case they needed to load up and flee for whatever reason. Also, they were just too tired to do everything manually and deserved to be lazy about at least one thing for once.  
  
Before the RV found is home at the West Gate, it was brought up to the house with the rest of the vehicles, parked around the circle out front for the purpose of unloading everything they’d brought with them and everything they—mainly Jo, with the help of Sophia—had gathered in the days since first arriving.  
  
Before they brought anything inside, though, and despite their tiredness, the group found themselves fueled by their excitement over their new home. They all began splitting up in pairs to discover every nook and cranny and figure out who would be sleeping where so they knew where to bring their belongings to. As it was laid out, there really wasn’t enough rooms to go around without at one or two people doubling up, and that included the three couples.  
  
The largest bedroom was on the second floor, as most were, and took up the south end of the house, along with its own private stairwell entrance. It was, according to Jen, who was the only one among them to have been to the house before, the bedchamber of George and Martha Washington. Before anyone dared to claim dibs, it was Morgan who spoke up and declared only Rick and Jo should have it.  
  
After all, who better to sleep in the same room as the first President of the United States and the _first_ First Lady other than the “president and first lady” of their group? With a nod of solidarity at each other, Rick and Morgan also exchanged a look that seemed to express that their disagreement from days prior was officially water under the bridge.  
  
All of the rooms, save for one that was virtually a closet with a window, housed full-sized beds. However, those beds were much narrower than modern standards of a full-sized bed mainly because people seemed to have been of much smaller stature two and a half centuries earlier. And, in truth, there didn’t seem like there would be much of an issue for sleeping, except for poor Tyreese who was a much larger man and easily took up more space on a bed. Karen didn’t seem undeterred. She claimed it would mean Tyreese and she would just have to snuggle, which would help with keeping warm once winter rolled in. Tyreese didn’t need convincing after that. They ended up taking the bedroom to the far right of the top of the stairs on the second floor, mostly because of the small crib inside. Considering Karen was due to give birth first, so long as Jo was able to carry her second child to term, having the crib already there just seemed rather fitting.  
  
Nicole made the suggestion that Finn and Jen take the only bedroom on the first floor, which had three entrances; one led out into the front entrance way, another led into the green dining room, and the third opened up into the back hallway which led toward Washington’s study and up the stairwell toward the room Rick and Jo would be living in.  
  
“It makes the most sense for you two to stay there,” Nicole spoke, looking more directly at the younger couple. “Going up and down too many stairs might cause Jen to overexert herself, and we’d need someone downstairs, near an entrance, as a sort of watchdog in case something happens and the rest of us need to be alerted. Plus, the study…I can use that as an infirmary. Right up the stairwell, down that private hall from Rick and Jo’s room is that yellow bedroom. I’ll take that one. I’ll be close to our infirmary at a moment’s notice.”  
  
No one had seemed to have any qualms with what Nicole said, so it was settled. Finn and Jen would take the downstairs bedroom. The tiny room with the single, canopy bed Mika claimed, justifying that she was the only one who could fit in the bed anyway. Jo wasn’t too keen on it, only because the small room had no fireplace and didn’t want Mika to get cold when the temperatures dropped lower. Sophia pointed out one of the rooms had a trundle bed, so Mika could either sleep with her in that room during the cold months, either in the same bed or on the trundle. So, that was sorted out. The remaining second floor bedroom was the most decorative. While everyone else seemed to think it gaudy, Michonne fell in love with the Chintz fabric that adorned the bedding, the drapery around the windows and the bed and even the upholstery on the chairs. It went without saying she claimed it.  
  
What was left was Tara, Morgan and the Dixon brothers. On the third floor, there were only three bedrooms and only two had fireplaces. Whether any of the fireplaces within the house even worked remained to be seen, though. And of those three bedrooms, only one was truly fitted as a normal bedroom, and a rather girly one at that. Done up in golden yellow fabrics and with a small wood burning stove in the corner, the men let Tara take it without question. Daryl offered up the only other bedroom with the only other fireplace, deciding he and his brother could work out their own sleeping arrangements later.  
  
And they did, Daryl had been prepared to go stay in the RV after it was parked at the West Gate, but Rick nixed that idea; determining it too far away in case something happened and they needed him. Knowing his brother and Rick were as close as real brothers should be, Merle gave up any claim to the third bedroom on the third floor, telling Daryl to take it. During their sweep of the estate and its buildings, they had discovered a cabin of sorts. On one half of the building there was some sort of room with a large loom and two large spinning wheels. The other half was set up as living quarters, which Jen clarified as the Overseer’s Quarters; the abode of whatever man of the time was in charge of managing the property, the livestock, the workers and the farms.  
  
Merle didn’t seem to give a shit about the history of it. He just liked the fact that he’d have his own space.  
  
Even though the sleeping arrangements had been settled and their supplies had been brought into the house, Rick had suggested everyone sleep together in the same room for the night. They would have the entire next day to finally settle in. For one more night, he wanted them all close together.  
  
So, they laid out their pillows and blankets on the floor of the large, two-story room on the north end of the house that appeared to have likely been either a ballroom or just a large gathering room. Either way, it had to have served a purpose for social gatherings, which meant it was easy enough for all of Team Family to find room to lie down and sleep.  
  
After a small meal consisting of the usual canned goods and squirrel meat Daryl had hunted, the latter of which was cooked outside until the figured out if the fireplaces worked and were able to gather up firewood, the group settled in on the hard floor to call it a night.  
  
Several feet away from Rick and Jo, Sophia and Mika laid curled next to each other for warmth. While everyone else seemed to already be asleep, having easily been consumed by their exhaustion, the two girls were still wide awake. Their eyes were focused upon the ceiling and examining the ornamental design, which was only possible because their eyes had long since adjusted to the darkness around them.  
  
Turning her head toward Sophia, Mika bit her bottom lip and tapped her surrogate sister’s arm to get her attention. “Hey.”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“What was the wedding like?”  
  
“What wedding?”  
  
“Mom and Dad’s.” Mika smiled a little. She liked having two parents again and found relative ease in referring to Rick and Jo as such.  
  
“It was simple, short,” Sophia replied, keeping her voice extra low so only Mika heard her. “It was kind of sad, really.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because no else was there. Jo—Mom didn’t even get to wear a nice dress. If we’d never lost the prison, they were gonna have a small, little wedding with everyone around. I think Mom would’ve even found a dress to wear. We could’ve gathered some flowers for her to use as a bouquet. We could’ve had music. A few people could play guitar. Maggie had a nice singing voice. We could’ve had a nice cookout. It would’ve been a really awesome day, and not just for them. For all of us.” Sophia sighed, rolling onto her side and facing Mika. “Hope could’ve been the flower girl. Shane or Daryl the Best Man. Andrea or Lori would’ve been Maid of Honor.”  
  
“Andrea,” Mika remarked. “Mom and Andrea were closer friends.”  
  
“Yeah,” the teen agreed. “I wonder what happened to her when the prison fell.”  
  
“She probably got shot by The Governor’s men or bitten by walkers, because she never made it to Terminus and Shane only left the signs about him and Hope. He would’ve said Andrea was with him, too.”  
  
Both girls fell silent for a few minutes; both most likely thinking about their lost loved ones. Doing so usually made anyone quiet as grief threatened to work its way back into their hearts and minds until they could push it back down.  
  
“Mom and Dad deserved a better wedding,” Mika continued to whisper. “Everything they’ve done for us and losing Hope. They deserve something nice. We deserve something to celebrate.”  
  
Sophia nodded and rolled onto her back as she pulled her blanket tighter around her for warmth. “Yeah,” she agreed, staring back up toward the ceiling.

 

* * *

  
  
Hours later, where Rick and Jo laid beside each other, Rick awoke a dreamless sleep and found himself staring up at the ceiling. When his eyes adjusted to the darkness in the ballroom, only then could he make out the decorative etching in the ceiling’s plaster and admire the intricacies of it. The entire house was gorgeous, to be honest, and he couldn’t believe they had found and secured such an amazing place like this for all of them to live in.  
  
Feeling a gentle breath upon his neck, Rick turned his head and looked upon Jo’s slumbering face; wondering what she was dreaming about, or if she was even dreaming at all.  
  
He let his eyes rove over her face, and the way the sliver of moonlight made its way into the ballroom and reflected upon her blonde hair. He let his eyes wander down, noting her stomach wasn’t discernable enough yet to tell she was pregnant. The jacket she wore to bed and the blanket covering them both did little to assist in that either. But just knowing she was pregnant and they had a house he truly believed they would be safe in for some time to come was enough to turn any frown he’d been wearing upside down.  
  
Not even the thought of the hundreds of walker bodies they had to still gather up and burn could ruin his feeling about this house.  
  
This house was theirs. It was their future.  
  
It was their _home_.

 


	52. Love

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This is another feel good chapter. The group is overdue and deserves more than just one day of good things happening for them. Up ahead will be changes, both good and bad. There will be gains and losses, additions and subtractions. This is the world of TWD, after all. Originally part of the previous chapter, but split up to form this one instead, I already had most of this already finished. I just needed to bang out the last five of twenty pages total, which I did last night. And, I'm gonna be upfront right now, the last five pages were basically just all sexy good times, so if that's all you really care about, scroll toward the bottom. If you're not a smoker, you might be wanting a cigarette afterward, bwahaha. Anywho, I'll wrap this note up so you can get with the reading. Enjoy, and please R&R!
> 
> xoxo -Holly

_“We loved with a love that was more than love.”_ — Edgar Allan Poe

* * *

  
  
The morning of the group’s fifth day in the house started quite lazily, and it was wonderful. Rick and Jo awoke in their new bed, in their new bedroom, as they had for the past four mornings, surrounded by sheer white curtains on either side. With the room painted white, and the morning sun pouring in through the windows, it felt like they were in heaven. The beds in the house, as lumpy as they looked, were surprisingly comfortable and the rooms weren’t too cold. With an extra layer of blankets and body heat, Rick and Jo hadn’t needed to use their fireplace yet, and not because Rick had yet to get it working. There was a flue issue and there just hadn’t been time to focus on that; not when it wasn’t an immediate priority.  
  
The group had had a busy few days. All their canned goods had been stored in the butler’s pantry off the dining room, along with some herbs, fruits and vegetables that been discovered growing wild, without cultivation, in the Lower Garden. Nicole had moved all the medicine and first aid kits into the study, along with the sonogram machine they would eventually get working as soon as they could find a portable generator. She expressed the desire to get some sort of cot setup in the room as a sort of hospital bed. Better yet if they could actually acquire a real hospital bed from an in-home care situation. An actual cow had been found wandering the edge of the woods, down by the water that must’ve broken free from the pen it was kept in back when the estate was up and running as a living museum. The animal had somehow avoided being attacked by the undead and there was not a wound on it anywhere. It was a little on the lean side, but Rick had been confident they could find some sort of feed to put some meat back on its bones. They wouldn’t eat the cow anytime soon. They wanted to keep it around to produce milk and maybe they could make cheese…if they could figure out just how to do that.  
  
A few dead trees had been chopped down, wood cut and stored along the piazza; ready for when the fireplaces were in order. The house was swept and cleaned of dust, cobwebs and dirt. Water was brought up from the river’s edge in buckets and which allowed the group to finally bathe, even if it was only sponge bathing. It was better than not bathing at all. The water also allowed them to finally clean their clothing; which was hung up to dry on some rope tied between the columns of the piazza.  
  
The house wasn’t in perfect working order yet, but it would get there before long, which is why Rick and Jo could wake up, feeling content and rested for the first time in a long time. Despite their emotional and personal setbacks over the last month, and then some, they finally had something to look forward to, and it kept them going.  
  
There were two large pantry-like closets off their bedroom. The closet furthest away from their bed was closer to the fireplace, so they had decided that would be a perfect place for their unborn baby’s nursery. They would find a real crib soon enough; for themselves, as well as for Karen and Tyreese. That little thing in the latter couple’s room was just too small and its safety was questionable. It might’ve worked in the 18th century, but they were 21st century people and still held to 21st century standards on certain things.  
  
Rick was first to get up from the bed. Shirtless, he sat up with his back to Jo as he pushed aside the sheer curtain. On a side chair next to the bed, Rick kept his clothes neatly folded, along with his regular belt and his utility belt. His Colt rested on the small table beside the bed and his boots on the floor beside the side chair. While standing up revealed Rick was completely naked from the waist down, it by no means meant he and Jo had made love the night before. They hadn’t done anything like that since the night in the basement of Ford’s Theatre, which was little over a week ago, but it felt like much longer in the world they now lived, when a week could feel like a month.  
  
“What’s on the agenda for today?” Jo asked, rolling onto his side of the bed to enjoy the warmth his body had left behind, along with his scent.  
  
“Daryl and I are burning the rest of the walkers down at the Pioneer Farm.”  
  
“And after that?”  
  
“Feed Bessie, cut some more wood, maybe start looking at that flue.”  
  
“Bessie?”  
  
Rick turned around, slipping back into his faded black jeans. “Yeah, Bessie,” he smirked.  
  
“Who’s Bessie? Should I be jealous?”  
  
“You should be very jealous,” Rick teased. Leaning forward as he slid his regular belt through the loops, he leaned down over Jo and kissed her sweetly. “Bessie is the cow we found.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Oh.” Then, “Why Bessie though? Doesn’t that seem a bit cliché?”  
  
“Maybe I like cliché.”  
  
“Wasn’t the pig at the prison named Bessie?”  
  
“Yeah, but in all fairness, I didn’t name the pig. One of the kids did,” he clarified, grabbing his T-shirt and pulling it over his head. In doing so, his curls became matted down around his face and his beard, which was starting to get even more unruly, puffed outward. “Bessie is a good name, though. I think my dad had an Aunt Bessie.”  
  
“I think everyone’s had an Aunt Bessie.”  
  
Stretching out with her arms high above her head and her toes pointing toward the fireplace, Jo felt like her whole body was yawning. She was so comfortable and warm in bed, she didn’t want to leave it. Rick grabbed his boots and sat down in the side chair, staring back at her as he slipped them on. They smiled at each other, but the smile faded a bit from Jo’s face after a few moments.  
  
“You okay?” Rick asked.  
  
Jo shrugged. “I was thinking about Hope again. I try not to. Not because I don’t _want_ to, but because it hurts too much, and I don’t want to keep hurting. But I was thinking about if we’d found her, and had her here with us; both closets would’ve worked for her and this little one.” Patting her stomach, she craned her head to look down. “They could’ve each had their own, little space. Maybe, in time, as they got older, we could’ve convinced Nicole to move into another room—somewhere—and Hope and this one could’ve shared that Yellow Room together. Maybe we could find a different bed for that little room Mika is sleeping in right now, and put a regular twin bed in there that Nicole could use and then bunk beds or something in the room Sophia is in for both her and Mika. I’m sure they would’ve understood the change up of sleeping arrangements, right?”  
  
“We could take a bed frame and mattress from a nearby house and put it in our infirmary. Nicole could sleep and work there. I mean, there’s a fireplace in there, so she’d be warm when it got cold. Something to consider, too, as time goes on.”  
  
“See?” Jo’s smile returned again as she gestured between them. “This is what we need to keep doing.”  
  
“Talking?”  
  
“Not just talking. Talking about our plans for the future so we’re not dwelling on the past we can’t change.”  
  
Rick nodded. Standing up, he stepped up to the side of the bed and sat down with one leg bent up under him. With his right hand, he reached for the side of Jo’s face and brushed some hair out of the way while she simply watched the way he looked down at her. “Be lazy today,” he muttered, leaning down to kiss her forehead. “Stay in bed till noon. Find a book to read. Just do something for yourself.” He brought his lips down to her nose and then brushed them against her lips. “You’re a queen and this is your castle. Take a day off from everything and luxuriate.”  
  
Grinning, Jo lifted her arms so that she could place her hands on either side of his face. With her thumbs she lightly massaged his cheeks that were half-hidden by his beard and her fingers toyed at the curls at his face. “Is that your royal decree?”  
  
Arching an eyebrow and smirking, Rick nodded. He kissed her once more and firmer this time, before sitting up. “The king hath spoken.”  
  
“Hear ye, hear ye.”  
  
Rick chuckled as he got back up to his feet. Making sure the curtain around the bed was closed, he winked at her through the sheer material. “Have fun being lazy.”  
  
“Have fun doing manly things.”

 

* * *

  
  
A couple hours later, Jo realized she actually must’ve dozed off again after Rick had left. The only reason she even woke up again to begin with was the faint knocking on the bedroom door and stirred her out of dreamland. Blinking away the sleep in her eyes, and trying to mentally adjust to where she was, Jo sat up on her elbows and looked right toward the foot of her bed.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
_“It’s Sophia. Can I come in?”_  
  
“Yeah, of course.”  
  
A small clicking sound preceded the door opening to reveal Sophia standing there. Flashing a small smile, the teenager walked over to the bed and pushed back the sheer curtain so that she could sit down beside her adoptive mother.  
  
“I know Dad told us to let you rest today, but us girls thought it would be nice to do some really girly things. We thought it’d be fun.”  
  
Jo narrowed her gaze. “What kind of girly things?”  
  
“Michonne found a small bag of makeup and nail polish in one of the cars blocking the West Gate, and there’s a lot of different kinds of pretty flowers in the vegetable garden. Nicole called it having a ‘long-overdue spa day.’ She said she used to treat herself to one once a month.”  
  
“A spa day, huh?” Jo seemed very intrigued. “I think the only time I really every had an actual spa day was with my bridesmaids the day before my wedding to my first husband, Oscar. We got manicures, pedicures, facials and had lunch together in Atlanta where we drank mimosas.”  
  
Sophia chuckled shyly. “What’s a mimosa?”  
  
“It’s a drink that’s half orange juice and half champagne.”  
  
The teen nodded and seemed to be thinking hard about something. “So, do you wanna have a spa day with us?”  
  
Jo smiled. “Yeah,” she agreed. Reaching up, she cupped her adoptive daughter’s chin and squeezed it playfully. “I’ll have a spa day.”  
  
“Cool.”  
  
As Sophia jumped up off the bed, but before she could dart out of the bedroom, Jo cleared her throat to get the girl’s attention. “What’s with the flowers, though? Are we gonna pick them and put them in vases?”  
  
“No,” Sophia replied nonchalantly. “There to make flower crowns, of course.”  
  
“Oh. Of course,” Jo nodded as if that was supposed to be common knowledge.  
  
As the young teen slipped out of the room and down the stairs, Jo stretched and dragged herself out of bed. Sauntering into the closet nearest the bed, there was a small chest left behind as décor for the house in its living museum state. Whether or not it was an authentic chest that belonged to the Washingtons or not remained to be seen. Either way, it was now just something use to prop up two buckets of water that had been brought up from the river. The water had been boiled and strained to remove dirt and any other impurities. Thankfully, the river was freshwater and not saltwater since it didn’t reach the Atlantic Ocean. The first bucket was strictly to aide in sponge bathing, since they had no running water or even bathtubs. The second bucket would be for hair washing. Before the shower room had been rigged up in the prison, this is the same thing they did then, as well as when they were on the road, so Jo was used to going through this all by now just to get clean.  
  
Behind Jo was a third, empty bucket, sat on the floor, which also served a purpose. After her sponge bath, she dunked as much of her hair as she could into the second bucket and then used a cup to pour over the rest of her lowered head to saturate the rest of her blonde tresses. Grabbing for the bottle of shampoo she had brought from the townhouse, stood up straight with the towel wrapped around her shoulders as she began to lather her hair up as thoroughly as possible. When she was done, she squinted and looked for the third bucket which she set down between the other two. Scooping clean water into a cup from the second bucket, Jo leaned over the third and began to rinse her hair into it. It was an annoying process, one they all decided wouldn’t be an everyday thing. They could stand to go a day or two without washing their hair. Sponge bathing, however, was more of a necessity; strictly from the standpoint of keeping illness and “personal” infections away.  
  
Finally cleaned up, Jo went about changing into clean undergarments, a clean shirt and socks, but the same jeans she’d worn the last two days. The last tasks were pulling her damp hair back into a ponytail and pulling on her boots.  
  
When she made her way downstairs, and through the infirmary to the dining room, she took a pear from the bowl of fresh fruit on the center of the table and followed the voices of the girls where she found them all, sitting cross-legged on the floor of the ballroom.  
  
There were already flowers strewn about and being linked together, and Michonne was in the throes of painting Mika’s nails a bright shade of pink. Jo could only look upon the scene and laugh. It was such a lovely, welcomed change of pace. And it was also weird to see Michonne, the toughest lady among them, smiling and painting fingernails.  
  
Karen got up to her feet and joined Jo at her side, and then pulled her back down to the floor with the others. Tweezers were pulled out of seemingly nowhere and Nicole crept over to Jo on hands and knees while chuckling. Tweezing Jo’s eyebrows quickly commenced, and was followed by several choice expletives from Jo’s lips with each removal of a hair that brought tears to her eyes.  
  
“Beauty is pain, honey. Deal with it,” Nicole teased; her ginger hair tied into a braid and draping forward over her shoulder.  
  
“Yeah, suck it up, buttercup,” Tara quipped. “If I can survive getting my eyebrows tweezed since, like, ever…you can, too.”  
  
“You’ve given birth naturally, been stabbed by some crazy lady in the woods and sprained your ankle jumping out of a building before it exploded,” Karen added. “Tweezing is small change compared to all that.”  
  
“Is this the pick on Jo hour?” Jo wondered, leaning back from Nicole and wiping a tear away.  
  
“What color do you want your nails?” Michonne asked, ignoring Jo’s question. “There’s a bright pink, a tannish pink, lavender, orange and a turquoise blue. The tannish pink seems a bit gunky, though. I think it’s seen its day.”  
  
“Uh…” Jo winced as another single, solitary hair was removed from her brow. “Lavender, I guess.”  
  
“Nah, I think turquoise blue.”  
  
“Then why ask me?”  
  
Michonne shrugged. “I thought you’d pick the color I wanted to paint on you.”  
  
Jo tutted, and then swatted Nicole’s hand away. “Okay. No more of that.”  
  
Nicole pouted. “Fine.”

 

* * *

  
  
As the beauty regime continued inside the house, outside in the woods bordering the estate, Rick and Daryl were standing against a wooden fence at the Pioneer Farm, facing out toward the river. Behind them, in the center of the sandy dirt between the covered wooden stalls for 18th century farming equipment, the remaining pile of walkers was up in flames. Daryl was wearing his red handkerchief around his face while Rick simply held his hand up under his nose; both trying to mostly breathe out of their mouths due to the stench of burning, rotted corpses.  
  
“I wish I knew what was grown here,” Rick remarked, nodding toward the untouched soil and the dead plants that had tried growing at the start of the apocalypse but failed with no one to till and fertilize the soil.  
  
“Doesn’t really matter,” Daryl shrugged, pulling his handkerchief down to talk. “We find some seed packets somewhere and take care of the soil in the spring; we can plant whatever we want here. Or, at least whatever we can find to plant here.”  
  
“Grain would be nice. I mean, I don’t know how to harvest grain to turn it into flour, but just imagine eating bread again.”  
  
“If wishes were horses.”  
  
“We can get there,” Rick remarked adamantly, looking at Daryl. “We can.”  
  
Daryl looked back and nodded. After a moment, he gestured to his own face. “When you gonna shave that shit off? You look like a fuckin’ ZZ Top reject.”  
  
Rick smirked. “Jo likes it.”  
  
“Jo’s also never seen you all squeaky clean like Sophia and I have. Remember the CDC? The hot showers…”  
  
Ignoring the awkward memory of having had sex with Lori in that CDC shower, Rick stroked his beard; having grown so used to the thickness of it on his face. “You think I should shave?”  
  
Daryl gave Rick a thorough once over, and then nodded. “Yeah. Start fresh,” he said. “You can always grow it back.”  
  
“Yeah, I suppose.”  
  
After a few moments of silence and contemplation, the latter on Rick’s part, the silence was broken by Daryl. “I think you should surprise Jo with it. Shaving the beard off, that is. Don’t let her see you doing it.”  
  
“You think?”  
  
“Yeah. At the very least I’ll get a kick out of her reaction.” Daryl snorted at the image in his head as he pulled out a cigarette from his vest pocket. “We don’t have much in the way of entertainment these days, in case you haven’t noticed.”  
  
Rick chuckled. “Yeah, alright. And how do I go about hiding the fact that I’m shaving. Have you stand outside my room like some sort of prison guard and not allow her to come in?”  
  
“Nah. We’ll go to Merle’s. He won’t give a shit if you shave there. Just clean up after yourself.”  
  
Pushing off the fence, Rick took a few steps forward; briefly eyeing the burning pile of bodies. “You have any shaving supplies? Because I don’t.”  
  
“Merle took a shaving kit from the townhouses, I think.”  
  
“Okay, then. But first I still need to feed Bessie.”  
  
“Morgan did it this morning.”  
  
“He did?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Rick pursed his lips for a moment. “Well, okay.”  
  
“Oh, and another thing…”  
  
Rick turned and looked at Daryl again as they began to head off toward the direction of the South Lane. “What?”  
  
“The rest of us have been talking, and the general idea is everyone wants to have an actual sit down meal together. Dressing nice and using silverware and shit.”  
  
Rick snorted. “You agreed to dress nice and use silverware?”  
  
“Fuck off.” Lighting his cigarette, Daryl brought it to his lips and inhaled a drag. “The girls wanted it mostly. They’re having a spa day or whatever. Figured we all deserved something nice. Merle and I are gonna cook up some rabbit I caught yesterday. We’ll have some fresh veggies and whatever else the girls do up. There’s wine to drink.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“Yeah. Merle took that from the townhouses, too.”  
  
“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.”  
  
Daryl smirked, taking a second drag of his cigarette. “We’re gonna have a real good night, all of us.”

 

* * *

  
  
“I don’t understand why I have to change just to eat dinner,” Jo muttered, standing in her bedroom with Sophia hovering around her with a Jo’s brush.  
  
Karen came bustling in a moment later, dressed in a simple blouse and a pair of jeans while a flower crown adorned her head the same as it did Sophia’s. Jo’s flower crown was resting on the dressing table beside her bed.  
  
“Here. It’s a bit wrinkly because it was still shoved into a duffel bag in my room, but I think this will fit you nicely,” Karen announced, holding up a long white sundress and a white sweater.  
  
“A dress? I haven’t shaved my legs since the Commune. I’m not wearing a dress so everyone can see me looking like Chewbacca.”  
  
Karen rolled her eyes and shoved the dress and the sweater forward. “It’s a long dress. No one will see your legs.”  
  
Seeing that Karen wasn’t taking no for an answer, Jo emitted a dramatic sigh. “ _Fine_.” Taking the clothing, she ducked into the spare closet that she and Rick intended to be their nursery and closed the door to give herself some privacy to change. She reemerged a couple minutes later, wearing the dress with the sweater over it. The sweater’s sole purpose was strictly for warmth. It wasn’t warm enough to go without it and if Jo wore her jacket over the dress, she had a feeling Karen might lose her shit. “Alright, there. Happy?” Jo tossed her discarded clothes onto the floor at the base of her bed and stood there staring back at Karen and Sophia with her hands on her hips. “Can we go downstairs to get dinner ready now?”  
  
“Patience is a virtue,” Karen remarked with a teasing smile. Reaching for the flower crown on the dressing table, she brought it over to Jo and placed it on top of her head and then played with Jo’s hair for a few moments. “Okay. Now we’re ready.”  
  
As the three of them headed downstairs, Sophia took Jo by the hand and simply smiled up at her adoptive mother, who smiled back. As they slipped through the infirmary, they moved next through the dining room and then out into the front hall. Mika was waiting at the base of the stairs with a bunch of marigolds in her hands, her hair pulled back in a French braid, and her own flower crown atop her head as well.  
  
“Look how pretty you are,” Jo cooed, pushing a few loose strands of hair back off her daughter’s face. “You look like a little princess.”  
  
The young girl beamed when she saw her adoptive mother. “And you look like a queen.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Thank you.”  
  
“Look at these flowers,” Mika looked down at her hands. “Michonne said they’re marigolds. I think it’s kind of funny. Marry. Gold. Marigold.” When Sophia abruptly jabbed her in the arm with her elbow, Mika became more serious. Handing the flowers to Jo, she smiled more politely and less overzealously. “They’re for you.”  
  
“Aww. I’ll find a vase for them. Thank you.”  
  
“No,” Mika said a little quickly. “Hold on to them. You look pretty with them. I mean, you look pretty without flowers, too. But even prettier with them.”  
  
Karen cleared her throat and stepped around into Jo’s line of sight. “Shit, I just remembered something.”  
  
Jo knitted her newly tweezed brows together. “What?”  
  
“Tyreese found this spot yesterday that he said was absolutely beautiful and I remembered I meant to show it to you girls earlier. He says it’s at the old tomb where George Washington and his family were originally buried, according to some plaque. Before we start dinner, maybe we can go see it. You know, before it gets too dark.”  
  
“Then why don’t we just wait till tomorrow when daylight is more abundant?”  
  
“He went before sundown...something about how the light from sunset came in through the trees,” Karen explained. “It probably wouldn't pack the same punch earlier in the day.”  
  
“I wanna see it,” Sophia said eagerly. Looking up at Jo, she squeezed her hand. “Can we go see it?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. I don’t see why not. Go ahead.”  
  
“No,” Sophia shook her head. “You, too.”  
  
“Well, let me tell Rick. I haven’t seen him since this morning.”  
  
“I just saw him a little while ago. He was walking the estate with your brother,” Karen stated, leading the way out the front door.  
  
“Speaking of not seeing Rick, where is everyone else?” Jo wondered as Sophia practically dragged her out the door.  
  
“Morgan and Daryl are cleaning the rabbits for dinner at Merle’s. I’m assuming Merle’s with them. “Michonne and Tyreese went to gather some more water from the river, Nicole took Jen for a walk down along the river because she thought the air down there might help her feel a bit better, and Tara…I don’t actually know where she is. Around somewhere.”  
  
Jo accepted the explanations. It all sounded quite logical.  
  
As she allowed herself to be led left down the South Lane with her adoptive daughters and Karen, Jo innocently looked around at the small white buildings, and up at the pinks and purples in the sky; enjoying the smell of the fresh air coming off the river to their left. The sun was already lower and would definitely set within the hour. Without any candles or flashlights, they’d have to make the trip to the old tomb a quick one.  
  
At the end of the lane, past the stables, they veered further left and began to wind around a path that suddenly appeared to be scattered with more marigolds as the path led down to some brick steps. It was almost a shame to have to step on them as they walked along.  
  
Without warning, Karen bustled past and hurried away down the steps and out of view while the girls remained by their adoptive mother’s side. Each linked an arm through hers and continued to walk forward with her while Jo awkwardly held onto the marigolds in her hand. Everything was really starting to feel a bit off and the girls kept looking up at her with such mischievous smiles that Jo was under the distinct impression that something was _definitely_ amiss. It wasn’t until Jo reached the last few steps and looked toward the tomb to their right that everything fell into place.  
  
She stopped in place and looked straight at the tomb where everyone Karen had said was off doing other things were instead gathered on either side of the tomb and looking back at her with smiles on their faces that suggested they had just pulled off the greatest secret known to man.  
  
Standing directly in front of the tomb, dressed in a clean, button-down shirt and smooth, clean-shaven face, was Rick.  
  
Having been standing there for some time, Rick had not known why Daryl had dragged him hear after he’d shaved and gotten dressed into a shirt Finn had come by Merle’s with for Rick to wear. He still hadn’t known what was up even after everyone else began to show up, but he was slowly having some suspicions. Not until that very moment, seeing Jo dressed in white with flowers on her head and in her hands, that he understood what was going on.  
  
Jo put the pieces together then, too.  
  
“Oh God,” she chuckled. She brought her flowers to her face and covered her nose and mouth with them to hide her bright smile. She looked at all the faces staring back at her and down at her girls, and then settling once more upon Rick. As she stepped forward without Sophia and Mika linking their arms through hers anymore, Jo made a slow beeline for Rick. “Your _face_.”  
  
Rick brought a hand up and smoothed it over his chin. “I know.”  
  
“You have one.”  
  
He laughed. “Yeah.” Holding his hands out, he took hers and squeezed them while looking her over. “I haven’t seen you in a skirt since the day we met.”  
  
“Technically it’s a dress. I’ve just got this sweater over it, and—oh my _God_ , what have all of you been up to?” Jo turned and looked over at Karen first before eyeing each person individually.  
  
“It was the girls’ idea,” Karen admitted with a proud smile; content that everyone had pulled this all off without a hitch.  
  
Rick and Jo both looked over at Sophia and Mika.  
  
Sophia smirked and shrugged. “We were talking the other night about how you two have done so much for all of us, and you expect nothing in return. And even after all we’ve lost, and you losing Hope, you kept us all together even when you were falling apart. Even then, you kept yourselves together because you love each other. Me and Daryl were lucky to be there with you on the road when you two exchanged some vows, and even though it was a real wedding because your hearts were in it, it was never the wedding you ever planned on having. I mean, no one else got to be there and you were covered in blood, for starters.”  
  
“So we wanted to throw you the wedding you deserved,” Mika added, holding her arms out wide. “Ta-da!”  
  
Morgan stepped up then, standing in front of the closed door of the old tomb with his hands clasped together in front of him. Finn stepped up, too, taking Jo’s hands out of Rick’s and into his instead.  
  
Looking at her little brother, Jo smiled. “You finally get to see me marry Rick.”  
  
“Remarried, technically, and I’m not just gonna watch it happen. I’m giving you away since dad can’t.”  
  
Immediately beginning to pout, overwrought with emotion and those damned pregnancy hormones, tears formed in Jo’s eyes and started to sting because of the eyeliner and mascara Nicole had applied to her earlier.  
  
“Shit, don’t cry,” Finn laughed.  
  
“It’s okay,” she insisted. “They’re happy tears.”  
  
Morgan cleared his throat to get everyone’s attention. “I’ll try an’ make this short and sweet, since the two of you already went through this spiel before,” he remarked with a smile as he looked between Rick and Jo. “But we’re gonna stick with some old school formalities, too.”  
  
“Should we be worried?” Rick inquired.  
  
Morgan simply smirked as he began to address everyone. “We’re all gathered in this place, and while it may be a tomb, it’s an _empty_ tomb. There is no death here anymore, just life. The trees, the plants, the birds, all of us and those of us yet to be born. Life continuing, life going on no matter what. We come together not to mark the start of a relationship, but to acknowledge and strengthen a bond that already exists. This ceremony is a communal affirmation of that bond and, as their family and friends, it is our honor and privilege to stand witness to this event. These two people before us have chosen to dedicate their lives to each other, who have found a second chance at love despite the odds, like a flower coming up from the crack in a sidewalk. Y’all love each other and that loves sets the standard for the rest of us, wishing we could only be so lucky. Now, I’m no preacher, by any means, and I know how Rick gets when I get preachy at him, so I’ll make this secular.”  
  
Rick chuckled under his breath, easily recalling their argument a week before at that abandoned apartment when Morgan brought God into the conversation and Rick was having none of it.  
  
“Finn, will you do the honors of giving your sister to her man?” Morgan asked.  
  
Finn merely smiled and nodded. Turning Jo toward him, he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tight and then planted a kiss on her cheek. “I love you, sis.”  
  
Jo was already tearing up again when she leaned back from him. “Love you, too.”  
  
Taking her hands, Finn placed them back into Rick’s. “You know the deal,” he muttered, eyeing his brother-in-law with a knowing grin. “Break her heart, I break your legs and all that.”  
  
“She’d break ‘em first before you could even reach me,” Rick joked, causing the others to laugh a little.  
  
“Ain’t that the truth,” Finn agreed.  
  
As the younger man stepped back, Rick looked his bride in the eye. He squeezed her hands and ran his thumbs over her knuckles. He truly did feel like the luckiest man alive to have a woman like her as his wife.  
  
“I know you two said your vows already on the side of the road, but I still wrote something down for you two to recite…to keep with tradition,” Morgan continued, as he pulled a small piece of paper out of his pocket. Because of the trees surrounding them and obscuring the remaining sunlight in the sky, he had to squint to read what he’d written.  
  
Watching Morgan flounder to see, Rick took the paper and held it up. “Why don’t we just take turns reading it to each other?” he questioned rhetorically.  
  
Rick gave a half smile as he looked at the man before him, but found his gaze retreating back to Jo. He just couldn’t help himself. He wanted to stare at her forever and ever. However, he lowered his gaze instead to the paper.  
  
“I, Rick Grimes, have chosen you… _Joanna Autry Moore_ Grimes, again as my wife.” Morgan had written simply ‘Rick Grimes/Jo Grimes’ on the paper, but Rick chose to alter the first line to encompass Jo’s full name. “In friendship and in love, in strength and weakness. To share the good times and misfortune, in achievement and failure. I will cherish and respect you through all the changes of our lives, forever giving thanks that we found each other.” With a wink, he handed the paper to Jo.  
  
Accepting the paper, Jo was grateful the natural lighting of the setting sun gave no hint to the fact that she was blushing over all this. “I, Joanna Grimes, have chosen you, _Richard_ Grimes, _again_ as my husband. In friendship and in love, in strength and weakness. To share the good times and misfortune, in achievement and failure.” She paused, thinking on their misfortune and their failures for a moment, but finding comfort to push past it by simply looking up at him long enough to turn away those grey clouds. “I will cherish and respect you through all the changes of our lives, forever giving thanks that we found each other.”  
  
Reaching forward, Morgan took the paper back and guided Rick and Jo into firmly holding each other’s hands again. Looking between the couple, he spoke, “ _These_ are the hands that are holding yours on your _re-_ wedding day as you promise to love each other today, tomorrow, and forever. _These_ are the hands that will countless times wipe tears from your eyes—tears of joy and sorrow. _These_ are the hands that will passionately love you and cherish you through the years. _These_ are the hands that will help hold your family together as one as you overcome adversity. _These_ are the hands that will give you strength when you need it. _These_ are the hands that will work alongside yours as you build your future together.”  
  
“What happened to this being short and sweet?” Jo asked teasingly. Then, with a shake of her head, she added, “I’m kidding. Sorry.”  
  
Rick merely grinned back and mouthed ‘shh’ at her.  
  
“Alright, alright,” Morgan relented with a grin of his own. “I’m getting carried away, I know. Alright, so…by the power vested in yourselves for having already exchanged vows a month ago today—and yes, it was a month ago today because Sophia did the math to figure it out—I pronounce you _still_ husband and wife.”  
  
When Rick and Jo hesitated, just looking at each other and smiling at how over the top this felt and how incredibly amazing it was that their friends had done this for them, Merle cut into the sweet moment with his brash voice. “Jesus, fuck. Kiss your damned bride, already, Rick.”  
  
Raising an eyebrow at her like a man up to no good, Rick released his hands from Jo’s. Placing one at the back of her neck to cradle her head, he placed the other hand around her waist and then pulled her body up against his as he claimed her lips in a kiss worthy of their most private moments together.  
  
To show his unmitigated approval, Merle led the others in wolf-whistling and clapping the couple on.  
  
“Now let’s go eat and get drunk on some wine,” Merle announced, turning around and leaving without a second thought.  
  
As Rick and Jo parted their lips from each other, he kept his eyes only on her and her alone.  
  
Even when the others congratulated them and hugged them, Rick’s eyes found Jo’s.  
  
Returning to the house was a blur.  
  
Rick and Jo led the way with the others following happily behind them. Daryl and Merle had gone about roasting the skinned rabbits outside. Karen and Nicole had gone to the kitchen, which was a building separate from the house, and took lead on boiling cabbage and winter squash picked from the garden. Sophia took a can of Mandarin oranges and a can of pear slices, mashed them together in a bowl from the pantry and Tara assisted her by pouring two bottles of a white wine in to make an alcoholic bowl of punch. Rick was given a glass to enjoy while Jo had to settle for water because of the baby.  
  
Because the dining room only had nine chairs around the table, which meant five more were brought from the ballroom and sandwiched in so that everyone could fit. It was a tight squeeze but no one seemed to mind. The meat from the cooked rabbits had been pulled from the bone and set on a platter while the boiled cabbage and winter squash had been drained out and set in a bowl. It wasn’t a large meal, but it was the heartiest they’d had in a long time. For dessert, Michonne had mashed up slices of apples and pears and mixed them with a just a dollop of water and mixed it all together with some sugar packets taken from their RV and stored in the Butler’s Pantry; it ended up being a very chunky puree but it was sweet and better than nothing.  
  
With candle glow radiating off their faces, everyone bumped elbows constantly because of their close proximity around the table with each other. They laughed, they told stories, and had a truly wonderful evening. At the end of the meal, Tara revealed two, small Hershey kisses still wrapped in silver foil with the paper banner sticking out the top. She smiled and placed the kisses directly in front of Rick and Jo.  
  
“You might not have wedding cake to shove into each other’s faces, but I figured you could feed each other a chocolate kiss instead.”  
  
Simply excited at the prospect of actual chocolate, Jo reached her hand across the table and gave Tara’s a squeeze. “Thank you.”  
  
“No prob, Bob.”  
  
Rick and Jo needed little incentive to go about unwrapping the candy. Removing the foil and the paper, they chuckled as they brought the pieces up to each other’s mouths and then popped them in. As they closed their lips around the chocolate, their cheeks indented as they began to suck on it; smiles continuing on their faces the entire time.  
  
“Is it better than sex?” Jen asked, with a laugh in her voice, from across the table where she was leaning sleepily into Finn’s side.  
  
“It better not be,” Rick quipped, his voice slightly garbled from chewing the chocolate. Leaning in, he pressed his lips to Jo’s and gave her a real kiss.  
  
Still sucking on the chocolate, she also enjoyed the feel his lips upon hers. “It’s definitely a close second,” she muttered when he pulled away.  
  
“Ew,” Sophia’s voice echoed from where she was sandwiched between Jo and Tara.  
  
Watching Rick as he turned away from her to listen in on some conversation between Tyreese and Morgan, Jo couldn’t help but study his profile and continue to process how he looked clean-shaven. She didn’t even realize she was touching the side of his face to feel the smoothness until he turned and looked back at her. “It’s so weird,” she smiled. “You’re like a whole different person.”  
  
“That a good thing or a bad thing?” he asked quietly, a bit amused by her awe.  
  
“It’s neither. It’s just…new.” They continued to just look at each other, both smiling gently, until she licked her lips and found her gaze focused on his. Leaning in, she asked, “You wanna call it a night?”  
  
“Yes,” he responded without missing a beat. Standing up, Rick pushed his chair back and then held his hand out to Jo to help her up to her feet. “Thank you, everyone, again…for all this. It was truly…it was a surprise.”  
  
“Definitely,” Jo agreed as they looked upon the faces around the table. “It really wasn’t necessary—”  
  
“Yeah, it was,” Karen insisted, cutting in.  
  
“Either way, we’re forever grateful for it.”  
  
Rick nodded in agreement. “But now, we’re gonna head on up and retire for the evening.”  
  
Daryl closed his left hand into a fist and promptly began to shove a finger in and out of it. “Yeah, more like _tire_ her out.”  
  
“ _Ew_ ,” Sophia repeated, with more emphasis, which caused Daryl produce a short laugh.  
  
Jo placed a hand to her face and just turned away, laughing. “Wow, okay. And with that, goodnight everyone.”  
  
Stepping around the table, Jo kissed the tops of Sophia and Mika’s heads and then blew a generic kiss to everyone before turning into the small hall between the dining room, pantry and infirmary. There she waited for Rick to join her after he said his goodnights. Once at her side, he took her hand and led her through the infirmary, to the back hallway and up the back stairwell. Just outside their bedroom, Rick grabbed Jo’s hand to stop her from continuing forward. Pulling her back toward him, he bent at the knees and effortlessly swept her up into his arms and promptly carried her across the threshold.  
  
“You really _do_ like clichés,” Jo giggled as he brought her over to the bed and set her down.  
  
“Told you so.”  
  
Jo laid back in the center of the soft, lumpy mattress and watched after him as he went to shut the door to give them privacy. When he turned around, he began to step around the bed and pull the sheer curtains closed on all sides. All the while, she continued to watch him. The room was dark but a sliver of light coming from the first quarter moon in the sky above offered some light for Rick to see what the hell he was doing. Picking up a box of matches on the dressing table, he took one out and struck it against the flint to light the votive candle there. The small glow it created helped a bit, but not by much.  
  
Shaking the match to extinguish the small flame, Rick set it down and turned back toward the bed. He stared back at Jo through the curtain as he began to undo his utility belt and placed it along with his Colt on the dressing table beside the candle. Taking half a step forward, he undid his regular belt and slipped it quick through the loops before letting it drop to the floor. In order to remove his boots next, Rick grabbed one of the bed posts for balance with one hand and pulled the boots off with the other hand. Slowly he began peeling off the next layers; the button-down dress shirt, followed by his faded black jeans. Both fell softly into a pile at his feet as he pushed the bed curtains aside and climbed up into bed and crawled over his bride.  
  
“Sit up,” he spoke, plain and simple.  
  
Pushing herself up onto her elbows, she let him lean forward and grab the bottom of her white sweater and pull it up over her head. When he tossed it, it hit the curtain, which billowed slightly as the sweater dropped to the floor in a clump. Jo’s expression quickly went from complacent to captivated as Rick hunched his back slightly and began to hoist up the hem of her white sundress until he had it hiked up to mid-thigh on her.  
  
Bringing his lips close to her neck, he whispered, “Lay back.”  
  
And she did.  
  
Jo let her head hit the pillows beneath her and she continued to watch him as he slid his hands under her hips and wrapped his fingers around the waistband of her underwear and slid them down off her ass and further down until they were completely removed.  
  
All of this was like a silent dance they’d choreographed and knew by heart. The movements of getting silently undressed came easily from so many nights spent together in their cell at the prison when she shared that twin mattress together.  
  
Moving to hover over her with his hands braced at her sides, Rick smiled and brought a kiss down to her lips that linger for quite a while. When his tongue slipped briefly into her mouth and brushed against her tongue, she could still taste the remnants of the chocolate he’d eaten and the wine he’d drunk with his meal. The latter was the closest she would get to drinking alcohol of any sort until after the child within her was born. Then, slowly, like a cat on the prowl, Rick crawled down her body; all the while barely breaking eye contact with her. Grabbing her legs, he parted them further and them tossed them over his shoulder as he bent forward and lowered his mouth to her mound.  
  
He became half hidden by the bottom of her dress, which was actually quite exciting. All she could see was the curls on his head but no longer his face as he languidly dragged his tongue along the juncture of her thighs. Instinctively, her fingers found their way through his hair and gripped those curls, urging him forward. The tip of his tongue darted forward, flicking and swirling around her clit which almost immediately caused a sharp intake of breath from her. When he pushed two fingers into her folds and pumped them rigorously in and out, Jo began to naturally squirm. As little mewls of pleasure escaped her lips, Rick began to flick his tongue against her clit at a more rapid pace until her thighs pressed firmly against either side of his head and she convulsed into a chain of spasms. When she came, Rick pulled back slightly but only to dip his face down and lick her clean while her body still twitched in the aftermath of her orgasm.  
  
Jo panted a little as she craned her neck to look down at him when he leaned back up. Her legs slipped down from her shoulders and he wiped his thumb around his mouth and then licked his thumb, all the while maintaining eye contact with her again.  
  
“My beautiful bride,” he muttered, crawling back up her body.  
  
Pushing herself up onto her elbows again, Jo placed a hand on the side of his face and enjoyed the smoothness of his cheek. It really was like being with a different man, what with no longer feeling the coarse bristles of his beard against her thighs whenever he went down on her.  
  
“My handsome groom,” she said back to him, leaning up more to kiss his lips and taste more than just wine and chocolate there now.  
  
Placing her hands upon his shoulders, she gently pivoted him around and then pushed him back against the mattress. She straddled his lap, feeling his erection hit the inside of her thigh, but she didn’t stay in that position. Hunching forward, she moved her mouth from his, down to his neck where she suckled against the warm skin there, and brought her lips around one of his nipples. She licked at one and rolled the other between her fingers; looking up at him through her eyebrows as she did so. When he began to bite his full bottom lip, she brought her mouth back up to his and captured that bottom lips between her teeth before proceeding to suck on it for a moment.  
  
As they began to kiss properly again, Jo brought a hand down between their bodies and wrapped her fingers around the base of his cock, which twitched with delight at initial contact. Slowly, she dragged her hand upward, and then dragged it back down. Deliberately slow, she pumped him and he reacted by thrusting into her firm grip.  
  
“Fuck,” he mumbled, pulling his face away from hers and dropping his head back against the pillows.  
  
Jo smirked with pride and took his break from their kiss as a cue to return the favor.  
  
Still maintaining her hold on his stiff length, Jo shimmied her way down his body and stuck her tongue out to lick away the precum on his tip, and then swirled it around the head. It was when she gently flicked her tongue against the frenulum which caused Rick to release a throaty moan that made her feel a bit smug. She cradled his balls with one hand while she bobbed her head up and down on his cock; swirling her mouth and tongue in a circular pattern. At the tip, she made smaller circles, then wider ones on the way back down; keeping a consistent rhythm. The move caught him off guard as he “mmm-ed” happily. As she kept up the motion, he began to get breathy and squirmy.  
  
After a little while longer, Jo returned to simply bobbing her head up and down on him, taking his length as far as she could until his orgasm finally hit and he came inside her mouth. Keeping her lips suctioned around his head, she made sure nothing spilled out as she swallowed it back while listening to the way his voice seemed to purr. When she moved away from his cock and sat up, Jo looked down at him and enjoyed the sight of him; his cock have drooped somewhat limply against his own thigh while he laid there spread out before her. His taut abdomen and chest glistened somewhat with a faint sheen of sweat already forming. The great thing about the curtains around the bed was that it helped keep the heat contained around them.  
  
“That was insane,” Rick croaked, lifting his head up slightly to look at her with heavy-laden eyelids.  
  
“You're welcome,” Jo chuckled; lowering her body down upon his chest.  
  
Any other night, this would’ve been where he rolled over and went to sleep, and only because he’d had such an early start to the day and kept physically busy for most of it. Now, in this moment, it was a different kind of physical and it was the first time in over a week since they’d been intimate. Because it was their re-wedding night, and this intimacy was something that allowed them to focus away from the wretched moments in their life as of recent, Rick not only _wanted_ to but _had_ to continue with this all.  
  
He wanted, needed and had to reaffirm that he _wanted_ her, that he _needed_ her and that he had to have her whenever they could find time like this. He didn’t want to squander any time with her, especially not these moments.  
  
Reaching his hand down between their bodies, he gave his cock a few firm strokes and then craned his head to look upon her face as she continued to rest her head against his chest.  
  
“Roll over,” he whispered.  
  
Lifting her head, she gave a nod and rolled off of him and onto her side and watched as he shifted around so that he was hovering over her again. In turn, Jo shifted as well so that both their bodies lined up with each other.  
  
Leaning down, Rick kissed her and lowered his hips against her; slowly rubbing his cock against her thigh to build the friction back up. As his it began to get harder again, he rubbed the length against her slit, which brought a receptive sigh out of her. Rick licked his lips and watched her face as he kept rubbing himself against her until he knew they were both ready to go full force again.  
  
While he loved to watch her face as she writhed underneath him, he wanted an angle that was always more fun for them both.  
  
This was their re-wedding night. There was no place for vanilla sex here.  
  
Leaning down, Rick placed his lips beside her ear. “Get on your hands and knees,” he instructed breathily.  
  
Without hesitation, Jo rolled over again and Rick sat up straight. He waited and watched as she lay upon her stomach, but only for a moment, before propping herself up on her hands and knees as requested. Sidling up behind her, Rick used his hands to silently guide her arms up for her to hold onto the headboard. For a moment, he placed his hands upon her shoulders before dragging them down her back, to the curve of her waist, and then coming to rest on her hips. The bottom of her dress had fallen back down and covered her ass completely, so he used his thumb to gradually bunch the thin material up until it was pooled around her waist and her ass was bare to him.  
  
Instinctively, she parted her legs and arched her back, and Rick countered by grinding himself against her; once against sliding his hardened length back and forth along her moistened sheath. Unable to continue like that much longer, Rick positioned his tip at her entrance and slowly guided his entire length within her velvety folds.  
  
Releasing a shaky breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in, Rick returned his hands to her hips and gripped firmly as he waited a moment for her to adjust to him before sliding halfway out and then, just as slowly as before, all the way back in. He purposely kept it at this pace, to drag this out as long as he could. He wanted the moment to last, so neither of them came too quickly.  
  
Gradually, he quickened his pace. The more fervent and deep his thrusts, the more ragged their breaths and guttural their moans. Jo began to rock back against him, rolling her hips on his dick while clenching and unclenching her walls around him to the point that Rick thought he might literally see stars. He focused his gaze on her ass, watching the way it jiggled with each thrust he made. Moving his hands from her hips, he instead gripped her ass cheeks instead; spreading them and massaging them and, on more than one occasion, giving them a firm but painless slap. When he felt his balls tightening with the coming of another orgasm, Rick hunched forward so that his chest was pressed almost completely against her back. One hand he moved to grip the headboard with her while the other reached around to her front and began to strum her bud like she was a finely tuned guitar.  
  
And that was virtually all it took.  
  
His fingers barely had to stroke her and she was already cumming and crying out his name. The warm juices slickened tenfold around his shaft and Rick closed her eyes, pressing his forehead between her shoulders blades, as he stopped holding back. Giving in to his own orgasm, he spilled his seed into her depths and his hips bucked erratically against her ass.  
  
Dropping her hands down onto the pillows, Rick followed with her while still pumping inside her until the last of their tremors ebbed away. When their bodies were spent, he curled his arms around her chest and pulled her down onto the side so that he was spooning her while still buried deep. He didn’t want to slip out yet and Jo felt completely content with him staying there.  
  
As silence fell around them, they could hear everyone still talking away downstairs if they listened carefully, and they both seemed to wonder the same thing.  
  
Had the others been able to hear everything Rick and Jo had just been doing, or had the others been talking too loud among themselves that the noises the couple made ended up drowned out?  
  
At this point, neither Rick nor Jo cared. It wasn’t rocket science to figure out the couple had left dinner early for the sole purpose of having sex. Poor Sophia had seemed to understand that, which was a little embarrassing for Rick and Jo, and they were just thankful that at least Mika was still oblivious and could look her in the eye the next day.  
  
Nuzzling the back of neck, Rick ‘mmm-ed’ into her hair. Lifting a hand, he snaked it down the front of her dress and cupped one of her breasts; finding solace in just holding it.  
  
“I’m so fucking tired now,” he murmured with a slight laugh.  
  
“I’m not.”  
  
“Yeah, well, you got to be lazy today. I actually did work.”  
  
Reaching a hand around, Jo pushed at him and forced him to finally slide out of her. Rolling around so that she was now lying on her opposite side, Jo faced Rick with a narrowed gaze. “You told me to be lazy. Don’t give me that shit.”  
  
Rick chuckled and then leaned in to kiss her; still tasting himself on her lips. “I know. I’m only teasing.”  
  
“Bastard,” she said with a smile.  
  
Rick smiled back, and quite brightly at that. “I love you, wife.”  
  
“I love you, too, husband.” Cupping a hand against his smooth cheek, Jo brushed her nose against his and then kissed him again. “If I let you go to sleep now, you gotta promise you’ll wake me up with morning sex, okay?”  
  
Rick couldn’t contain his amusement as he let out a hearty chuckle. Mirroring her gesture, he cupped the side of her face and kissed her back. “That’s a promise I’ll make every morning if you let me.” One more kiss to her lips and Rick dropped his head down upon his pillow and then just stared at her. When he began to close his eyes, he brought his hand away from her face and wrapped his arm around her waist as he snuggled against her; moving his face to rest upon her chest instead. “Your tits make better pillows,” he mumbled sleepily.  
  
Jo smirked, curling an arm around his head and playing with his dark brown curls that were matted to the side of his face from perspiration. After a few minutes, when he breathing seemed deeper and it was likely he was already the early stages of sleep, Jo tilted her head so that it leaned against the top of his.  
  
“Goodnight, sweet prince; and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest,” she whispered, a content smile toying at the corners of her lips.  
  
“Mmm,” was the only reaction she got out of Rick.  
  
Finding absolute comfort in the way he seemed to wrap around her as he fell deeper into sleep, Jo closed her own eyes and found sleep found her just as easily without trying.


	53. December

_“How did it get so late so soon?_

_It's_ _night before it's afternoon._

_December is here before it's June._

_My goodness how the time has flewn._

_How did it get so late so soon?”_

— Dr. Seuss

* * *

  
Wrapped tightly in a thick, plaid blanket that was so much longer than her height that it trailed behind like a queen’s ceremonial robe on the way to her coronation, Jo scurried down the back stairs from her and Rick’s bedroom, completely barefoot, despite his displeasure with her walking around without socks on. Mostly it stemmed from how she would accidentally touch her bare feet against his legs while they slept and it would give him an unpleasant jolt from how cold her feet were compared to the heat he seemed to naturally emanate. Also, he just didn’t want her to catch a cold. Even though the fireplaces were now up and working, the house was still drafty and it was getting even colder outside.  
  
Jo just couldn’t help it. She had never been a big fan of socks and shoes for most of her life. She used to walk around barefoot outside and inside when she was home. Even when she got cold, she would bundle up with the appropriate amount of layers of clothing, and yet still forego socks. They were prisons for her feet. When the world fell apart, though, she had no choice but wear something on her feet virtually at all times. Especially while she slept, because she never knew when she’d have to get up and make a run for it. Even at the prison, it just wasn’t safe to not wear something at all times.  
  
But life was different for them now, here at Mount Vernon. Life was quiet, and peaceful.  
  
In the month since Rick and Jo’s “re-wedding” there hadn’t been one negative incident, unless you’d consider Mika dropping the full bucket from the portable toilet before she got it outside to be dumped.  
  
_That_ had been a right nightmare.  
  
The smell was evenly matched with that of the undead, cleaning the floor and walls where it all splashed was as far from a good time as possible, and then Mika crying so hard because she had been so embarrassed by the accident made that day just…just bad.  
  
Fortunately, the floor and walls were cleaned so well by Nicole and Tara that no one would’ve ever known human shit had just been there. Doors were left open for a while to air it all out and the bottle of Febreeze that Rick had found on a small supply run days before had finally come in handy. Mika was also calmed down and it was decided that she didn’t need to be in charge of disposing of the waste. The grown-ups would take care of that. Karen and Jo both felt even better about it all because Nicole had explicitly disallowed the pair from that chore. Since they were pregnant, she didn’t want them to get their hands literally or figuratively dirty with any task in or around the house that could get them sick and endanger the lives they were growing within them. In fact, because of how Karen and Jo had both had further spotting as of late, they were both told not to take part in most of the physical chores around the house or the property.  
  
The house, in itself, was starting to feel more and more like a home, and less like a living museum. It was no longer a window into George Washington’s past, but an opportunity for lives to flourish once again. The fact that the new world was closer to 18 th century life rather than the 21st century helped the family considerably. Everything in the house and around the property was conducive to life now. It was just a matter of getting accustomed to it all, and learning how to use everything, which was actually not a hard task at all. Team Family seemed to be a bunch of quick learners. Plus, it helped that they’d already lived somewhat similarly in their previous camps; the prison or the Commune, depending on the person.  
  
During supply runs for extra things they might need, Rick had found the portable toilet that must’ve belonged to an elderly person who had it in their bedroom in case they couldn’t make it to their bathroom during the night. Luckily, it was clean and empty, which meant there were no worries about bringing it back to Mount Vernon. The biggest find from that same day had been the tub.  
  
It was a copper, free-standing claw foot tub that was just sitting there in the master bathroom of some craftsman style bungalow. He just stared at it, thinking about the possibilities. He thought about how nice it had been to soak in that tub with Jo back at the Commune, even if the water had been cold. Sponge bathing got old after a while and the idea of being able to properly bathe, submerged in water was tantalizing. The main issue would be how to get it to Mount Vernon and where to put it afterward.  
  
Returning to Mount Vernon, he had found Tyreese and broached the subject with him. With the larger man’s help, Rick wouldn’t have much trouble getting the tub home. Daryl and Finn were coming back to that bungalow, too, to help. First, they had to fold down the two back rows from their passenger van so they had the space to transport it, and once at the bungalow they were able to wrench it free of the pipes; taking only the plug for the bottom of the tub to keep water from draining out once it was filled. They loaded it into the van, drove it home to Mount Vernon and brought it up to the house where they carried it inside and then left it in the entrance hall because Rick was still unsure where to put it.  
  
After a day of mulling it over, he decided on the little parlor. The harpsichord in that room was moved into the adjoining ballroom along with the small, leather couch that happened to also be a settee bed. The table and two chairs, however, remained in the room, as a place to store bathroom toiletries anyone would need. The carpeting in the little parlor was ripped up and removed, and then an average coffee mug-sized hole was cut into the floor. When the tub was brought into the room, it was placed along the wall opposite the windows, nearest the fireplace. The tub was positioned so that the hole in the bottom of the tub coincided with the slightly larger hole in the floor, so when water in the tub needed to be drained, it would empty down into the hole in the floor which ended up somewhere in the stone cellar, they assumed. The portable toilet had then been placed where the leather couch had been. The buckets of water everyone had been using in their rooms for sponge bathing were no longer necessary and instead occupied their newly minted bathroom, since the 18th century house didn’t have one before that.  
  
To go to the bathroom beforehand, they’d all had to go outside and use the 18th century style privies that were basically glorified outhouses. It had become less and less ideal the colder it got, and especially at night. No one wanted to have to wander around outside in the cold with only a flashlight to use the facilities. The guys had it easy; just having to whip it out when they had to take a piss. The girls? Not so much.  
  
Another great find had been the portable generator that was brought back to Mount Vernon and placed into the infirmary. Once it was running, the ultrasound machine was hooked up to it. Karen and Jo got to actually see their babies inside of them, and how they were doing. It was still too soon to tell what either was having, a boy or a girl, but Nicole was able to determine both babies seemed healthy, with strong heartbeats. She was even able to print out copies sonogram for each expecting mother to have. The fathers, Tyreese and Rick, had been present for the viewing of their respective partner’s womb, and both men cried happy tears at the sight before them.  
  
Life was getting better, despite all the many previous losses they’d all been through. It almost felt too good to be true, that nothing bad had happened yet. Each person smiled more and laughed more. Each person was happier, but there was no denying the underlying feeling that they were walking on egg shells, just waiting on that other shoe to drop. Every time anything good had happened in the past, something bad was just around the corner to balance things out.  
  
It reminded Rick and Jo of their conversation heated conversation after Sam’s death in North Carolina, about how their lives were a rollercoaster. Up and down. Good things, then bad things, and then more good things, only for more bad things. Up and down, back and forth.  
  
On this specific day, Jo had no reason not to believe it wouldn’t be another good day. And she would be correct in that assumption.  
  
In fact, it was literally a specific day.  
  
Rick had gone out early that morning, just after sunrise, as he did most mornings, but this time it was to scavenge some nearby houses he’d been meaning to look through. Daryl had gone with him; never one to really sit still in one place too long anyway. Both men had only been gone a few hours, returning around ten or eleven with backpacks filled with important things they could put to use, like more toiletries, batteries, canned goods, and candles. But also little things they didn’t necessarily need but would like to have, that would bring smiles to their faces, such as a bag of M&Ms, the Monopoly board game and books to read.  
  
Jo was scuttling through the infirmary toward the dining room, wrapped in that long, plaid blanket when she heard the front door opening, with Rick and Daryl’s voice filling the air a moment later.  
  
With a smile on her face, Jo stepped around the dining table in the bright green dining room and slipped out into the entrance hall. Reaching a hand out, she grabbed onto the curled base of the black walnut staircase’s railing and just stood there as Rick turned and saw her.  
  
“Hey,” she greeted; playfully narrowing her eyes at him. “You left again without waking me to say goodbye. You gotta stop doing that.”  
  
Rick winced, then flashed her a half smile. “Yeah, I know. But you looked so warm and peaceful all bundled up in that bed.” Stepping up to her, he greeted properly with a kiss. When they parted, and slowly at that, he glanced down at the floor and frowned. “And what did I tell you about wearing socks?”  
  
Jo grinned. “You’re not the boss of me.”  
  
Daryl snorted as he came forward, shifting the backpack hanging off his shoulder. “She ain’t wrong. More like she’s the boss of you.”  
  
Rick threw Daryl a look of mock betrayal. “Whose side are you on?”  
  
“Hers,” Daryl replied without missing a beat. “Ain’t you learned yet to not get on the bad side of a pregnant woman?”  
  
Jo raised an eyebrow at the archer. “And if I weren’t pregnant?”  
  
“You’d still be the boss.”  
  
With a victorious grin, Jo stepped over to Daryl and squeezed his face in the hand not holding her blanket around her and kissed his cheek. “There’s a good boy,” she quipped. “Now, what’d you two bring back this time? An elliptical, maybe?”  
  
“An elliptical? Really?” Rick questioned with a chuckle. Setting his backpack down on the curled base of the railing, he unzipped it and began to forage.  
  
“I wouldn’t be surprised if you did,” she replied. “After seeing that claw foot tub come through that door, anything’s possible.”  
  
“You love that claw foot tub.”  
  
“I do,” she agreed. “Doesn’t mean seeing it appear wasn’t hilarious.”  
  
“The tub was a practical find,” Rick maintained, his face still buried within his backpack; clearly looking for something in particular.  
  
“An elliptical would be, too. Keep ourselves in shape now that we’re not constantly moving from place to place. And it would be just as hilarious, either way, and—what are you looking for in there? Digging to China?”  
  
Rick looked up at his wife and rolled his eyes. “No.” Biting down on his bottom lip, he smirked when he touched down on whatever it was he was trying to find amidst the jam-packed clutter of baubles and bits he’d brought back home with him. Withdrawing a white device of some sort with a grey screen and what looked to be random words and numbers all over it. “Check it out.”  
  
Jo narrowed her gaze. “Is that a digital calendar?”  
  
“Solar powered. Means it’s never lost track of time like we have.” Handing it over to Jo, Rick just smiled. “Today is the third of December, in case you were wondering.”  
  
Taking the calendar into her hands, Jo felt suddenly emotional. It was almost ridiculous how something as simple as knowing the exact date could make her so inexplicably happy. As tears stung her eyes, Rick moved his backpack down from the railing and set it on the floor at the base of the stairs. With a single step forward, he pulled Jo into his arms.  
  
Feeling awkward to just stand there watching the couple, Daryl cleared his throat. “I’m gonna take this into the blue room and sort through this shit,” he muttered, turning around and ducking into what was technically called the West Parlor. But, because it was painted completely blue, all anyone called it was the ‘blue room.’  
  
Rick pulled back and placed his hands on either side of Jo’s face, smiling down at her. “I figured you’d like having that. Hell, I think we’d all like having it,” he commented. “I have no idea when exactly this world fell apart since I was in a coma, but the rest of you would remember, and could figure how long it’s been. But mostly, now we can know when to look forward to special days, like Christmas or birthdays. We’ll know the day our baby is born. He or she will have a birthdate. So will Tyreese and Karen’s baby.”  
  
Smiling so happily through her waning tears, Jo leaned her forehead against Rick’s chest. “Hope would’ve been about ten months old now, give or take a week or two, I guess. If it’s December, she was born in around early or mid-February.” Lifting her head up, she seemed confused. “That doesn’t seem right. It wasn’t cold at all when we met. We would’ve met in January.”  
  
“It was unseasonably warm after the New Year, but the months before that were as cold as hell. Maybe the outbreak affected global warming or whatever. I don’t know.”  
  
Jo smirked. “Al Gore’s gotta be rolling in his grave.”  
  
With a chuckle, Rick took the calendar back and nodded. “He ain’t the only one.” Off the curious raise of Jo’s eyebrow, Rick sighed. “Dale. He had this book that helped him keep track of dates. And when we got to that self-storage facility, a short time later, he deduced it was Christmas and we all celebrated. I mean, there wasn’t snow but it was a bit cold, so we just believed him. And a week after that we celebrated New Year’s Eve. I guess time really became lost on us, especially Dale, because there is no way it was Christmas when we celebrated it then.”  
  
“Maybe he knew it wasn’t actually Christmas but figured it was something y’all needed.”  
  
Rick considered this. “Yeah, maybe. Most of us _were_ getting pretty close to ripping each other’s throats out,” he joked lightly. “Me, Shane, Lori, and even Andrea. We were all arguing with each other and Hershel played mediator. He got us to play nice for once.”  
  
Jo just smiled at the image of the four of them bickering and Hershel putting his foot down; the parent among squabbling children. She hadn’t known either Hershel or Dale long, but both men had left enough of a mark on her; so much so she named gave Hope the middle name of Dale before he died. She’d been born barely an hour before. Jo had heard the stories of the in-fighting already, usually from Andrea, Lori or Carol because the guys never talked about stuff like that. The women still liked to gossip, even after the world went to shit. It helped Jo get to know everyone better in the early days, which was barely a year ago.  
  
Damn, time was a weird thing nowadays.  
  
And apparently so was the weather.  
  
“So, where is everyone?” Rick wondered, crouching down to lift his backpack up onto his shoulder again.  
  
Jo shrugged. “I don’t really know. The baby’s made me feel extra tired lately so I slept in late, and it felt amazing, by the way. I literally had just woken up a few minutes before you and Daryl got back.”  
  
Rick tilted his head slightly. “Morgan’s probably taking care of Bessie.”  
  
“She’s been doing better; getting healthier,” Jo remarked in regard to the cow in question. Hushing her voice, she added, “That’s more than I can say for Jen, though. I mean, she’s been adapting better to not having her hand anymore and contributing to chores, but she doesn’t really look any better, you know?”  
  
Rick nodded in agreement. “And if this winter turns out to be as brutal as I fear, she’s gonna need to refrain from those chores and take it extra easy like you and Karen. She’ll make herself sick and she looks like death as it is most days.”  
  
“But she’s so positive that you almost forget the state she’s in.”  
  
“I think that’s a sign she’ll be right as rain eventually. It’s just taking her a bit longer to get there.”  
  
Jo sighed. “I hope so. I mean, I’m not that close with her, which is a shame since she’s my brother’s girlfriend and all, but I’d hate to see her get worse, simply for Finn’s sake. He loves her so damn much.”  
  
“Maybe we should throw them a wedding, too. I mean, what’s anyone waiting for these days?” Rick chuckled. “The dead are walking the earth. A meteor could hit us tomorrow, so why wait for anything, right?”  
  
With a tiny upturn of her lips, Jo smacked Rick’s arm and then pulled her blanket tighter about her when it began to slip. “Well, since no one’s apparently around, and if they needed us they would holler, and since you don’t seem to busy right now…” Jo trailed, giving him a come hither look.  
  
“I like the way you think, woman.”  
  
Jo’s small smile grew bigger when he quickly caught on.  
  
Setting the solar powered calendar into his backpack, Rick walked backward and stepped into the blue room where Daryl was sitting on a couch, cleaning under his dirty fingernails with the tip of his knife instead of going through his own backpack like he said he’d be. Rick set his down at Daryl’s feet and didn’t bother with sugarcoating what he said next.  
  
“I’m gonna go fuck my wife. You need me for anything else right now?”  
  
Daryl let out a snort of laughter. “Nah, I don’t need ya for anything. Go fuck your wife.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
As Rick left the backpack and stepped back into the front hall, Jo was staring back at him and shaking her head. “You’re an ass,” she giggled.  
  
“Hey, you’re the one that married me. _Twice_.”  
  
Without a moment of hesitation or waiting from any verbal response out of her, Rick lifted Jo up into his arms and carried her bridal style into the dining room like he did when he carried her across the threshold of their bedroom on their re-wedding night.  
  
Further giggles escaped Jo’s lips and trailed after them on the air as they made their way upstairs.

 

* * *

  
Another week had passed.  
  
It was now the tenth of December and just knowing that was something special.  
  
The entirety of Team Family seemed to find a certain amount of peace in the simple joy of knowing what day it was. They had even begun preparations for celebrating Christmas. Because they had missed Thanksgiving, Michonne was insistent they find a turkey that she and Tara could cook in the kitchen; the two of them having taken on that particular chore and getting pretty accustomed to how the kitchen — an entire building separate from the main house — worked. Daryl would go off hunting in his spare time, usually alone, but sometimes Sophia came with him. It had actually been Daryl who suggested it; possibly because with it being near the holiday, which was a time to gather with loved ones, they were starting to miss Carol more than ever, and the two of them used that time together to bond over their shared grief while Sophia was further taught a useful skill.  
  
On this day in particular, Jo and Karen were spearheading the task of making decorations that would soon adorn the house. Mika and Jen helped. It was the one task that required little to no physical exertion that Nicole signed off on as being okay for the three adults involved. Several aluminum pans of Jiffy Pop popcorn had been found on an earlier supply run and had been heated in the kitchen, thanks to Michonne. Now, it was all being laced onto string to be used as garland. Mika and Jen were painting several pieces red and green with the Crayola paint set that had been found specifically for Mika and Sophia. It gave it more of a festive feel than just plain ol’ popcorn. It also prevented anyone from eating any. Strips of construction paper were being glued together in links to make more garlands to be hung. They wanted to somehow make ornaments, but they needed a tree, which explained Rick’s absence that day.  
  
He hadn’t gone off alone. He never did that one a run. It just wasn’t safe, no matter how familiar they were becoming with the neighboring areas and how much they’d secured certain places to keep Mount Vernon cut off from the rest of the world. Daryl was off hunting again with Sophia, hoping to find a turkey and bring it home alive to keep it fresh until Christmas. This meant Rick didn’t have his usual right hand man at his side, and instead brought Finn and Michonne along for the ride. Both seemed to need an escape from the house.  
  
For Michonne, she just needed a break from the house and wanted to spread her wings a bit again. Finn, on the other hand, had become akin to a helicopter parent; always hovering around Jen to make sure she was okay and had everything she needed. Even though she was still weak and didn’t seem to be improving, at least she wasn’t getting worse, and Jen seemed to be getting tired of the lack of breathing room Finn was giving her. She loved him, and he loved her, but his hovering was becoming an issue that Rick had picked up on. Bringing his brother-in-law along was mostly a gift for Jen. It gave her time to just relax with the girls to enjoy something normal without the twenty questions of if she was alright or needed anything like food to eat, warm tea to drink or an extra blanket.  
  
Sitting behind the wheel of one of the sedans they’d taken to using for smaller supply runs, Rick tapped his fingers to the music wafting from the stereo, thanks to the CD Michonne had popped in after calling shotgun. They were both bopping their heads slightly to the sounds of Fleetwood Mac’s _Rumours_ album.  
  
“I used to picture myself as a black Stevie Nicks when I was a teenager,” Michonne muttered, halfway through ‘Dreams’. “I had this friend that dragged me to a renaissance fair with her parents when I was about fifteen or sixteen. I bought this dress with some money I’d saved up and it looked like the one Stevie Nicks wore on the album cover. It just so happened I was going through a classic rock faze then. Not typical for a girl of my particular coloring, growing up in Atlanta.”  
  
Rick smirked. “Did you have the tambourine and lacey shawls and everything?”  
  
“No. But I did have a recorder.”  
  
“You played the recorder?” Rick chuckled heartily.  
  
“Oh, yeah. I played the shit of that recorder.”  
  
“That is definitely not something I would’ve guessed by looking at you.”  
  
Michonne grinned. “I wasn’t always this cool.”  
  
Rick looked over at her and continued to smirk before returning his full focus to the road as it curved to the right. Just up a ways, the side street he’d been meaning to search at some point anyway was fast approaching. He’d been down it once before, but there hadn’t been enough time to clear the area. It was covered with enough walkers to prove a hassle, but today he had come here first, so he had the time, and he had Michonne and Finn’s help. And, like Jo had said to him before: Michonne was like a ninja with that katana of hers. She was fast and precise with her walker kills.  
  
Turning left onto Lynnhall Place, the road in question, Rick knew it led to a dead end with large homes, and a few were gated. Gated meant contained. It meant nothing was really getting in or getting out. Walkers on the street could be kept off the property and give them time to search more freely without the worry of a walker coming up on them. Then again, there was still the prospect of the property and the house being filled up with the dead, much like Mount Vernon was. But, that was nothing they couldn’t handle. If they could clear an estate like Mount Vernon in under a week, they could clear a McMansion on about an acre of land.  
  
Pulling slowly up to the end of the road, Rick let the car idle for a few moments before deciding to turn it off. Several walkers had taken notice and he was trying to assess the path he’d take once he’d slipped from the vehicle. Directly in front of them was a rather Palladian-style house, wide open and not very protected from anything. To their left was a Plantation-style home, surrounded primarily by some minor tree and shrubbery coverage. To the right was the typically gaudy McMansion type of house, and just as open as the one in front of them. The large home between the Palladian and the gaudy one was the only one nearby that was gated with both wrought iron fencing and greenery. On the other side of the gate was a circular driveway in front of the house, which appeared much larger than the others. Rick’s aim was for that house.  
  
The gate would’ve required electricity to keep it locked in the old world, but now there was also no electricity to open it. Even though the fencing was short, the top was spiked with pointy railheads. However, the silver lining was the stone pillar between sections of fence that could be climbed upon and used to jump over into the property.  
  
That was Rick’s plan so far.  
  
Get out of the car, kill walkers in their way, and climb over the pillar.  
  
With a nod, mostly to himself, Rick looked at Michonne and then at Finn in the backseat. “Alright, that house,” he pointed at the gated McMansion. “We clear our path to that pillar between the fences and climb over.”  
  
Finn leaned forward between both front seats and narrowed his eyes toward the wrought iron gate. “You know, that gate’s being held closed with a chain of some sort. We have bolt cutters in the trunk,” the younger man deduced. “We cut those, we can just push the gate open and walk right through like we own the place.”  
  
Rick followed his brother-in-law’s gaze and frowned. He hadn’t seen the chain and now felt like an idiot. “If there’s a chain keeping the gate closed, nothing else is,” he realized. The lack of electricity was no longer keeping the gate locked in place. But it also meant something else. “Someone would’ve put that chain there to keep something out, or something in.”  
  
“We could be dealing with a house full of walkers,” Michonne remarked.  
  
“Nothing we can’t handle, right?” Rick smirked at her with a rather charmingly mischievous way.  
  
Michonne looked back at him with a slight squint that she paired with a smile. “When you smile like that I can understand why Jo turns to butter around you.”  
  
Rick was immediately taken aback by the comment.  
  
Finn, too.  
  
“I—I wasn’t—I wasn’t flirting,” Rick suddenly became embarrassed and flustered by what she’d said. He looked over his shoulder, back at Finn to ensure he’d meant nothing by it.  
  
“Wow,” Michonne laughed. “I wasn’t implying you were, but now I know how to turn you a bright shade of red.”  
  
“I swear I wasn’t flirting. I’d never—I mean, that’s not to say you aren’t an attractive woman— ”  
  
“ _Whoa_ , Rick, reel it back in,” Finn muttered, leaning forward and slapping his brother-in-law on the shoulder. “You’re just gonna put your foot further into your mouth.”  
  
“I wasn’t flirting, though, I was just smiling.”  
  
“Yeah, we get it.”  
  
Michonne was just all out cackling by this point. Slumping against the passenger door, she wiped some tears from her eyes. “Your face. Sweet Jesus, it’s priceless. I wish I had a camera.”  
  
Rick frowned and shook his head. “Aww, fuck you.”  
  
In response, Michonne just kept laughing.  
  
“Let’s just get this fucking done with,” Rick huffed.  
  
Staring forward, he refocused his mind and energy on the gate, and then let his eyes wander toward the walkers starting to swarm the car. Turning the key in the ignition to start the car back up, but keeping it in park, he was able to roll his window down halfway. Without missing a beat, he pulled out a pocket knife and jammed the blade into the rotted forehead of the first undead face that came close enough to the window. When the body dropped, Rick quickly turned the car off and tossed the keys to Michonne. Turning in his seat, pulled the handle and opened the door wide and fast, knocking back two other walkers that had gotten close enough. The force with which Rick had done so had caused those walkers to stumble back. One of them had even fallen into the side of the car and dropped to the ground, disoriented.  
  
Using the window of opportunity provided him by the walkers stumbling out of the way, Rick practically jumped out of the car. Slamming the door shut, he kept the knife in one hand and then slid his machete out. Forging a path away from the car, Rick’s unrelenting slaughter of walkers gave Michonne and Finn a chance to free themselves of the car as Rick was causing enough of a distraction for them to do so.  
  
Armed with their own weapons, Michonne and Finn came up behind the amassed walkers that were beginning to swarm Rick and started to help pick them off. As the undead numbers dropped, Michonne hurried around to the back of the car and unlocked the trunk, removing the bolt cutters Finn had mention. As she shut the trunk, she was caught off guard by an approaching walker and wasn’t able to defend herself fast enough. Fortunately, she didn’t have to.  
  
As she stared directly into the decayed face that had been moments away from chowing down on her own face, part of Rick’s machete was suddenly sticking through the walker’s head, having been impaled from the back of its skull by the blade. Gripping the walker’s shoulder for leverage, Rick pulled the blade back out and let the body drop between them.  
  
With a nod of thanks, Michonne took a deep breath mentally kicked herself for letting her guard down for even a second. “Thanks,” she expressed verbally as well.  
  
Rick nodded back. “You can thank me by not bringing up that train wreck of a conversation in the car to Jo,” he muttered, taking a step back and pocketing his pocket knife. “Jo would understand, I’ve no doubt, but it would also give her ammunition to tease me with later.”  
  
Michonne smirked. “Deal.”  
  
Smiting the few, remaining walkers in their immediate path, Rick led the way toward the gate and gestured for Michonne to hand him the bolt cutters. As she did, he simultaneously returned his machete to his side. With both hands completely free to hold the cutters, he took them to the chain keeping the gate closed. Gritting his teeth, he applied enough force to snap the chain. With a simple yank, he removed the chain from the gate and tossed it aside into the low shrubbery. Taking a moment, he looked up at the house and then gave the gates a decent shove forward.  
  
As the gates swung open, and slowly at that due to how heavy they were, Rick stepped inside with his right hand reaching instinctively toward the grip of his Colt Python. Narrowing his gaze, he took in the sight of the front yard and how overgrown the landscaping was, just like it was everywhere else. Dead leaves littered the ground from the previous fall and the one that was on its way out; he trees more or less already bare now. Even though it was basically mid-December and there was still no snow, and despite the bright sun overhead, the clouds that were forming in the sky lately seemed heavier. The air was even colder and had more bite to it, especially the closer to water they got, like back at Mount Vernon or hear at this McMansion that was right on the Potomac River as well.  
  
“Looks quiet,” Finn remarked, looking up at the house.  
  
“Looks are deceiving,” Rick replied. “That gate was locked for a reason and we’re about to find out why soon enough.”  
  
“Remind me again why we’re here?”  
  
“Specifically or in general?”  
  
“Specifically.” Finn gripped the handle of his axe a little tighter as they neared the front door. “I’m not having some existential crisis about why we’re on this planet.”  
  
Rick threw a look over his shoulder at the younger man and rolled his eyes. “You know why. And if we don’t find one in this house, there’s bound to be one in at least one of the other houses.”  
  
“Is that seriously it? Risking our necks so we can get a stupid—”  
  
A crashing sound from inside the house easily pulled their focus away as they scurried up to the front door and tried peering inside the tall paneled windows on either side.  
  
“What do you think that was?” Finn asked, changing the subject back to the more immediate task at hand.  
  
“Judging by this house, probably a million dollar Ming vase or something equally as expensive,” Rick bantered.  
  
“Yeah, okay, but living or dead?”  
  
Rick shrugged.  
  
“Maybe it was an animal,” Michonne offered.  
  
“You think an animal can survive nearly two years alone in a house like this?” Finn wondered.  
  
“For one, animals are highly intelligent beings capable of a great many things we humans don’t give them enough credit for,” she riposted as they sidestepped away from the front door and toward the side of the house. “Secondly, I read about this study published a few years ago about how a middle-aged woman had been eaten by both of her dogs. And you know what the worst part was?”  
  
“Being eaten by her pets wasn’t the worst part?” Rick questioned, as he led them along the closed garage bays, further around to the back of the house.  
  
“The dogs consumed her entire body. The only things left of the poor woman were small bone fragments, a piece of her skull, and some hair. Apparently the woman had been dead for a whole month before she was found. Officers at the scene arrived to find two bags full of dog food that had been ripped open and eaten. They had run out of their normal food, so they had to look elsewhere.”  
  
“This is why I was always a cat person,” Finn quipped.  
  
“Oh, no, cats have been known to do the same thing. It’s instinctual. When they get hungry, they’ll eat whatever they can. And if your dead ass is just lying there, you’re fair game.”  
  
“Let’s hope the woman was dead before her dogs ate her, and not the reason why she died.”  
  
The back of the property sloped slight, with steps leading down toward the back of the house where there was a concrete patio below with dual stone staircases that led up to the same stone deck. Looking between Finn and Michonne, Rick continued to take lead; heading up the stairs first. Michonne went next, and then Finn. Once on the deck, Rick moved forward, toward the large two-story windows that gave the back of the house an amazing view of the river, but the glare from the sun prevented being able to see inside without pressing his nose up against the glass. Unfortunately, that was what Rick would have to do.  
  
Stepping slowly up to the glass, Rick was expecting a walker to slam up against the other side while hoping the noise inside could just be attributed to someone’s abandoned pet gone stir crazy. Looking to his right, he saw Michonne had her katana at the ready. At his left Finn was also rearing to go at a moment’s notice. From what Rick could see inside, he was looking into a large family room that seemed rather lived-in.  
  
Moving back from the window, Rick walked over toward the door that led into the house. Grabbing the handle, he wasn’t sure whether or not he was surprised to find the door open. Gingerly he walked inside, letting his eyes scan the interior for any signs of a threat. Over to his left was the kitchen that opened up into the large family room he was standing in. As Michonne and Finn came in behind him, Rick began to mill about the room, touching his free hand down to pillows and blankets strewn about the wraparound couch and the floor. Unlit candles were everywhere, charred logs were in the fireplace, empty cans could be see piling up on the counters in the kitchen along with pots, and a few empty water bottles with the exception of one which was halfway filled still. The board game of Chutes and Ladders was spread out on the coffee table, abandoned, but how long ago it had been abandoned was the real question.  
  
“I wonder who’d been staying here?” Finn wondered; not really looking for an answer.  
  
“Whoever it was left not too long ago,” Michonne remarked. “The smell of burning wood is still hanging in the air. A fire was burning in that fireplace recently. Maybe not today or the day before, but recently.”  
  
“Considering we heard something from in here a few minutes ago, I think it’s safe to assume someone still _is_ here. Probably saw us coming up toward the front door and ran to hide somewhere,” Rick spoke. Stretching his arm out, he tapped the blade of his machete against the wall and waited for a moment. “Hello! Anyone here?”  
  
Nothing.  
  
“We’re not here to hurt you. If there’s someone here, we won’t take anything from you. We’ll leave and go somewhere else instead.”  
  
“If there’s no one here, then asking if someone is would be pointless,” Finn quipped with a smile thrown over to Michonne.  
  
She merely shook her head at him to shut up.  
  
Rick, ignoring his brother-in-law’s comment, tapped the machete against the wall again, but this time harder and louder. “We heard something break in here, so we know someone’s gotta be here. Or maybe it’s some _thing_ and I’m wasting my time. I promise you won’t get hurt by us. We’re good people. That being said, if you try to hurt us, we’ll be forced to defend ourselves and that’s not a fight you want to have.”  
  
Turning around, Rick looked at Finn and then Michonne before shrugging. Maybe it really was nothing. Maybe there was a window open somewhere and a breeze knocked something over. Maybe it actually was just an animal stuck in the house. Maybe it was a walker. Though, the latter seemed more and more unlikely. From the noise Rick had been making, a walker would’ve made its presence known by now.  
  
Walking toward the front of the house, Rick spotted the remains of a glass bowl on the floor in the dining room. Surrounding the shards of glass was a small puddle of looked to be water and Fruit Loops, as well as a single spoon.  
  
Someone was definitely there.  
  
Someone had been in the middle of eating, and then probably gotten so scared at the sight of people approaching that they ran and hid.  
  
“Alright, now I definitely know someone’s here. Just come out already.”  
  
“Why don’t we just go?” Finn asked. “Let’s just check the other houses for—”  
  
_“How many of you are there?”_  
  
Rick panned his face away from the younger man and directed his attention to the stairwell in the front foyer. The voice they’d just heard was male and definitely coming from upstairs.  
  
Stepping closer toward the bottom of the stairs, Rick grabbed the banister and looked up. “Three of us.”  
  
_“Do you have weapons?”_  
  
“Uh, yeah.” Rick made a face. What kind of idiot didn’t have a weapon on them these days? “Do _you_?”  
  
_“Yeah.”_  
  
“Well, I meant what I said. We won’t hurt you. We don’t want to hurt anyone. It’s not our intention, but we _will_ defend ourselves if that’s what it comes to.”  
  
_“How do I know you aren’t lying?”_  
  
“I have no reason to lie.” Rick sighed. “Tell you what. I’ll tell you my name and you tell me yours. We’ll go from there, okay?” After a moment of not getting a response, he continued. “My name’s Rick. Rick Grimes. Now it’s your turn.”  
  
Another moment passed, but it was cut short by—  
  
_“Mike.”_  
  
“Mike? Hi, Mike,” Rick greeted the voice. “I’m here with my brother-in-law Finn and our friend Michonne. We’re just here looking for certain things, things that might seem ridiculous to you. You don’t have to worry about us taking your food or water or medicine. Nothing you would need. I swear on the lives of my children.”  
  
_“You have kids?”_  
  
“Two daughters currently. Another on the way.”  
  
_“Congratulations.”_  
  
Rick chuckled, catching Finn’s smirk as well. “Thank you. Do _you_ have kids?”  
  
_“Two. Currently.”_  
  
“Expecting another one, too?”  
  
_“No,”_ came the reply. _“I lost my daughter in the beginning.”_  
  
That hit home. “I lost my son toward the beginning, and another daughter somewhat recently. I know how hard it is. Our kids aren’t supposed to go before us.”  
  
_“Tell me about it.”_  
  
“Why don’t you come out of hiding?” Rick was getting a little tired of the back and forth, and not having a face to put the voice to. As far as he knew all the talking could be a distraction to keep him and the other two busy while they were getting surrounded.  
  
_“I’m not here alone. I have people to protect. Your word that you won’t hurt anyone doesn’t really mean shit to me right now,”_ Mike remarked. _“We’ve crossed paths with too many assholes already.”_  
  
“Yeah, same here. Seems like there’s more bad than good these days. We just dealt with this big group of assholes in DC a little over a month ago.”  
  
_“Guy name Sarge?”_  
  
Rick paused. Then, “Yeah. You know him, too?”  
  
_“I’ve met some of his people. But that was more than half a year ago. They took all our shit.”_  
  
“Yeah, they took our shit, too. Well, what shit we had on us, anyway. Killed one of my people, too.”  
  
_“They did? I’m sorry.”_  
  
“Yeah, it was rough.”  
  
Suddenly a figure stepped out from around at the top of the stairs. A man in his mid to late forties appeared, standing there in a worn pair of denim jeans and a grey hoodie that had seen better days. In fact, there looked to be old stains of blood and whatever else splotched here and there. He was far from clean-shaven but his facial hair was nowhere near as overgrown as Rick’s had been. His dark eyes seemed tired but, then again, whose weren’t most days? The kicker was that all he held in his hands for protection was a baseball bat, and not even a metal one. A simple, wooden bat that looked like the last time it had seen any action was at a little league game before the apocalypse.  
  
“Well, hello there,” Rick greeted properly. “Nice to have a face to put to the voice.”  
  
“Not much of a face,” Mike replied scratching at his stubble.  
  
“You should’ve seen mine,” Rick quipped, gesturing to his own face. “Anyway, this is Finn and Michonne. How many people are you keeping safe here? Just you and your boys?”  
  
Mike shook his head. “My wife, Alyssa, and our three friends.”  
  
“All of you are hiding up there from just the three of us?” Rick was rather amused by this.  
  
Lowering his bat to the ground and using it to lean on like a cane, Mike shrugged. “If we’re being honest here, the three of you coming up toward the front of the house was intimidating enough. I mean, you’re holding a machete, katana and axe. And you have guns strapped to you.”  
  
“Don’t _you_ have guns? You said you had weapons.”  
  
“I have this bat. We have knives from the kitchen we keep stashed around the house just in case,” Mike admitted. “We have guns, but no more bullets. Blunt weapons have been enough to protect ourselves when we’ve gone out to look for food.”  
  
Rick watched the way Mike looked down toward the opposite hall from where he stood, nodding to someone there. “How long have you and your people been here?”  
  
“A couple months. Maybe three, four,” Mike answered. “We’ve had to move around a few times. My family used to live right in DC. I worked in government, but I was no one important enough to be spirited away to secured bunkers when the world began to fall apart. My family got out before the city was napalmed. We’re originally from Texas, so we tried to get on the road, but didn’t make it far. Ran out of gas, and just moved around ever since, camping out in abandoned homes like this one. This…this has been the best place we’ve had so far.”  
  
“It’s definitely cleaner than most places we’ve seen.”  
  
“Barbara passes her time with cleaning,” Mike smirked.  
  
“Barbara one of the friends you got holed up there with you?”  
  
“Uh…yeah. Sorry, it’s just been awhile since any of us have had a conversation with anyone other than ourselves or anyone from the outside world who wants to cause trouble for us.”  
  
“Well, as I said, we’re not like that,” Rick insisted, making a show of good faith by holstering his machete.  
  
Michonne and Finn followed suit.  
  
If Rick felt there was no threat, then neither did they.  
  
“The people we’re with; we’re a family,” Rick continued, narrowing his gaze up the stairs toward Mike. “My wife, our kids, my brother-in-law, his girlfriend, our friends…we’re all one family. We’ve been through so much together and it’s brought us closer. We would do anything for each other.”  
  
Mike nodded. “Same here.”  
  
“How are you on food? I noticed a bunch of empty cans piling up in the kitchen. Is that all you have to rely on? Canned goods? Have you tried hunting?”  
  
Mike snickered. “In the suburbs?”  
  
“I take it you lot have never had squirrel or raccoon,” Finn spoke up. “Our friend Daryl is an artist with a crossbow. Can hunt and catch anything that walks on four legs for us to eat.”  
  
Mike nodded and considered this. “Some of the houses around here have gardens that still produce vegetables, but not too much. We fish sometimes, but none of us seem to be really good at it. What food we find, we eat it sparingly. We haven’t been anywhere long enough to grow our own gardens.” After a moment of silence between both men, Mike gestured at Rick, Finn and Michonne. “Where are you set up? In some other house nearby?”  
  
Rick wondered whether or not he should give up their location. “We’ve been in the area almost a month and a half,” he offered up. “We cleared out a place. Took us a while, and it took all of us, but we’ve made it home.”  
  
“You look clean, well-fed…”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Mike bit his lips together. “Where…how did you do it? How are you surviving?”  
  
“It’s been a hard road, but we just keep going. That’s the only option.”  
  
Mike seemed to lose his composure a little then. He began to chew the inside of his bottom lip and looked toward the floor. “Is it safe where you are?”  
  
Rick found himself looking up at a man who was near a breaking point; someone barely holding it together. Rick saw part of himself in Mike and felt guilty. Mike might be holed up in a McMansion, but it was just a shell. Just a place. It wasn’t anywhere he could thrive with his family and his friends. “Yeah,” Rick nodded. “It’s safe.”  
  
Turning back toward the opposite hall from him, Mike beckoned for whoever he was looking at to come forward.  
  
Watching with careful eyes, with his hand instinctively going to the grip of his gun out of habit, Rick was soon welcomed with the sight of a rather thin woman in her early forties with dark blonde hair hanging well past her shoulders. She seemed incredibly timid and immediately reached out for the two boys who appeared behind her at the top of the stairs. The eldest son looked to be a year or two older than Sophia while the youngest appeared to be the same age and height as Mika. Next out came a Hispanic man who was looked no older than thirty-five, at the most, and was armed with a butcher’s knife.  
  
“This is my wife, and my boys Taylor and Ryan.” Gesturing to the Hispanic man, Mike also introduced, “This is José.”  
  
José looked skeptical about greeting Rick, Michonne and Finn. “’Sup?” he called down to them with an abrupt nod of his head.  
  
“Hi,” Rick greeted back.  
  
Lastly, another man, who looked closer to Rick’s age, stepped out of the upstairs shadows holding the hand of a short, stocky woman who had to be well into her sixties. Being the only other female, Rick could safely assume that was Barbara.  
  
“This is Lewis and his mom, Barbara,” Mike informed.  
  
“Hi,” Rick repeated. “How long have all of you known each other?”  
  
“My mother and I found José just after DC was bombed,” Lewis spoke. “My dad was getting attacked by one of the dead. I would’ve lost my mom, too, if José hadn’t showed up. He’s been by our side since. A few months later we got together with a larger group. Mike’s family was part of that. But then we got overrun with more of the dead and had to make a run for it. Lost some others along the way, and like Mike said, we’ve just been moving around. This is the best place we’ve had and the longest we’ve been anywhere.”  
  
“But we’re low on food, and we can’t really find much anywhere else,” Barbara added her two cents. “With winter on our doorsteps, we can’t afford to stay here much longer or we won’t survive.”  
  
Rick looked down from the seven people staring at him from the top of the stairs and glanced over at Michonne. The two of them looked at each other and he tried to nonverbally hold a conversation with her about what she thought they should do.  
  
With a raise of her eyebrows, and gentle expression, she tilted her head slightly in the seven’s direction and then nodded subtly at Rick.  
  
Turning to his left, Rick looked at Finn next to flesh out the same thought process.  
  
Finn simply shrugged, leaving the ball in Rick’s court.  
  
Clearing his throat, Rick placed his hands on his hips and looked back up at Mike, Lewis and the others. “Listen, the place my people and I have is nearby. We have food, enough to get us through the winter until we can start to grow more. We have weapons to protect ourselves. We have medicine and even a nurse to take care of us when we get injured or sick. The house we’re in, every bedroom is being used. I can’t make any promises to all of you right now because we need to talk to our family first and see what they say. If they’re all in agreement, we might be able to have you come back with us. We’ll share our food, find a place for you to sleep, but we’d expect you to contribute with chores; cooking, cleaning, keeping the place safe. You’ll have to learn to hunt, to bring more food to the table. Things like that.”  
  
Mike looked like he’d just been handed a winning lottery ticket. The smile of relief on his face said it all. “Y-yeah. Yes, whatever it takes, we’ll do.”  
  
“Well, like I said, we need to talk this over with our family first. But first, I need to ask you an important question.”  
  
Mike nodded eagerly. “Yeah, anything.”  
  
Rick just stared back for a moment, licking at his bottom lip. Then, “Do you know if there’s a fake Christmas tree and a box of ornaments anywhere here in this house that we can take?”

 

* * *

  
As the sedan rolled up to the house at Mount Vernon, the front door opened up before the ignition was even turned off. Jo stepped outside, wearing nothing more than a long-sleeve shirt and pair of jeans that were unzipped because they weren’t fitting right anymore because her stomach was already protruding more noticeably. She was smiling when Rick, Michonne and her brought climbed out of the car and narrowed her gaze at them.  
  
“Back so soon?” she inquired as Rick walked toward the back of the car and unhooked a bungee cord that was keeping the trunk somewhat closed.  
  
“Well, we got what we went looking for, and then some,” Finn answered.  
  
“Oh? Did you find anything good, like more chocolate, maybe? I mean, I’ll settle for anything sweet at this point. Or maybe a jar of pickles that hasn’t spoiled yet?”  
  
Yanking a rectangular, nylon storage bag out of the trunk that was large and bright red, Rick dropped it at his feet while Michonne was busy pulling a blue, 18-gallon Rubbermaid storage tote out of the back seat where she’d been sitting; having let Finn have shotgun on the drive home.  
  
“Is that what I think it is?”  
  
Rick smiled over at his wife and nodded. “One artificial Christmas tree and a box full of ornaments, just as you ladies requested.”  
  
Michonne rolled her eyes, her arm muscles flexing as she carried the box up to the front door. “Yeah, pin it on us, as if you men weren’t looking forward to having a tree to decorate, too.” With a smile, Michonne eyed Jo and then slipped past her into the house. She turned left into the blue room and continued straight through to the ballroom where they planned on setting the tree up.  
  
“We could’ve just cut down a tree,” Jo remarked, folding her arms and leaning against the doorframe.  
  
“We’d still have to go find a tree stand and ornaments,” Rick countered. “And with everything else we do around here, who wants to add watering the tree and cleaning up pine needles to the list of chores? We finally have something in our lives that won’t ever die.”  
  
Jo smirked. “Alright, point taken.”  
  
As Finn assisted Rick with carrying the storage bag up into the house, Jo stepped aside to let them in and then closed the door behind her with a shiver going up her spine from the cold air.  
  
Noticing said shiver, Rick frowned. “Why aren’t you wearing something warmer?”  
  
“I was only outside for a minute.”  
  
“A minute is long enough to catch a cold.” Looking down, he added, “And you don’t even have shoes on your feet.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes as she followed after both men as they continued to carry the bag toward the ballroom where Mika and Sophia were waiting eagerly. “At least I have socks on this time.”  
  
“Just promise me you’ll bundle up better. It’s getting so much colder out there.”  
  
“Yes, daddy.”  
  
Rick dropped his end half a second before Finn did, and then glanced over at Jo. “What’d I say about calling me that outside the bedroom?” he joked.  
  
“Oh Jesus fucking Christ, I don’t want to hear about your bedroom kinks with my sister,” Finn exclaimed with mock disgust. There was probably plenty of real disgust there, too.  
  
While the comments seemed more or less lost on the girls, Rick and Jo only smirked at each other. Michonne didn’t seem to care either way.  
  
“Where’s Jen?” Finn asked, like clockwork.  
  
“We finished the garlands and she went to lay down.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Without another word, Finn disappeared, likely to go check on his girlfriend for himself. Rick meanwhile stepped over to Jo and placed his hands on her hips and pulled her close to him for a kiss.  
  
“How was your morning so far?” he asked, parting his lips slowly from hers.  
  
“I jabbed my finger with a needle a few times while trying to impale painted popcorn onto a piece of string, but other than that it’s been pretty good,” she replied. “How about _your_ morning? Did you run into any trouble?”  
  
“Not really.”  
  
“Not really?” Jo repeated.  
  
“The cul-de-sac of McMansions had a small swarm of walkers we had to take care of, but that was pretty much it,” he answered. “Oh—and there’s seven people living in the McMansion we got the tree and ornaments from that I’m thinking we should bring back to live here with us.”  
  
“Wait—what?”  
  
“I wanted to bring it up to everyone else first, take a vote.”  
  
“And just who are these seven people? Where would you have them stay exactly?” Jo leaned back from Rick and raised an eyebrow at him.  
  
“Their de facto leader is a guy named Mike, with his wife Alyssa and their two boys. I forget the boys’ names but they're Sophia and Mika’s ages. Then there’s a guy about my age named Lewis and his mother Barbara, and Lewis’ friend José. They’re all a close knit group like ours.” Leaning in toward his wife, Rick lowered his voice. “You’ve seen how I’ve been with newcomers in the past, back at the prison. I didn’t even want to bring Sam and Ana back to the prison, regardless of the sickness we had there. But these people are different. These people are where we would’ve been right now if we hadn’t found and cleared this place. They’re running low on food. They won’t have enough to make it through the winter. They have no weapons other than a baseball bat and some kitchen knives to protect themselves. They’re sitting ducks if people not like us cross their path. Lewis, Barbara and José seem more blue-collared. They seemed willing to rough it, unlike Mike and his family. They lived the city life in DC before the shit hit the fan. They said they fish sometimes but they’re not very good at it.” Seeing the skepticism on Jo’s face that was usually reserved for his, Rick brought his hands up to her elbows and gave them a squeeze. “We found a second chance at a home, here at Mount Vernon. Mike and the others haven’t had that luxury. We can teach them how to survive better. If something happens in the future where they leave here, at least they’ll have better tools on making it somewhere else.”  
  
Jo nodded slowly, and then began to smile a little; rather loving how optimism looked on him. “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”  
  
Rick smiled back. “Exactly.”  
  
With a subtle roll of her eyes and a smile that became considerably brighter, Jo leaned in against Rick’s chest and snaked her arms up around his shoulders before placing a small kiss upon his lips. “If _you_ can trust strangers that you _just_ met, enough so that you want them to live with us, then I suppose I can trust them, too.”  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
“Don’t thank me. There are other people that live here that need convincing.”  
  
“Well, having you on board was the most important thing. And I already have Finn and Michonne’s votes. Jen will go with whatever Finn says. Morgan will likely say yes, too, because…well, you know how he is.” Rick considered the others. “Do you really think anyone else would say no?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “We’ll find out.”  
  
“Where is everyone else?”  
  
“Daryl came back with Sophia about an hour ago. Still no luck finding a turkey, but he wants to try again later. Merle was off with Tyreese, gathering more water for the house down at the river, Tara asked Nicole to start training her on basic first aid, so they’re in the infirmary right now. As for Morgan, last I saw, he went upstairs to his room. He caught his pants on a nail sticking out from some wooden beam somewhere near the stables and tore the material. He took the sewing kit to mend it.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Okay, well, let’s gather everyone up for a meeting, shall we?”

 

* * *

  
The vote to let Mike and the others come back to Mount Vernon to live had been unanimous. After Rick, Michonne and Finn had all spoke their piece about how they believed all seven people to be good people, no one seemed go against the idea.  
  
Merle proposed the idea of putting them all up in the former slave quarters. There were bunks and a fireplace to keep them warm. It could be their own place separate from the house, and while Rick considered that option, he also didn’t trust how warm it would be during the worst of the winter season. He didn’t want to bring those people to Mount Vernon, only to put them at risk of dying not long after of pneumonia because the slave quarters were too drafty and cold, regardless of whether there was a fireplace or not. And if they were hit with a bad snowstorm, trying to make their way up to the house for food and to bathe or use the bathroom wouldn’t be ideal. Maybe during the spring, Mike and his group could occupy those quarters on the property, but for the meantime Rick thought it would be okay to let them stay in the ballroom.  
  
Less than two hours after Rick had left the McMansion with Michonne and Finn, he was already returning. This time with the RV since Mike’s group only have a small car that wouldn’t fit everyone in it with their supplies. Rick drove the RV, and Michonne tagged along again.  
  
Finn stayed behind this time. His excuse was that he wanted to allow more room for Mike and his group to fit themselves and their belongings easily into the RV. However, Rick and Jo both looked at each other and seemed to be on the same page about thinking Finn just wanted to stay near Jen as usual.  
  
Once they arrived back to the McMansion, Rick and Michonne explained how the living situation would work for the winter months; that Mike and his group would stay in one room together where there was a fireplace, so they wouldn’t have to worry about keeping warm. There was the issue of no beds, so Mike’s group would need to bring their own bedding, like blankets or sleeping bags, until cots or something else could be acquired for them. When the months got warmer again, Mike and his group would be expected to utilize the other housing on the property.  
  
Rick still hadn’t even told them where exactly his group was living. It was something he was actually waiting to reveal until they arrived.  
  
When they did, Mike’s group was in awe.  
  
“You live here?” Mike asked. “You live at Mount Vernon?”  
  
Rick nodded with pride as they all began to climb out of the RV.  
  
“But…how? This place was crawling with the dead. Thousands of them, from what we heard.”  
  
“My family can handle anything,” Rick remarked.  
  
“Clearly.”  
  
“What did you hear about this place?” Michonne wondered, helping Barbara step down.  
  
Apparently the stout, 60+ year old woman had bad arthritis and no longer had the medication to help combat it anymore. She merely suffered in silence.  
  
“We met a man and his family a few months after the outbreak, before my family found Lewis, Barbara and José. This man said his family had made their way here, after the televisions stopped working but before the major radio stations powered down,” Mike explained, standing there, looking up at the house and back behind them toward the Bowling Green. “Some televangelist told people to come here, to bring their families; that they’d find an escape from the damnation of the world here.”  
  
“This place was swarmed with walkers,” Michonne said. “The road leading toward the entrance gate and the parking lots were littered with abandoned vehicles of all sorts. Trucks, cars, buses, vans.”  
  
Mike nodded. “This guy, he said the people flocked here, looking for a port in the storm, so to speak. But that’s not what this place really was. The televangelist, I remember him just barely. He used to have this show every Sunday morning on local access television. He brought hundreds if not thousands of people here, passed around water for everyone to drink and said a prayer beforehand. The guy I met that had been here, he said he and his family were among the last to get water and didn’t drink right when everyone else did. He said within minutes, everyone was convulsing and dropping dead to the ground. He forced his family to abandon the water bottles and get out of there. He realized it was all some sort of mass suicide event, like that Jonestown mass suicide back in ‘78. You know, the whole ‘don’t drink the Kool-Aid’ thing. Like Jonestown, those that weren’t drinking the water or that were trying to flee were shot on sight by members of the televangelist’s so-called church.”  
  
“Was that televangelist an older guy in his sixties, thin, with John Lennon-style eyeglasses?” Rick asked.  
  
“Uh, yeah. Yeah, that sounds like him.”  
  
Rick nodded knowingly. “Yeah, after we cleared the grounds, the only body inside the house was in the dining room with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to his head. Gotta be the same guy.”  
  
“Died just like the leader of Jonestown, too.” Still looking around, and still impressed, Mike leaned in toward Rick, just as the front door opened and Rick’s group began to step outside to greet the newcomers. “What happened to all the bodies, if you don’t mind me asking?”  
  
“It took that first full week here, give or take, but we carted them up in the back beds of trucks and drove them down toward the Pioneer Farm, if you’re familiar at all with that. We piled them up and burned them all, little by little.”  
  
Mike considered this, and just continued to look impressed. “Shit, for a second I thought you were gonna say you buried them all.”  
  
“No,” Rick said with a shake of his head. “We don’t bury walkers. We bury our own. Walkers get burned.”  
  
“Walkers? That’s what you call them?”  
  
Rick nodded. “’Cause all they do is walk around.”  
  
Mike smirked. “Makes sense.”  
  
Once everyone was outside to greet Mike’s group, introductions were formally made. Because of how cold it was, Mike’s group was ushered inside and shown to the ballroom where a fire had already been lit by Morgan ahead of time.  
  
“Go ahead and set up anywhere in here,” Rick suggested. “I’d recommend closer to the fireplace to keep warm.” He pointed to the door to the immediate left of the fireplace. "That room in there used to be some other parlor. The harpsichord and small leather couch thing over there,” he pointed to the corner of the ballroom, “used to be in that room, but now it’s our bathroom. There’s a tub which we’ll explain how it works later. The toilet, though, I’ll explain now, because that’s more of a necessity than luxuriating in a bath.”  
  
“I haven’t enjoyed a proper bath in—I can’t remember when.”  
  
“Yeah, it’s a nice setup we worked out,” Rick chuckled. “Anyway, the toilet is only a portable one. Whoever uses it last, empties it. Except for the kids and anyone pregnant. There’s a large rubber tub outside, just off the piazza, filled halfway with water. Urine gets emptied into that bucket. We figure the water would dilute it and diminish any smell rather than just dumping it into the grass. Shit gets buried into a hole, further away from the house. There’s one already dug. When it gets filled with enough shit, we cover the rest with soil. The bucket for the toilet gets cleaned outside as well; rinsed with water and sprayed with disinfectant. We don’t want anyone getting sick from germs we can prevent from spreading.”  
  
Mike considered all this.  
  
“Cooking food is done in the kitchen, which is a building separate from the house. We can show you that tomorrow, along with other places around the property. Michonne and Tara have pretty much become our resident chefs. They oversee the preparing of most meals, usually just one main one in the late afternoon or early evening. In the morning every pretty much just helps themselves to a piece of fruit or a small canned good item. Just enough to keep our stomachs full so we don’t go hungry,” Rick continued. “I’ll expect your group to follow the same lead. With seven more mouths to feed, we’re gonna need to be more careful with our food supply.” Rick pointed to Daryl. “Daryl is our main hunter. He might not look like a willing teacher, mostly ‘cause he isn’t, but he’ll teach you want you need to know to learn to hunt for food on your own. Don’t be afraid to ask. He won’t bite.”  
  
“He’s not allowed to because he hasn’t had his shots,” Jo quipped, sauntering up beside Rick.  
  
Rick looked down to his wife, realizing he hadn’t actually introduced her like he’d done with the others; remembering it was because she’d gone to put on her boots and a jacket. By the time she’d come back down, everyone had already been coming inside the house.  
  
“This lady here is my wife, Jo,” Rick introduced.  
  
Jo smiled politely and held out her hand. “Nice to meet some friendly faces. It’s a nice change of pace.”  
  
Mike chuckled and nodded. “I couldn’t agree more. I’m Mike Willis,” he replied. Pointing over his shoulder toward his family, he added, “And that’s my wife Alyssa and our sons Taylor and Ryan. We, uh, had a daughter, too, but we lost her in the beginning. She was bit on our way out of the city. My wife hasn’t really been the same since.”  
  
Jo’s polite smile faded into a sympathetic frown. “I’m so sorry.”  
  
“Rick told me you lost a son and daughter, too.”  
  
“Oh...well—” Jo began, about to correct him that Rick’s son was lost before she’d met him, and that they’d met after the apocalypse, but Rick cut her off.  
  
“Yeah, it’s not something you ever get over. But we take it one day at a time,” Rick stated. “It’s all we _can_ do. And we have other children that need our focus. It’s not fair to them if we ignore them just because we’re still upset about the others we’ve lost.”  
  
“My same sentiments,” Mike muttered. “I loved my little girl, and sometimes I still have nightmares about the way we lost her, but my sons need me. I gotta live my life for them now.”  
  
Rick nodded. “We gotta do whatever we can to survive.”  
  
“Here, here.”  
  
With a small smile, Rick looked to Jo and then stepped closer to Mike and lowered his voice. “Just one more thing we need to go over before you and yours get settled in for the evening…”  
  
“Sure. Shoot.”  
  
As his smile faded, Rick whispered in Mike’s ear, “I just want you to know, that if I think for _one_ minute that you’re putting my family at risk, I _will_ kill you.” Leaning back and staring Mike in the face, he held the other man’s gaze. “Are we clear on that?”  
  
Mike swallowed down a lump in his throat and nodded, rightfully intimidated. “Crystal.”  
  
“Good,” Rick smiled again, slapping Mike on the shoulder. “Welcome to Mount Vernon.”

 


	54. Winter

_“Now is the winter of our discontent.”_ — William Shakespeare

* * *

  
  
Within the following week, the temperature had actually seemed to get warmer, or maybe it just seemed that way because there had barely been any clouds in the sky, so the sun was constantly beating down on everyone when they were outside. In fact, it felt colder inside the house than out. Also, with being so active, everyone was usually working up somewhat of a sweat, so the brisk breeze off the river was a welcomed and refreshing treat.  
  
Earlier in the week, Rick was able to test the mettle of Mike and his group when he put them to work at repairing some fencing at the animal pens. Sometime during the night, a group of walkers had found their way from one of the nearby cul-de-sacs to the south of the estate, moving their way north through the woods and migrated up the property through the woods between the Pioneer Farm and the gardens. In the midst of the fixing the fencing is when the walkers had made their presence known; having sensed movement and heard the noises.  
  
Rick had stood back, waiting to see how Mike, Lewis and José reacted and then acted. Mike was the most startled, but only at first. The surprise of a group of walkers just happening upon them had given him an understandable fright, but he grabbed up the hammer he’d had sitting at his feet and gripped it tightly in his hand, ready to defend himself. Instead of waiting until the walkers got to close, Mike joined Lewis and José in heading over to the walkers and either bashed in or hacked into those undead heads first. When the trio stood back, they looked over at Rick and realized he had remained where he was like a lifeguard keeping an eye on kids in a swimming pool.  
  
Opting not to dwell on the moment, like a parent not making a big deal of their child falling down lest the child see the parent’s reaction and choose to turn on the waterworks, Rick gave a nod of his head to the men and returned to fixing the fence he’d been working on with José. The slightly younger man sauntered back over, picked up some nails and his own hammer and rejoined Rick at his side; crouching down and holding up the new plank of wood to be nailed to the post. Mike and Lewis followed suit with the other animal pen, which Rick had determined to have been the pen Bessie might’ve busted out of at some point and which Bessie was currently back in. The only thing that had been keeping her inside with the broken section present was two wooden pallets propped up, and which was what Rick and the other three were using to pull apart for the wood.  
  
Later that day, Rick had Lewis grab a truck ‘round so they could load the dead walkers into the back bed and then take them all to the Pioneer Farm to be burned. Afterward, Rick dismissed the others and went walking toward the woods he figured the walkers had come from. It wasn’t a long walk at all, either. Coming out on the other side, he found himself staring up at the backs of two Georgian-style homes near the dead end of a cul-de-sac. Looking around carefully, Rick continued on between the houses until he reached the street.  
  
Standing there, he listened to the wind rustling up old leaves and watched the way they swirled along the pavement. Overhead he saw two birds launch off the same bare branch of a tree in front of another Georgian-style house. This entire street had already been scavenged before, but not at any particular length; just enough to make sure it had been void of human and undead life, and to take any immediate supplies they needed. Rick and the others hadn’t actually been back here; instead opting to search so many of the other streets and cul-de-sacs around the neighborhood. Some of those streets were the ones they had blocked off, and some were the streets farther out. Rick preferred to avoid those ones when possible. He didn’t want them growing too dependent on supply runs. He tried limiting them to once a week, and even then, he tried keeping the runs to homes nearer to Mount Vernon.  
  
Rick still had his worries about outsiders like The Marauders that might happen upon everything his group had and take advantage. Or worse.  
  
The house at the very end of the street, the one with the bare tree in front of it where the birds had been perched, sat there vacantly with the door to the garage wide open and Rick was struck with a thought. Walking forward toward the driveway, he wandered up toward the garage, kicking aside random debris left behind from whenever the house’s previous occupants fled. Inside the garage, Rick perused the shelves and a work bench off to the side, but didn’t find what he was looking for.  
  
Honestly, he had a feeling none of the houses around the cul-de-sac would have what he was looking for. To get what he wanted, for the purpose he needed it for, a supply run much further away from Mount Vernon would be required.  
  
Rick supposed it wasn’t exactly a necessity, but it would be help as a deterrent against anyone, living or dead somehow making their way through the woods. It was something he would mull over for a few days, but knew he would end up doing either way. It would just come down to who he’d take with him and working out a plan of how to get there, the safest and quickest way.

 

* * *

  
  
“Do we really need it?” Jo asked, sitting at the white linen-upholstered wingback chair. She was folding her and Rick’s laundry she’d cleaned the day before and had pulled off the line outside on the piazza.  
  
“It’ll help,” Rick replied, standing in the doorway to their room.  
  
“But do we really _need_ it?” she repeated.  
  
Rick sighed. “Yes.” Stepping further into their room, he sank down upon the end of their bed and stared across at her; slightly distracted by her folding one of his shirts. “If we can find enough barbed wire, we can wrap it around the trees at the utmost edge of those woods that those homes back up against. Some of the homes are fenced in, but those that aren’t provide access from the street they’re on and any walker or person that should happen along, that might slip through the ends of the streets we’ve barricaded off with cars and trucks, will be greatly deterred from continuing forward.”  
  
“Maybe.”  
  
“Maybe is better than not at all. I want the kids to be able to roam freely all over the property, without any walkers coming out of any of the woods and catching them off guard. I want the worst thing our kids and any others have to worry about is a sting from a honeybee,” Rick remarked. “I don’t want any surprises.”  
  
“Well, surprises can be a good thing sometimes.”  
  
“I don’t want any _bad_ surprises,” he clarified. “We’ve had more than our fair share of bad surprises to last multiple lifetimes.”  
  
Jo stopped folding; setting his folded shirt onto the small table beside her with the stack of clothes she’d already folded piling up. Placing a hand upon her burgeoning stomach, she sat back and met Rick’s gaze. “I guess I just don’t want you to leave. I mean, I can handle you going off to some street around here to scavenge for supplies, but we’re talking going into an area that saw a lot of traffic in the old world and would mean a strong likelihood of it being overrun.”  
  
“It’s nothing we haven’t done before.”  
  
“Yeah, I know, but I went with you a lot of those times; _every_ time since losing the prison.” Jo sighed. “I just get more nervous now. I worry about you not coming back when you’re only picking apart nearby houses. Now you’re going somewhere much more risky and I won’t know if something happens to you until it’s too late, and that’s assuming anyone else makes it back to tell me so.”  
  
“I can’t just stay here and send everyone else off to get things. It’s not fair to them.”  
  
Jo frowned. “Not everyone has children already here or on the way.”  
  
Narrowing his eyes, Rick folded his arms over his chest. “Are you suggesting only the single and childless go off risking their lives for the group? That’s hardly fair.”  
  
“That’s not what I mean. I just…” Jo cast her eyes down, focusing on a random spot on the striped carpet. “You do so much as it is around here. You’re always off heading up supply runs. I feel like maybe you don’t know how to delegate the larger tasks for anyone other than yourself to take on. Honestly, I think you might be a bit of a control freak.”  
  
Watching the way a slight smile toyed at her lips, Rick smirked back at her. “I can’t help it. I’m a Capricorn.”  
  
“Are Capricorns supposed to be control freaks?” Jo asked, amused.  
  
Rick shrugged. “From what I remember of all that horoscope shit Lori used to read me, Capricorns think that they’re the only ones who know how to solve a problem, so yeah…I guess so.”  
  
Jo smiled. “I’m just nervous. Maybe it’s another thing I can chalk up to pregnancy hormones, but I get more nervous when you go anywhere now than I ever did before.”  
  
“You never seemed nervous.”  
  
“I guess I’m good at hiding it then.” She frowned as she held his gaze. “I take on any menial task I can around her to keep my hands busy, because otherwise I start to fidget. Literally, right now, not doing anything other than thinking of you going off has my hands shaking.” To prove her point, she lifted her hands from her stomach and, sure as shit, there was a slight shudder to them.  
  
“You sure it’s not just the cold? Maybe you’re just trying to convince me to stay,” he teased gently, knowing by the look on her face that she was one hundred percent serious.  
  
“It’s, like, fifty degrees out. I wouldn’t call that cold.”  
  
Stepping forward, Rick knelt down in front of her and took her hands in his. They were slightly colder to touch than his felt, but he also seemed to radiate more heat than she did. Plus the house was cooler than outside was, likely due to drafts, but he knew the temperature of her skin had nothing to do with the shake in her hands. It was all about the unease she felt deep in her gut.  
  
“Everything has been going so well lately,” she continued to speak as she watched him bring her knuckles to his lips. “Remember the roller coaster conversation? We’re up right now. The roller coaster has to come down sooner or later and I feel like something bad is gonna happen if you go off to find that Home Depot all for stupid barbed wire.”  
  
“We _need_ it,” he maintained.  
  
“Aren’t there any homes around here that have barbed wire you could take?”  
  
“The people that lived in homes around here would’ve had no need for barbed wire. And even in the off chance they did have some, there wouldn’t be anywhere near enough. A couple of loops maybe; enough to wrap around a couple of trees. It’s extremely unlikely though. We’d only find it at a Home Depot or if we went even further away from here, toward farmland.”  
  
Jo frowned again, unconvinced. “I still don’t think we need it,” she insisted. “The girls aren’t stupid. If they go off playing anywhere out of eyesight, they know to take a weapon with them. They know how to defend against a walker if it got too close. They know to keep their eyes peeled for any dangers that might present themselves. Not to mention the girls are alive, so they have speed in their corner; they can make a run for it and put the necessary distance between themselves and walkers to get to safety while walkers are still stumbling around.”  
  
“And the point I’m trying to make is that I don’t want the girls to have to be in that position anymore,” Rick spoke, looking up at his wife as he held her hands. “I want all of us to be able to walk around here without worry from the outside world getting in. I want us to be able to walk around without always having weapons of any kind strapped to us all day and night. I’d like to see us get back to some sense of normalcy.”  
  
As they stared each other down, Jo agreed with his sentiment. She wanted all those things to; for the girls and for all of them. It didn’t change how anxious she felt about him going off, though. She just didn’t feel like getting barbed wire was a necessity. At least, not now.  
  
“The weather is gonna take a turn for the worse any day now. The colder it gets, the slower walkers will get. They won’t be venturing around much. And if we get hit with a decent amount of snow, that’ll slow any walkers down even more,” Jo remarked. “Maybe we can put off the need for barbed wire until the weather gets warmer, toward the end of winter.”  
  
“When walkers will be more riled up again?” Rick shook his head. “It’s better to do it now while we have their slower movements in our favor.”  
  
“I’m not gonna convince you to stay put, am I?”  
  
“No,” he admitted honestly. “But I can promise you I _will_ come home. I won’t leave you alone forever.”  
  
Jo knitted her brow together and tears suddenly spilled from her eyes. As her chin began to quiver, Rick brought a hand up to cup the side of her face and pulled her forward so that their foreheads rested against one another.  
  
“Please don’t go,” she begged quietly. “I really have a bad feeling.”  
  
Breathing in slowly and steadily, Rick listened to the ache in her voice and felt his heart constrict with guilt over how nervous and scared she sounded. She was rarely like this. In fact, he had no memory of her ever reacting like this to him going off anywhere. If something was bothering her, the optimist in their relationship, about something going wrong, he felt the need to give her the benefit of the doubt. Even if she showed signs of worry before, she never shook or cried over it.  
  
Standing up, Rick pulled Jo up with him and pulled her into a tight embrace. She began to cry more openly with her face pressed against his chest while he kept his arms wrapped around her. He placed gentle kisses against her head, inhaling the scent of the floral shampoo she’d been using to wash her hair.  
  
“It’s okay. I won’t go anywhere. I’ll stay here,” he relented.  
  
Pulling her face up and looking at Rick with tear-stained cheeks, she pouted. “I’m sorry. I just—”  
  
“It’s okay,” he repeated, holding her face with both hands. “You’re right. We can wait until after winter. Getting barbed wire now was just me trying to be preemptive.  
  
“I don’t want you to be mad at me, I just feel like something—”  
  
“ _Jo_ , I said it’s _okay_ ,” Rick interrupted. He smiled to prove his point. “What do you want me to say to convince you it’s okay?”  
  
Jo let out a small chuckle. “Maybe a song and dance routine,” she joked as she wiped away her tears.  
  
“Nah,” Rick shook his head. “Trust me, you don’t wanna see that.”  
  
Inhaling a deep breath, Jo leaned her face back down against his chest. She could feel his heartbeat pounding steadily underneath, which was out of rhythm with how hers was beating much faster from her nerves getting the best of her. With each breath and passing moment, she felt herself calming down, and she owed that to the comfort she felt in Rick’s arms.  
  
“I should finish folding the laundry,” she mumbled into his shirt before she began to pull back.  
  
“Nope.” Rick kept her in place, unable to move away. Looking down at her at such an angle gave him a double chin. “You need to calm down.”  
  
“I am,” she insisted, craning her head back to look up at him.  
  
“No, I mean _properly_ calm down.”  
  
Running his fingers through her hair, he smiled down at her as he gently massaged her scalp for a few moments. Watching the way she closed her eyes and sighed contentedly brought a smirk to his lips, and then he brought those lips to hers. As they kissed, Rick turned them around and began walking her backward toward the end of the bed until she was sitting against it.  
  
Instead of letting him lead her further up the bed to where this was all headed, Jo stopped him by placing a hand on his chest and the other to cup the side of his face where his stubble had grown back considerably already.  
  
For a moment they just studied each other’s faces; finding comfort in it.  
  
“I love you,” she muttered quietly.  
  
Puckering his lips, he leaned forward and kissed her again while bringing his hands to rest upon her hips. With a nudge to her nose with his, he whispered back, “I love you, too.”  
  
A knock at the doorframe to their bedroom brought their attentions to focus in that direction. There they found Daryl in the doorway.  
  
“Sorry, just wanted to know when you were thinking of heading to that Home Depot,” Daryl wondered, eyeing Rick.  
  
Rick stood up straighter and took a step back from the bed so his friend was more in his line of side and not obscured by the bedpost. “Change of plans: we aren’t going.”  
  
“We aren’t? Why not?”  
  
“It’s, uh, I changed my mind about it,” he replied. “I think we can hold off on that right now. Focus more on things around the house to get better prepared for winter. We’ll revisit the plan for Home Depot when the weather gets nicer.”  
  
“It’s nice now, if you ask me.”  
  
“We ain’t going now,” Rick said, more firmly.  
  
Daryl just stepped back from the doorway, taking a moment to look between the couple and read the signs. Something had been discussed and he accepted Rick’s change of plans without further provocation. “Yeah, okay. I’ll tell Tyreese and José.”  
  
The latter had offered to make the trip with the other three, to prove his worth perhaps in his group joining Rick’s.  
  
As Rick and Jo turned back toward each other after watching Daryl retreated down the stairwell. Running his hands along Jo’s forearms, Rick leaned in closely and pressed his forehead against hers.  
  
“I can’t put off going on runs that’ll take me further away from here for too long. Sooner or later, I’ll need to head out when there’s something we’ll desperately need that we can grow or make for ourselves here; something we’ll need from the outside world, in a place that’ll likely be overrun,” Rick spoke. “Walkers aren’t going away. The problem they create isn’t going away. People ready to take advantage of the less fortunate are not going away either. We just gotta be on our toes, and be prepared for anything, and we are. We’ve been down that road countless times already. It’s old hat by now.”  
  
“I know,” Jo muttered quietly. “But right now, we have everything we need for a while.” Lifting her face up, she looked Rick in the eye. “Christmas is a week away, after all. Let’s just try and take it easy for once. If you feel that barbed wire is such a dire necessity after the holiday, and if the weather holds off, then, by all means, go on that run.”  
  
“Are you compromising now?” He flashed her a somewhat teasing smile.  
  
Jo released a deep sigh and rolled her eyes. “Yeah, I guess so.”  
  
“What happened to that bad feeling?”  
  
“It’s still there, and I don’t think it’s going away anytime soon. Whether or not it’s got something to do with you going off away from here or not, I dunno. I’d just rather not take that chance. There are chances we should take and chances we shouldn’t, and I truly feel Home Depot isn’t one of them.” Jo gripped the front material of his shirt and looked down. “But I trust you, and I trust that you know what you’re doing. I don’t worry about you doing something that will get yourself seriously hurt or killed. I worry about something else, something beyond any of our control throwing a wrench into our plans. You can have the supply run to Home Depot planned with optimum precision, with multiple escape routes and whatever to make it the perfect run. But something could happen still. That supply run Daryl took back before we lost the prison, when Bob died. That run was going perfectly, but there was no way to prepare for that helicopter on the roof that fell through. I thought Lori, Zach and I were just going on a routine jaunt outside the prison fences to burn all those walkers and then The Governor happened.”  
  
Rick’s face became serious, as they both did whenever either one of them mentioned that man by name. Even though it felt like a year, it had only been two and a half months since the prison fell and they had lost so many of their friends.  
  
“Well, I’m not gonna go anywhere right now. But when I do, if something happens, then it happens,” he remarked, lifting her chin so that she looked back up at him. “We don’t get to choose when it happens. We just make the most of what we got, while we got it.”  
  
Jo shook her head. “You’re not helping. I know we’re all gonna die sooner or later, and in this world the emphasis is on sooner. I can’t really put it into words, Rick. I’ve had this feeling the last day or two. I can’t shake it. It’s like a weight on my chest, and when you said you were planning on going to go find barbed wire, it just…”  
  
Watching the way she tensed up and pulled back from him to sink back down upon the mattress, Rick frowned. Jo was the one who smiled more between them, who believed things would be better more than he did. So, when pessimism drifted over her like a dark cloud on a sunny day, Rick felt uneasy and awkward. It was like when he was younger and he’d be having a great day at school, but then received a failing grade on a test he knew he’d have to take home for his parents to see.  
  
Dread was the word.  
  
Jo feeling it was contagious. It jumped to him like lice and suddenly he was feeling it, too. Not as strongly as she was; more like secondhand dread, if that was a thing.  
  
Taking it slowly because of how achy his knees were getting these days, Rick knelt down in front of his wife and placed his hands on her knees as he looked up at her. He waited until she was staring back at him and he forced a genuine smile to ease her unease, if just a little bit. Leaning forward, he pressed his lips to her stomach and kissed the blossoming bump. Rick ignored the ache building up in his knees for remaining in that position for longer than necessary; instead snaking his arms around her lower back and resting his face against her stomach.  
  
“I’m not going anywhere,” he repeated.  
  
Jo appreciated the sentiment. She rested her hands upon his head, letting her fingers nestle within his soft, brown curls. “Thank you,” was all she could think of to say.

 

* * *

  
  
The end of that week saw the weather shifting again. The temperature dropped back down and the sunny skies gave way to ominous grey snow clouds. Yet, snow still would not fall.  
  
True to his word, Rick had stayed put; finding things to do around the property as usual. He considered different options if going to get barbed wire never panned out, like making some wooden spikes to shove into the ground along the edges of the woods to keep outsiders, be they living or dead, at bay. They’d done it before at the prison, and they could do it again at Mount Vernon.  
  
Everyone in Mike’s group, except for Mike’s wife Alyssa had been actively contributing. Daryl had been showing Mike and Lewis how to track and hunt; mainly because he wanted the extra help in finding that damned wild turkey he’d spotted that was eluding him. Morgan was teaching Mike’s sons to fish down by the river much to Alyssa’s displeasure what with having her boys out of eyesight and earshot. It had taken convincing, but Mike had assured his wife Taylor and Ryan would be in good hands. While José had gone on a run with Tyreese to bring find diapers for when Karen and Jo’s babies were born, Barbara had been able to take some minor pain medication that helped with her arthritis and allowed her to participate in helping in the kitchen building; preparing meals without modern conveniences the ways she remembered helping her grandmother as a little girl. Michonne and Tara had quickly found enjoyment in having Barbara help them out, especially after they got to know the older woman’s blunt attitude and bawdy sense of humor. It made for a grand, ol’ time.  
  
Despite agreeing to not venture toward a Home Depot or anywhere further from Mount Vernon, and finding plenty to occupy himself with in and around the house, he was going a bit stir crazy. Jo noticed it and felt guilty for convincing him to stay, even though she felt she had a perfectly good reason to do so. She could see in his face, the way it twitched here or grimaced there, that he was feeling restless.  
  
To be honest, so was she.  
  
Were the temperature a bit warmer, she would’ve suggested they walk the entire property together, but she could hear him in her head, telling her that she’d catch her death or overexert herself by walking so long over terrain that wasn’t completely level. With each passing day of her pregnancy, he was treating her more and more like a porcelain doll and it was irksome.  
  
They were both growing weary of their self-induced confinement, so to speak, and would need an outlet to channel it into soon.  
  
That outlet came five days before Christmas eve when Jo finally approached Rick while he was outside on the spraying the bucket from the toilet chair with disinfectant after having just the contents into the hole several yards away from the house. When he turned around and found Jo leaning against one of the columns, staring at him with an impish grin, he shook his head and smiled.  
  
“What?”  
  
“Did everything come out alright?” she teased, wearing one of the winter jackets that had been found and collected for the entire group during one of the first scavenging trips to a neighboring cul-de-sac. On her head was a black beanie, similar to the one Tyreese always wore, even in the blistering summer heat that Georgia had to offer.  
  
Rick chuckled under his breath, setting the can into a basket nailed to the column for safekeeping. “Yeah, I’m a regular Rembrandt.” Tipping the bucket over, he gave it a quick shake to free it of excess water and whatever else before turning his attention back to his wife. “What’s up?”  
  
“Put that bucket back, wash your hands and then throw on your jacket.”  
  
“This your way of getting back at me for harping on you for not dressing more warmly?” he asked, looking briefly down at himself and how he was without his own jacket and only a long-sleeved shirt.  
  
“No. I have something we need to go do.”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”  
  
“I’ll be waiting inside.”  
  
Without another word, Jo slipped back into the house, glancing at the solar calendar set upon the sill of the window at her immediate left. It was just after one in the afternoon and apparently December 19th. Jo noted that it was the birthday of one of her aunts who would likely be dead and gone now. She wasn’t inside a minute when Rick came in. He ducked into their makeshift bathroom and returned the bucket to the toilet chair, and then squirted a decent dollop of hand sanitizer to his hands to rub around. When he stepped back into the entrance hall, he stood there, just looking at Jo.  
  
“So where are we going?”  
  
“Jacket,” was all she said, pointing to the closet under the stairs.  
  
With a smirk, Rick walked over and pulled the closet door open. Inside, his jacket hung on a hook. As he removed it and slowly pulled it on, he watched her carefully with curious eyes. The wall opposite the stairs used to have four extra dining chairs just sitting there, but they were taking up unnecessary space and instead moved to the ballroom. Now, a folding table had been set up there where a lot of their weapons were laid out to easily grab before leaving the house. Inside the house, they didn’t need to carry anything on them, though they all had an extra weapon in their bedrooms, just to be on the safe side. That table is where Jo went and picked up her sword.  
  
It took a bit more effort with the thick jacket she was wearing, but she managed to strap on her scabbard with her sword sheathed in it. Rick watched as she grabbed a handgun, checked to make sure it was loaded and then tucked it into the back of her pants, under her shirt and her jacket. Lastly, she took a smaller hunting knife which she held loosely in her hand.  
  
“Preparing for war?”  
  
“Maybe,” she replied. “Grab your shit.”  
  
Without missing a beat, Rick zipped his jacket up most of the way and grabbed up his machete with the red handle. His Colt Python was already strapped to his side. Every night he left it on the small table next to his side of the bed and every morning he holstered it to his utility belt; wearing both the gun and the utility belt had always felt like a second skin to him. He, too, also took a smaller hunting knife, but sheathed it alongside the machete on the hip opposite from where his gun was.  
  
“Any hints you might wanna give me?” he wondered.  
  
“Christmas shopping.”  
  
Rick paused in the doorway for a moment, slightly confused.  
  
Following her out the front door as she picked up her pace and began to walk toward the North Lane, they both then continued heading forward toward the Bowling Green.  
  
“Jo, where are we going?” he pressed, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“Christmas morning is six days away and I want to find some Christmas gifts for everyone.”  
  
“You’re kidding me, right?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Sidling up beside her as they walked, Rick kept his hand instinctively hovering over his Colt as he kept his eyes in front of them. The line of trees to their immediate right was virtually void of leaves now; all of which now blanketed the ground under their feet. Beyond those bare trees there was a clearer view now of the Upper Garden where plenty of flowers, along with some vegetables like cabbage and onions, grew; with the large greenhouse with former slave quarters on either side just beyond the garden. Rick was momentarily distracted by it all; out of habit, looking for threats.  
  
“You need to explain this to me a bit better, babe.”  
  
Jo smirked. “What’s there to explain?”  
  
“Uh, maybe how you plan to find Christmas gifts around here. Are you planning on scavenging the vehicles? I’m pretty sure we’ve picked those clean for anything worthwhile already.”  
  
“Ye have little faith.”  
  
Rick said nothing further and just continued to follow where Jo led them. At the end of the Bowling Green, they passed between the gaps in the ha-ha walls and continued along the path to the right, back toward where they had all originally come into the property from. They walked along toward pasture they had also originally come through from with Rick occasionally throwing amused glances at his wife as she began walking ahead of him with such a calm and collected manner in her step.  
  
As they came out through the main entrance, Jo kept walking toward the left and Rick just maintained his quiet curiosity. He might not know what Jo had in mind, but he trusted she knew what she was doing and where she was going. It kind of went hand in hand; loving her meant trusting her with his life and vice versa. The pair of them didn’t go much further anyway when Jo came to a stop outside what was, or had been, the gift shop at Mount Vernon, and Rick suddenly felt like an idiot for not realizing that would be the location Jo was taking them to. Where else but a gift shop to get gifts? Duh.  
  
Rick placed his hands on his hips and shook his head with a laugh. “Of course,” was all he muttered.  
  
Jo threw a look over her shoulder at him and grinned. She seemed to catch on quickly about how he felt like an idiot for not understanding where they were going. “Yep.”  
  
This was one of the places they actually hadn’t cleared, mostly because no threat had seemed to come from it, and they had only been focused with the actual property and blocking off entrances from the outside world. Also, they never came out this way anymore.  
  
Out of sight, out of mind.  
  
Removing his machete and taking it firmly into his hand, Rick stepped forward toward the gift shop entrance ahead of Jo, unconsciously taking the lead in order to keep her safe first and foremost. The doors weren’t locked, but they weren’t closed either. One of the glass doors seemed to have been yanked open with considerable force and was barely hanging on its hinges, which meant there could be an undead threat wandering around inside. Remarkably, though, none of the glass had been broken. As Rick slowly and quietly pushed the unhinged glass door aside, he took pause and banged his fist on the door frame and whistled in order to draw out any possible lurkers from inside.  
  
When the sound of something rustling inside alerted Rick and Jo, they both banged on the doorframe and whistled to draw what was inside, outside.  
  
What they found, though, was not at all what they expected.  
  
In fact, it amused them a great deal.  
  
Darting by the doors in a flurry of feathers and with an irritated cackle, was Daryl’s allusive turkey.  
  
Crouching down and covering her face with one hand, Jo cackled as well, but with laughter.  
  
“Well, the turkey’s alive, so I doubt we have to worry about any walkers inside because that bird would’ve been picked apart by now.” Rick chuckled lowly, gripping one side of the doorframe and sticking his head in. “Pretty well-lit inside, too. There’s skylights on the ceiling and all these regular windows on the sides. We won’t need to worry about wandering around in there without having flashlights on us. We’ll be able to see just fine.”  
  
“We just gotta worry about getting gobbled,” Jo quipped, still laughing. Her face was bright red, and not because of the brisk temperature.  
  
Rick looked down at her, amused more by how she was reacting than by the turkey situation. “Careful you don’t laugh so hard you piss yourself. Pregnant women’s bladders are already a crazy thing to begin with.”  
  
“I’m trying my best,” Jo replied, quickly composing herself as she stood back up; grabbing onto Rick’s arm to do so. “Do we shoot the turkey and take that joy away from Daryl or do we somehow corral it?”  
  
While he took those options into consideration, Rick unclipped the walkie-talkie from the front of his utility belt. Bringing it up to his lips, he pressed the button in on the side. “Daryl, you copy?” Rick waited, casting a look at Jo who was peering slightly inside the gift shop for further signs of whereabouts the turkey had gotten to. “Daryl.”  
  
The walkie-talkie crackled. _“Yeah, what’s up?”_  
  
“Jo and I found your turkey.”  
  
_“Shit, really? Where’s it at?”_  
  
“Inside the gift shop, just outside the main entrance,” Rick replied. “As in the main entrance we don’t use. Come out, turn left. We’re there.”  
  
_“What you doing there?”_  
  
“Christmas shopping.”  
  
_“The fuck—Christmas shopping?”_  
  
Rick smirked. “I think the turkey’s got the same idea.”  
  
Jo chuckled a little as she threw a brief look at her husband. Resting her free hand upon her stomach, she took a step back against the small section of wall available to lean on.  
  
_“Yeah, okay. Give me a few minutes to get up there.”_  
  
“Where are you now?”  
  
_“The main entrance we use now. The West Gate inside the RV.”_  
  
“Alright.” Rick nodded a nod Daryl obviously couldn’t see. “See you in a few minutes.” Clipping the walkie-talkie back to his utility belt, Rick looked to Jo and sighed. “Now we just make sure our future Christmas dinner stays put till Daryl gets here.”  
  
“Won’t be hard,” Jo shrugged. “If it comes close to the doors, we spook it and send it running further back inside.”  
  
After approximately ten minutes of just standing there and making small talk, Daryl appeared with his crossbow slung over his shoulder as usual but also a bedsheet in his hands. He gave the couple a nod in the place of a greeting as he approached them.  
  
“It still in there?” he wondered.  
  
“Yeah. There hasn’t been any movement in the last few minutes that we could hear,” Rick answered, stepping back to give Daryl room to go forward inside.  
  
“What’s with the sheet?” Jo asked with a small smile. “Were you napping?”  
  
“Nah, this is to throw over the turkey to blind it so I can scoop it up. I don’t exactly have a net. I’ll need you two on the door to make sure it don’t get out. Gotta catch it alive so it can be killed fresh next week for Christmas dinner.”  
  
“Try not to break anything inside,” Jo added.  
  
Daryl threw a look at her over his shoulder before continuing inside. Rick and Jo just looked at each other and began to wait a little longer. They remained silent, setting aside small talk for later and just listened to Daryl moving around. Moments later by the sound of Daryl running into something followed, just as many items seemed to hit the ground at the same time Daryl swore.  
  
“Everything alright in there?” Rick called; an impish grin on his lips.  
  
_“Fuck off.”_  
  
Rick’s grin grew larger as he winked at Jo.  
  
Daryl kept grumbling and cursing under his breath for a minute or two more, along with a few other things toppling to the ground before any sound of victory escaped from within the gift shop. Sauntering toward the glass doors with a very wriggling bedsheet enclosed over the turkey, Daryl stepped outside; struggling to maintain his grip on the sheet to make sure it didn’t slip from his grasp and allow the turkey to make a run for it.  
  
“This fucker’s a fighter,” Daryl muttered. “Almost feel kinda bad to kill it.” Upon looking between the couple standing on either side of him, he added, “Almost.”  
  
“Where you gonna put it?” Jo inquired. “One of the animal pens?”  
  
Daryl grunted. “I don’t trust this guy in one of those old pens. He’ll bust out or fly out.” He tightened his grip around the sheet to maintain it being closed. “Nah, I was thinking that 16-sided barn down at the Pioneer Farm. It’s big, plenty of room for this one to wander around, doors that close, and the windows are too high up for this fat ass to get out of, but I’ll make sure they’re closed anyway. I don’t trust this turkey.”  
  
“Alright then,” Rick smirked as his friend began to take steps to leave. “How badly did you break shit in there?”  
  
“Not too bad,” Daryl replied, almost inaudibly. “You’ll be able to find plenty of shit still worth taking.” Then, with a shake of his head, he mumbled as in disbelief, “Christmas shopping.”  
  
With that obstacle taken care of, Rick and Jo looked at each other and then Rick stepped out of the way, letting Jo head inside first. Normally he would’ve gone first, but now they both knew there were no more threats, either from the undead or animal variety.  
  
“Find some tote bags,” Jo suggested. “It’ll help with carrying things back to the house.”  
  
Rick nodded, heading in an opposite direction from his wife as they began looking around at everything still available in the gift shop, which was virtually everything. Those poor souls who had come to Mount Vernon on the beckoning of that televangelist only to fatally poisoned by him hadn’t come to Mount Vernon to buy souvenirs in the gift shop. They’d come for safe harbor in the storm that was the outbreak.  
  
“We shouldn’t get just practical gifts,” Jo continued, picking up a pair of novelty socks with George Washington’s face stitched into them. “Some fun things, too. We do have downtime where we don’t need to be watching our backs like we used to all the time. Plus, it’s Christmas. It’s supposed to be a happy time. Let’s get things to make everyone happy.”  
  
“We should tell the others about this place, so they can do the same as us,” Rick remarked. He had wandered around the counter where the cash registers remained and found a few plastic bags they could use instead.  
  
“Sounds good.” Jo made her way over toward Rick and grabbed a plastic bag he offered her. “They have an entire week to. If we find some old newspapers we can wrap the gifts, too.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Let’s just get one thing for each person, from the both of us. We’re married so we’re one person now.” With an amused smile, he winked at her. “That’s how it works now.”  
  
Jo smiled back. “That’s fine with me. It means less to carry back to the house.”  
  
“What do we get Mike’s group? We don’t know them enough to know what they like. I mean, do we bother getting them anything?”  
  
“Yes.” Jo stopped and looked at him until he caught her eye. “They may be new to our group, but they’re our group now. We get everyone something.”  
  
Noting how she stood there, so stalwart, Rick nodded and smiled again. “Okay, okay.”  
  
“I mean, I know Barbara likes helping Michonne and Tara in the kitchen now. She was telling me about her grandma’s cornbread recipe yesterday, so I know she’ll find enjoyment out of a practical gift like this cookbook here.” Jo held up a tan colored book entitled _The Early American Cookbook_. “Kids get toys or a game, or whatever is age appropriate. I mean, I doubt Mike’s youngest son is gonna want a porcelain doll and his oldest son might not want anything like a toy anyway. Anyone we aren’t sure on, we go practical.”  
  
“You got this all worked out.”  
  
“Like I said: we have downtime.”  
  
Rick smiled, turning to look upon some T-shirts. “You know, we can take some time and fool around if you want.”  
  
Jo snickered. “And they say romance is dead.”  
  
“It’s quiet, there’s no one around, and we don’t have to worry about any walkers or any more turkeys interrupting.”  
  
“It’s also cold and there’s no comfortable surface.”  
  
“There is a floor. There is a counter top I can sit you down on,” Rick countered. “It’s not the first time we’ve had to be creative.”  
  
“Sorry, my love. I’m not in the mood for that right now.”  
  
“Ugh, blue-balled,” he joked. “What happened to this being the season of giving?”  
  
Jo simply replied by laughing.  
  
Rick didn’t press the issue any further. At least, for now. Maybe later that night, warm in their bed, she’d be in the mood.  
  
“I found something for you so don’t look over here and don’t go through this bag at any point unless I say it’s okay to,” Jo commented quietly from a darker area of the gift shop.  
  
“Same goes for you then.”  
  
Turning around, he avoided looking in Jo’s direction and instead turned his attention toward the jewelry counter. Glancing down through the glass case, he perused the selection, making sure Jo wasn’t looking over toward him to know what he had in mind. He was quickly able to find something he wanted to get for her, but getting it with her there would be impossible. The noise he’d have to make to get at the piece of jewelry he wanted would draw her attention and she’d at once know what he was doing. He would just have to come back later, without her. The little signs beside the pieces of jewelry threw him for a loop. Even though money was a thing of the past, he was still flabbergasted by the prices. The piece in particular he wanted had been priced at $6,500. He would’ve never been able to get Lori something that expensive in the old world. Judging by what Jo and her former husband’s jobs were in the old world, he doubted Jo would’ve ever been able to have something that expensive either.  
  
Nowadays, though, it wasn’t a problem.  
  
There was no call for wearing such finery anymore, but now it was there for the taking.  
  
“There are some things here we should just take back to the house anyway. Food stuff,” Jo spoke. “There are tins with mixed nuts, jars of honey, bottles of mulled cider, jars of maple syrup and seed packets.”  
  
“I saw some tapered candles, too. We can definitely use those.”  
  
“Put them in your bag.”  
  
“I’ll make a second trip later for that stuff,” Rick remarked, using it partly as his excuse to come back for the piece of jewelry he wanted for her.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“This was a good idea,” Rick muttered, cast a glance in her direction.  
  
When she turned and caught his eye, she smiled. “I know.”  
  
With a soft chuckle, he shook his head. “So humble.”

 

* * *

  
  
Yet another week had come and gone and now it was that fateful day everyone at Mount Vernon had been looking forward to.  
  
Christmas Eve.  
  
Snow had also finally fallen. It was only a dusting, really; barely two inches. It was nice to look at, though. It was a nice change of scenery and made the world seem quieter and more peaceful. Plus, it gave a fresh, crisp scent to the air. The tree in the ballroom was decorated with painted popcorn garland and all sorts of ornaments; homemade, those found at the house Mike’s group had been squatting in, and in the Mount Vernon gift shop that Rick and Jo had brought back with them while they were “shopping” for gifts. Those gifts were now all wrapped with old newspaper and tied closed with burlap string or whatever anyone could find lying around to keep the gifts from being revealed before they could be given to their specific recipient. Candles were lit all over the place, what with officially being winter and it being dark by the time five in the evening rolled around. A stereo that ran on D cell batteries had been acquired months ago and hadn’t been used until now. A variety of Christmas CDs were being played at the moment, adding to the air of holiday cheer which allowed everyone a wonderful time to forget about the horrors of the new world.  
  
The house was busy and full of life. Michonne, Tara and Barbara were disappearing back and forth between the house and the detached kitchen, preparing the vegetables that would work as side dishes to the turkey Daryl had finally caught in the gift shop and finally killed that morning after keeping it locked up in one of the former slave quarters for the last week. Karen and Jo, both going through very early nesting stages in their respective pregnancies, had the dining table removed from the green dining room, as well as the card table from the blue parlor and the table removed from Finn and Jen’s room; all three set up together in the ballroom to accommodate everyone eating together at the same time. There were plenty of side chairs to go around as it were. They set plates and silverware out, and went about making rice crispy treats from a box of generic Rice Krispies cereal and a bag of marshmallows that had been found in weeks prior as well and saved until now. Both also had questionable expirations dates, but it wasn’t like there was mold on anything. To make it festive, the pair split the batch in half; adding red food coloring to one bowl and green food coloring to the second. For that, they had to head into the kitchen outside which was already buzzing with activity with the other three women already there.  
  
As the day progressed, everyone began to clean themselves up and put a little effort into their appearance, much like they had when Rick and Jo were given their re-wedding ceremony and dinner. Rick was tempted to shave again but then decided last minute not to bother. He put on a clean flannel shirt and even sprung for wearing a pair of denim jeans instead of his usual worn out black pair, that were faded, patched up and fraying at the bottoms of the pant legs. Plus, they were due for a thorough washing. Dirty, worn out pants didn’t exactly scream “Christmas attire” when they were living contentedly in a house such as Mount Vernon.  
  
By nightfall, the kids were chatting animatedly amongst each other as the meal was brought in little by little from the kitchen and set upon the tables in the ballroom. Since the dining room table was oval shaped, there wasn’t exactly an end, but Rick and Jo still sat down at the area that would be considered the head of the table while Tyreese sat opposite at the end of one of the two extra tables set next to the dining table. With Karen at his right, everyone else filled in the available seats that remained.  
  
Bottles of wine and mulled cider, or hot tea, were available for drinking with the food. Because of it being the holiday, Rick felt it alright to indulge the kids with a glass of wine each. He had half expected Jo to protest somewhat, but was met with no resistance from her at all. In fact, she seemed amused by it. Anyway, it wasn’t the first time they’d allowed the girls to partake in the beverage. When they stayed in that yellow house, the night before Jo and Tara were taken by those Wolves, the girls had been given cups of wine then, too, from the stash Milo had found. The only one to make any hint of unhappiness about it was Mike’s wife Alyssa when wine was poured for their sons. While meek and mousy Alyssa was hesitant and sour-faced at the idea, Mike didn’t seem to care. It seemed it was his sons’ first time drinking wine and he seemed to get some entertainment out of seeing how the boys’ faces twisted at the bitter taste that passed through their lips.  
  
The entire scene reminded Rick so badly of the night he and the original members of his group, which included Daryl, stayed at the CDC with Dr. Jenner and he and Lori allowed their son to try wine, and how Carl immediately disliked it; opting to stick with his soda.  
  
Rick smiled at the memory.  
  
It was the first time in a while he found himself able to look fondly back upon a memory of his son, a memory from this new world, and not be filled with renewed grief immediately afterward.  
  
Perhaps that pain was finally starting to dull. Or maybe the happiness, the smiles and laughter around the dinner table, kept those feelings of grief suppressed for the time being.  
  
Even though Michonne, Tara and Barbara had been the ones to prepare and cook the meal, Daryl had been the one to kill and clean the turkey, which was the main course, and therefore given the honor of cutting it up for everyone. As meat was carved off and set upon a platter, the platter was then passed around for each person to take a portion for their plates. The side vegetable side dishes were passed around the table the same, and soon the only sounds were that off the Christmas songs being sung through the small stereo speakers and the clinking of forks and knives against the fine china they were all eating from. They were so immersed in sating their appetites with delicious food that there was no time for chatter.  
  
Afterward, they sat back — resting their stomachs — and a lull of conversation soon returned. More wine and mulled cider was poured for those whose glasses were empty or near so, except for the kids. One glass each had been the only indulgence allowed. Even Jo and Karen figured one glass wouldn’t hurt. Both women barely finished their own glasses, though. Having gone so long without any alcohol made them realize their tolerance would be down as well and their palates were just not as accustomed to the taste as they’d once been. The mirrored the kids; twisting their faces because of the bitterness. And with all the potential risks, what with having barely any modern technology other than the ultrasound machine and Karen’s medical know-how, Karen and Jo just didn’t want to tempt fate any further.  
  
After the meal, the rice crispy treats were passed around for dessert. After resting their stomachs a bit longer, some games were played. The kids enjoyed a seemingly never-ending round of Monopoly and several of the adults enjoyed a few hands of Poker which was played among for literal peanuts. There was some minimal dancing, but mostly everyone just sat around, conversing with one another; sharing funny stories from their respective or shared pasts, as well as past holiday memories from the previous world.  
  
No gifts were opened that night.  
  
Instead, it would be put off into morning, as to extend the festivities a little longer. After all, they would take as many good days as possible.  
  
Once the table was cleared and remains of food were disposed of and dishes cleaned, the tables were returned to where they’d been taken from, along with the chairs. This was necessary to make room so Mike’s group was able to sleep comfortably that night. It was easier now, because Sophia and Mika had taken to sharing the same bed in the same bedroom, offering up the canopied twin bed in the tiny room kitty corner to theirs to the eldest of the boys. The trundle bed from their room had been moved into the tiny bedroom for the younger brother. Even though there was no heat source in that tiny bedroom, both boys sandwiched in there and wrapped warmly in enough blankets offered enough warmth.  
  
None of the children believed in Santa anymore so there was no need for the adults to pander to those ideas anymore when they sent the kids up to bed. When the four of them disappeared upstairs to their rooms, the adults weren’t much longer behind them. The preparation all day and with stomachs full of food and spirits gave way to easily heavy eyelids and plenty of yawns.  
  
Rick and Jo were among the last to disperse to their own quarters, walking around and making sure every door was locked and secure for the night and every candle was blown out so fires didn’t start while everyone slept. Extra wood was added to stoke the fire in the fireplaces to keep the rooms warm during the night while the wind outside began to howl as it picked up speed and pelted fresh snow against the windowpanes.  
  
Slipping into comfortable sleepwear, Rick and Jo slid in bed beside each other, with Rick curling up against Jo’s back to spoon her; letting his natural warmth radiate onto her.  
  
As they laid there in the dark of the bedroom, listening to the wind and the subtle crackle of the fire, they easily fell to sleep with the help of the matched rhythm of their breathing.

 

* * *

  
  
When day broke and light began to filter in, Rick stirred awake first, as he usually did. He rolled over onto his back, separating himself from Jo and the position they’d managed to maintain throughout the night from months and months of practice of sharing a twin bed. He stared upward at the underside of their bed’s canopy and was hit by the slight chill in the air, hinting to the fact that the fire in their room had died considerably while they’d been asleep.  
  
There was no need to feed that fire now, though. Once they got up and dressed for the day, they wouldn’t be back to their room until that evening when they went back to bed most likely. There was no point in wasting wood to warm a room they wouldn’t be occupying.  
  
Rolling back toward Jo, he sat up and rubbed her arm.  
  
“Merry Christmas,” he whispered, trying to urge her awake as gently as he could.  
  
Two mornings before, she had been in such a deep sleep that when he’d roused her out of her slumber, she’d been so startled that she’d subconsciously reacted by smacking him in the nose with the back of her hand.  
  
He’d learned his lesson quickly.  
  
Leaning back and eyeing the hand that would likely retaliate without her realizing she was doing it, Rick repeated himself, a little more loudly. “Merry Christmas, Jo.”  
  
“Hmm,” came a happy-sounding hum from the closed cavern that was her mouth. Slowly, she rolled over onto her back and looked up at Rick. “Merry Christmas,” she echoed with a smile on her lips. “I was having the best dream ever.”  
  
Propping his head up in his palm with his arm bent at the elbow and resting against his pillow, Rick grinned down at her. “Oh yeah? What about?”  
  
“I was walking in a mall somewhere, not one I’d ever seen or been to before, and there were all the people around. It was packed; like…Black Friday kind of crazy but not in a claustrophobic way. And they were normal people. This wasn’t one of those walker-filled nightmares.”  
  
“I assumed as much when you said it was the best dream ever,” Rick quipped.  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “Whatever,” she muttered. “Anyway, I was walking through this mall, and I think I had a bag in my hand. I don’t know what I had bought, but next moment it wasn’t there and you were there and you were sitting on some couch and I think we were both naked.”  
  
“I’m liking this dream already.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Yeah, well, it went exactly where you’re thinking. Neither of us seemed to care there were all these people around us, and it seemed like no one saw us anyway. We were just there on that couch, me in your lap facing you and we were fucking like bunnies. It was great.”  
  
“So, the dream world version of yourself is into public sex and voyeurism?”  
  
“I guess so,” Jo replied with a knowing smile.  
  
“Does that mean you’re in the mood? It’s been almost two weeks, and it is Christmas, after all.”  
  
“Is that your way of asking for sex?”  
  
“Is that your way of saying yes?” Rick countered with a mischievous smile and a raise of his eyebrow.  
  
Jo sighed. “Maybe later this evening or tonight I’ll be in the mood.”  
  
Rick’s face immediately fell, having quickly found himself looking forward to Christmas morning sex with his beautiful wife. Jo noticed the way his smile turned into a frown and she chuckled again. Sitting up, she stared him in the eye and sighed.  
  
“How about I give you a Christmas blowjob? Will that suffice for now?”  
  
“I’ll take whatever I can get.” With his smile returning, Rick lean back against his pillow and, as Jo slipped underneath the covers, he watched the way her body moved down the mattress. Tilting his head back, a thought came to Rick’s mind that made him chuckle.  
  
“What?” Jo asked; her voice muffled under the layers of blankets.  
  
“I just have this Christmas song suddenly stuck in my head,” he replied. And then, in a sing-song voice, “Oh, _come_ , all ye faithful…”  
  
Jo’s giggle from underneath the blankets was actually rather adorable, but adorable was not the word he would use to describe the way she used her hands and mouth on him moments later.

 

* * *

  
  
Christmas morning around the tree was almost idyllic.  
  
Everyone sat on the ground or in a side chair, watching as the kids tore into their gifts first. Because that’s where the joy of Christmas morning really came from: watching those faces light up. It wasn’t even about what they were getting, either. They were just so happy to have a Christmas morning again and the adults were happy to give them parts of their childhood back to them.  
  
The gifts were simple, and nice, with each person having made their way to the Mount Vernon gift shop over the course of the last week to find things they wanted for everyone else. Daryl seemed to be given a lot of letter openers, and not because anyone thought he’d be opening envelopes anytime soon, but because they were pointy enough for him to use as a weapon and would definitely be able to put to use. Books and souvenir T-shirts and socks were given; clean clothing always a must have in the new world. The kids got toys; either dolls, stuffed animals, 18th century-era games, little instruments or spycraft. Basically anything to keep them occupied.  
  
Everyone else was so wrapped up into their own gifts among each other or watching the kids enjoy their gifts that no one was really paying attention to Rick and Jo, who sat beside each other in a pair of side chairs. On Jo’s lap there sat a small gift wrapped haphazardly in newspaper as Rick looked on with anticipation; waiting for her to open what he’d given her. When she’d finally removed the paper and opened the jewelry box that was revealed to her, Jo was struck dumb with the beauty of her gift.  
  
Included in the box was the appraisal, detailing the necklace inside as a “Lady’s Cartier Diamond Pave Heart Pendant” on an 18k white gold chain.  
  
“Oh wow, this is so beautiful, Rick.”  
  
“Guess how much that thing cost in the old world.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I dunno. Nine hundred dollars?”  
  
“Try sixty-five hundred.”  
  
Jo turned and leaned back from here. “Holy shit, seriously?”  
  
As Rick nodded in reply, he removed the necklace from the box and unclasped it. “This might’ve cost two months’ salary for me back then, but what else do I get for someone who’s priceless?”  
  
Jo immediately shook her head and snickered. “That was a good line.”  
  
“You like it?” Rick smirked, placing the necklace around her neck. Squinting to focus on clasping it back together, his arms tensed until he succeeded in that task. “It’s also nowhere near as beautiful as you, but it’s beautiful enough.”  
  
“You’re really aiming for sex tonight aren’t you?” Jo teased.  
  
“What can I say?” he shrugged, lowering his voice to whisper in her ear. “That blowjob was amazing, but it still left me wanting more. I am a man who cannot be bought so easily.”  
  
“Apparently not.” Touching her fingers down to her necklace, Jo smiled. “My gift for you is nowhere near as glamorous. I feel it’s kind of lacking now.”  
  
“Well, I get to have sex with you, so I’d say we’re pretty much even.”  
  
Jo practically cackled, which drew some attention away from the kids and toward them instead. After a moment, she shook her head at him and then handed over his gift to him. The shape of it and how the newspaper was tucked around it instead of wrapped or tied shut was a dead giveaway that it was a coffee cup of some sort.  
  
“I’m pretty sure you saw this in the gift shop, but I found it amusing and thought you would, too.”  
  
Removing the old newspaper, Rick stared down at the mug in his hands that was white mug with a light green handle, light green inside and with a quote in the same light green color. “A sensible woman can never be happy with a fool. G Washington.” Rick smirked. “By that logic, you’re gonna be very unhappy for the rest of your days with me, because I tend to be a fool.”  
  
“Maybe sometimes,” Jo teased. “But you’re my fool.”  
  
Rick smiled and thanked her with a slow, tender kiss to the lips. “I love it. I’ll use it every morning and at every meal.”  
  
As Rick and Jo leaned in toward one another, they watched as everyone else continued to open the rest of their gifts, as well as occasionally opening gifts given to them by the others. It was after every gift under the tree was open and the floor was scattered with discarded old newspaper that the good tidings seemed to slowly slip away.  
  
When Jen stood up and left the ballroom for the bathroom, the sound of pained groans could be heard from behind the closed door. Everyone tried to ignore it, but when a loud thud followed, it was hard not to be on alert. Finn was up on his feet in an instant, and pushed the door open to the bathroom, allowing almost everyone a view of Jen down on the ground. And like that, there was a flurry of motion and the air seemed to change. It was charged and kinetic. Hairs were standing on end as Nicole rushed in after Finn and Rick as well after he set his mug down.  
  
Lying rigid and unconscious on the floor with drool pooling from her mouth, Jen was lifted up primarily by Finn but assisted by Rick. They carried her out of the bathroom, toward the other side of the main floor to Nicole’s infirmary where they laid Jen down on the cot in the room where Nicole could easily look after her. Jo was soon to follow; walking through the bathroom, careful to step around the vomit on the floor, pass through the entrance hall, through Finn and Jen’s room and then to the infirmary off the back hallway.  
  
“Is she okay?” Jo inquired.  
  
Nicole barely glanced in her direction as she gently slapped Jen’s face to wake her up. The younger woman stirred slightly, mumbling incoherently while Finn moved around frantically, finding a cloth to wipe the drool away from the side of her face.  
  
“She’s burning up. I need to bring her fever down,” the former ER nurse rattled.  
  
Backing up and making his way over toward his wife, Rick placed his hands on Jo’s shoulders. “Let’s give them some privacy,” he muttered quietly.  
  
When he led Jo back toward the entrance hall where several others were already standing there curiously, wanting to know if Jen was okay. His primary concern was that if Jen had come down with something infectious, he didn’t want Jo near her. The medication they had was still limited and used sparingly. If everyone came down with some sort of sickness, like at the prison, they would be screwed. The fact that Jen seemed to be taking a turn for the worse, medically, was no real surprise. She had been growing steadily weaker over the last two and a half months. It was only a matter of time before something like this happened.  
  
But Nicole was plenty capable, so no one would doubt whether or not Jen was in good hands.  
  
Having helped her mother take care of her ailing grandmother when she was a young girl many, many moons ago, Barbara offered her services to Nicole should they be needed. For now, all anyone could do was return to enjoying Christmas morning as best as they could.  
  
Barbara and Michonne went out to the kitchen to make some oatmeal for late breakfast for everyone, to keep themselves occupied now that opening gifts had ended. Tara had taken to reading the early reader book she’d received, “The Secret Solider: The Story of Deborah Sampson.” The book was aimed at older children, but its true story plot must’ve made whoever had given it to Tara think she would enjoy it and, so far, she seemed to be. By noon, it seemed everyone had scattered to their own parts of the house. Just when the kids had wanted to head outside and build snowmen, the wind picked up against and thicker snow began to bluster around. With how ill Jen seemed to be, neither pairs of parents wanted their children outside in such weather. They didn’t want their kids getting sick and adding to Nicole’s stress and work load.  
  
Inside everyone remained, even Daryl who usually hated being stuck indoors. The sky grew greyer and darker and soon it was whiteout conditions to the point where no one could see the river from the windows at the back of the house or the buildings to the left or right of the house from the windows at the front.  
  
As old a house as it was, it was hard to keep the drafts at bay, so everyone remained close to the fires in whichever rooms they were occupying at the moment. For the most part, they all tried to stick together for the sake of more bodies present meaning more collective body heat to keep them all warm.  
  
Rick, as de facto leader of the two merged groups, his and Mike’s, found himself being the one to go and check in with Nicole to see how Jen was doing. Finn had yet to leave his girlfriend’s side and, as admirable as Jo found it, she had already expressed to Rick her concerns that if Jen was contagious with something, she didn’t want Finn to contract whatever it might be.  
  
“Call me selfish, but I’d rather not lose him to whatever’s ailing her. I’d rather she suffered this without any collateral damage,” she whispered to Rick later that evening as they sat together in the blue parlor, playing cards alone together. “If it means no one else get sick, and I’m talking prison-level sick, I’d prefer her to die and take whatever she has with her.”  
  
Rick looked up at his wife with a raised eyebrow. “That’s pretty harsh,” he commented, taking a card from the deck which only he could see was an eight of diamonds. “Actually, that’s something I would say.”  
  
Drawing a new card from the deck and then discarding another hand, Jo shrugged. “I can’t help it. I felt guilty for a while about having cut her hand off, because in doing so, it’s what put her on this path to being so weak and now so sick. But, if I hadn’t she would’ve died that day from that bite. There wasn’t any time to waste thinking on the pros and cons of what I had to do, and I say _had_ because there was no other option if she was going to live. The axe I used could’ve been rusty, or contained germs or whatever that got into her blood system when I cut her hand off. Maybe that contributed to where she is now, or maybe it was waiting as long as Nicole did to finally cauterize her stump and get medication into her. Who knows?” Leaning back in her chair, Jo looked down at their game of gin rummy. “I know how harsh it sounds, and what’s worse is I don’t feel guilty about any of it anymore. If she survives this winter, I’ll be thoroughly surprised.”  
  
“You need to spend some time away from me. I’m rubbing off too much.”  
  
Jo smirked. “Nah, I’m just looking at things realistically. I love my brother and I want him to have a long life, a future in this world, and I don’t see her having one. He loves her, I know, but right now all I see for him in the near future is grief either because she’s going to remain as weak as she is now for a while yet to come and become a burden or because she’s going to die. If she lives and becomes a burden, I feel like he might grow unhappy with his lot. If she dies, he’ll be inconsolable because he’ll be in mourning.”  
  
“Neither option is ideal, but if she makes it past this hurdle, there is an option that Nicole could work her magic and make Jen’s life more tolerable. She might not ever be as strong as she once was and she might continue on as a non-active member of our group when it comes to taking care of this place and its people, but it’s possible.”  
  
“When did you become the optimist and me the pessimist?” Jo snickered.  
  
“Probably almost two weeks ago when you wouldn’t let me go on that supply run to a Home Depot for barbed wire because you had some bad juju feelings about something bad happening.”  
  
“Bad juju feelings?” Jo looked over at him with a smile.  
  
Rick shrugged. “You know what I mean.”  
  
“Yeah, I do.”  
  
“Maybe that feeling wasn’t about me and that run. Maybe it was some sort of prophetic sign of what Jen’s going through now.”  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, Jen’s health has been an ongoing issue for months. That’s nothing new. No. That feeling I had hasn’t really gone away. It’s more or less been shelved for the time being, I guess. Like, I know it’s still there and it’s not going away. Some mornings I sense it, but then I find myself a bit more scatterbrained lately thanks to our bun in my oven.”  
  
Rick smiled, letting his eyes lower to her very noticeable baby bump. “Well, whatever it is must not be too terrible if being scatterbrained trumps bad juju feelings.”  
  
“You’re funny,” Jo commented dryly. “Also,” she placed her cards down on the table, “I win.”  
  
“Fuck.”

 

* * *

  
  
Before everyone had gone to bed for the night, Rick had spoken to Nicole again about Jen’s condition, out of earshot of Finn as not to disturb either the patient, who was sleeping, or Finn who was at her bedside still in the infirmary. Nicole tried to feign optimism, but Rick wasn’t easily fooled. He had Jen tell him exactly what she believed was the next course of action for caring for Jen. Would they need to go out in this weather to find better medication, did she merely need an extra blanket, should they be digging a grave?  
  
On the latter suggestion, as lighthearted and flippant as Rick had tried making it, Nicole seemed to shrug at it, indicating that was more likely what would need to be done.  
  
Nicole had not told Finn or Jen the truth of what was ailing Jen, instead being vague and saying it was a mix of things. In Jen’s current state, medication would no longer help. When Jen’s arm had first been severed, the walker infection had been prevented thanks to Jo’s quick thinking, but a new infection had taken route and had taken all this time to finally rear its ugly head. Nicole believed the symptoms had become more serious lately but that Jen had been hiding them for a while because of the holiday and not wanting to ruin it for anyone.  
  
“What infection, and is it contagious to anyone else?” Rick had asked, worried about another prison incident.  
  
“I strongly believe it’s tetanus, and it doesn’t spread from person to person. Bacterial spores gotta enter a wound for the infection to spread. I’ve noticed her sitting more and more rigidly lately  
  
“So, what now? Do you need me to do anything?”  
  
Nicole sighed. “We just wait.”  
  
“Wait for what?”  
  
Nicole just looked at him pointedly and Rick quickly understood. He looked over her shoulder toward the infirmary and frowned. Reaching out, he placed a hand on Nicole’s shoulder and nodded at her, silently thanking her for all she was doing. There was really nothing more either could say on the matter, so Rick left the nurse to do her job and he left to send the stragglers off to bed.  
  
When he joined Jo upstairs in their room, she was sitting at her dressing table, brushing through her hair, and asked how Jen was doing. His response was simply just looking at his wife and shaking his head.  
  
Jo didn’t need to have that gesture explained. She understood what he meant.  
  
With a frown that mirrored his, Jo finished brushing through her hair and set the brush down. Turning toward Rick, she watched as he tossed two more logs onto the fire, poked it all around with the metal poker stick and then placed the screen back in front of it so no errant, fiery coals popped out during the night and set the room ablaze while they slept.  
  
The pair of them walked to their bed and slipped under the covers.  
  
Despite his hope from that morning when they first greeted the day, Rick was no longer thinking of making love to Jo. His mind had become so clouded with what was going on with Jen that sex hadn’t even crossed his mind. Lying there with the wind howling outside again and the crackle and pop from the fire, husband and wife were soon able to let their minds shut down for the night and be lulled to sleep.  
  
They laid there, curled in toward one another out of comfort and the desire to keep warm, for a few hours after falling asleep, barely stirring in the slightest.  
  
It wasn’t until at some point during the middle of the night when a long wail of anguish from somewhere downstairs in the house seemed to wake the entire house.  
  
Rick and Jo both bolted upright almost immediately; their faces darting toward the door as if expecting to find some demon bursting into their bedroom. Instead, the wailing continued, along with grievous sobs.  
  
Jo knitted her brow together and felt her chest clench with sadness.  
  
When Rick turned and looked at her, they both had come to realize what had happened.


	55. Downswing

_“Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow...”_ — William Shakespeare  


* * *

  
Jen died in her sleep, just after three in the morning, the day after Christmas. Finn had been asleep in the chair beside the cot she was lying upon, his head tilted uncomfortably all the way back, and unaware that she had already slipped from this world. It wasn’t until that all too familiar raspy, groaning sound stirred him from his slumber, causing him to sit up straight, that he realized something was wrong.  
  
He had turned toward Jen and found her trying to sit up with difficulty because of how well Finn and Nicole had tucked two blankets around Jen’s body to keep her warm while she slept. The movement he’d created in waking up had drawn Jen’s attention toward him and due to the light from the flickering of flames in the fireplace, Finn was able to see how her eyes had glazed over, how gaunt her features had become, all from the effects of succumbing to the infection after she died and reanimated.  
  
Finn was justifiably distraught, crying out but only loud enough for Nicole to hear; who was asleep in Finn and Jen’s downstairs room off the same back hallway the infirmary opened up to and that lead up the stairwell toward Rick and Jo’s bedroom upstairs. Throwing back the covers, Nicole had hurried to the infirmary to find Finn standing up, backing away from Jen’s dead body as she chomped the air in his direction; successfully freeing one of her arms from underneath the covers. They watched as Jen twisted her body and toppled forward onto the floor below the cot and growled at them with a hunger that would never be sated as long as she remained the walker she now was.  
  
Both knew they had to give Jen peace. After months of suffering in silence with her ailments stemming from losing her hand, the young woman didn’t deserve to continue this way, but neither Finn nor Nicole made the first move.  
  
Finn felt it should be him; that Jen should be put down by someone who loved her but, at the same time, he hated the image in his head of shoving a blade through her skull. He knew once he did, that was it. There would be no more Jen, forever. The finality of it broke him, but it was finality Jen deserved. Then there was Nicole who felt that maybe she should be the one to do it, to spare Finn such a task of ending the woman he loved.  
  
Nicole had even grabbed for her knife and was prepared to step forward to do it, but then Finn held his arm out across her chest to stop her. With tears in his eyes and a shake of his head, he took the knife from Nicole’s hand and inhaled deeply to center himself. With an exhale that was just as deep, Finn had stepped forward to Jen’s writhing body as she struggled miserably on the floor to free her legs from the blankets and pull herself up. As Finn neared her, she looked up at him and reached for him, but he stepped out of the way. Crouching down at the top of her head, as she reached upward for him, he began to cry. Nicole came over and crouched down at Jen’s side, grabbing the undead blonde’s arms and holding them down to stop her from trying to reach for Finn so he could do what had to be done.  
  
“I’m sorry, baby,” he mumbled, looking down at Jen’s unseeing eyes that blindly searched his face.  
  
And with that, Finn placed a hand on her forehead to hold her head somewhat still and then jammed the blade into her ear socket.  
  
Almost instantly she had stilled.  
  
For a moment, her body still twitched and twisted, but then nothing as the last sparks of life in her brain went out like a flame.  
  
She was no longer a living, breathing woman, and no longer a walker either.  
  
She was just a corpse.  
  
She was a shell.  
  
And that’s when Finn dropped down to the floor and began to wail so loudly, he woke the house.  


* * *

  
Bright and early that same morning, once day had broken, Rick had recruited Tyreese’s help to dig a grave outside.  
  
Mother Nature must’ve known they had something important to do, because the blustering snow had stopped, allowing both men to trudge through the foot and a half of snow that had fallen over the course of the last two days. No one in their group had died until now since arriving to Mount Vernon, so they had yet to find a reason to dig graves anywhere. Grabbing shovels they had, they found the perfect spot that was only barely out of the way and private. The grassy area behind buildings on the South Lane would do just fine. It was boxed in on all four sides; a brick boundary wall taking up two of those sides, the backs of three of the four white buildings on the South lane was a third side, and a white, wooden fence extending from the last building at the end of the lane till about seven or eight feet before the brick boundary wall provided the fourth and last side. It would most certainly do.  
  
They just hoped this would be the only grave they had to dig for a long time.  
  
After deciding on a spot near the brick wall facing the backs of the building, they first had to use the shovels to toss the snow out of the way. Only then were they able to start digging and in under two hours a four foot grave was dug; taking slightly longer because the ground was somewhat harder than normal due to the colder temperatures. Inside the house, Jen’s body had been wrapped tight in a bed sheet. Because there were no flowers blooming, Mika drew one and placed it on top of Jen’s body to be taken with her to her burial site.  
  
Adorned with coats and hats, as well as gloves and scarves if they had them, everyone left the house, with Finn insisting on carrying Jen by himself. Rick and Tyreese led the procession down the South Lane, following the same path they’d trudged through to reach the grave. Once there, Finn climbed down into the grave and gently laid Jen down before climbing back out with Morgan’s assistance.  
  
Once everyone was standing there, looking down at the sheet-wrapped body, Finn broke down again. He turned toward Jo and leaned into her, resting his head down on her shoulder and crying into her hair while she wrapped her arms around him to console him as best as she could. Even though they did have their paternal grandmother and aunts present, for the most part there was no other constant, motherly figure in either of their lives, but at least Finn had his big sister to somewhat fill that void when he was growing up, what with an eight year age gap between them. She had always been a “little mom” to him and he had always been her “little boy.” That didn’t seem to be any less different now. He needed her more than ever now. Even though Rick was his brother-in-law, even though Sophia and Mika were his surrogate nieces, and even though he had an actual niece or nephew that was yet unborn, all Finn truly had for family was Jo. He never knew who his biological father had been and the only father Finn ever had was dead, their mother was dead, his niece Hope, who he never got to meet, was also dead, and now his girlfriend was dead.  
  
Finn couldn’t find the words to say in order to say goodbye to Jen. All he could manage was a simple “I love you” and then bent down to grab a handful of cold soil, which he promptly tossed down upon Jen.  
  
Shortly after, he walked off; explaining he needed to be alone for a little while.  
  
Rick and Tyreese remained, after everyone ventured off back toward the house, in order to fill the grave back in. With nothing to mark the grave with yet, until a cross or something similar could be constructed, Rick grabbed a large stone and placed it at the head of the grave after he and Tyreese were done.  
  
That evening, Finn had finally come back to the house, chilled to the bone and struggling to carry the thin, twin mattress that came from the RV where it was still parked at the West Gate. After being asked why he had it with him, he explained he couldn’t sleep in his and Jen’s bedroom anymore. In fact, he didn’t want it anymore and would instead crash on a floor somewhere with the mattress he had taken from the RV. Michonne was the one who offered her room first; saying Finn could put the mattress down on the floor and sleep there close to the fire to keep warm at night. Had this all been under different circumstances, she might have joked with him to behave himself but, considering he’d just lost his girlfriend, the time was nowhere near right for that kind of humor.  
  
With an empty room available now, it was offered to Mike’s group who decided that Mike and Alyssa would take it. Barbara, Lewis and José were fine, making do in sleeping bags in the ballroom, but it was decided that the next priority for an outing away from Mount Vernon for any supplies would be to acquire new beds.  
  
They were going to need cribs eventually for Karen and Jo’s babies, so it only made sense to get spare beds and mattresses for actual adults. Actually, as beautiful and nice as most of the beds were in the mansion, they were replicas of 18th century furniture and not exactly spacious enough for people today. After the new year, or as soon as the snow melted, they would pick apart a few nearby homes to dismantle the bed frames and transport them along with their respective mattresses to Mount Vernon. Everyone would have to start doubling up. The more integrated and familial both groups were becoming, it made more sense to allow them space within the house as well. For now, they would stay as is.  
  
The days following Jen’s death seemed to be passing quickly and before they knew it, New Year’s Eve had arrived but no one was feeling celebratory anymore. Losing Jen had put a damper on the remains of the holiday spirit. The night was just another night, but there was still the same feeling of hope a new year offered in the beginning. Maybe things would get progressively better. Maybe, somewhere out there in the world, scientists that survived the outbreak were busy at work in underground laboratories working on a cure. The short term hope, however, was simply for an early spring so the group at Mount Vernon could get to tending the gardens and planting fresh vegetables from the packets they had stored in the pantry.  
  
On what was New Year’s Day, Karen and Tyreese went to Nicole for their weekly sonogram to see how their pregnancy was doing. When they left the room, they were all smiles. They joined Rick and Jo at the dining room table, sitting opposite from them, while Barbara came in with a teapot of hot water so some hot morning tea could be enjoyed since they’d run out of instant coffee as well as cocoa packets. All that was left, aside from water, were the tea packets, a few off-brand Kool-Aid packets, some bottles of wine and other varieties of alcohol, and three unopened boxes of Great Value brand nonfat instant dry milk. As Barbara was pouring hot tea from the pot over the orange pekoe tea bags in Rick and Jo’s cups, it was obvious that the other couple had something to say.  
  
Upon a thank you to Barbara, Rick reached across for some of the powdered creamer they still had in stock. That was something that was easy to find plenty of in the world these days because it was not something anyone would need. Because Rick’s group was settled and safe somewhere, these were the kinds of luxuries they could figuratively afford to indulge in now. He cast an eye over the table between Tyreese and Karen and raised an eyebrow at them.  
  
“What’s up?” he wondered.  
  
With an arm around the back of Karen’s chair, Tyreese nodded at her. “Show ‘em.”  
  
Karen reached down into her lap and pulled up a piece of paper that Rick and Jo were familiar with. It was a sonogram picture. They had a couple of their own as it were already. Passing the picture across the table, Jo took it and glanced down at the black and white hazy image before smiling brightly. When she turned it toward Rick for him to see, he smiled as well when he saw the little white arrow pointing to a spot on the baby and the word “I’M A BOY” printed on it, determining their baby had a penis.  
  
“Congratulations,” Rick beamed. He stood up and walked around the table as Tyreese stood as well, and both men embraced and hugged it out. “We’ll have to find some adorable onesies with fire trucks and dinosaurs on them for your little guy while we’re out looking for baby supplies.”  
  
“As long as we have enough necessities, I don’t care if my son is wearing a pink, frilly tutu,” Tyreese quipped as both men sat back down.  
  
“How excited are you?” Jo asked, more directly at Karen.  
  
Rubbing her stomach, Karen shrugged. “It’s making it feel more real now, I guess. We’ll have to start thinking on names more seriously. All that matters is he comes out healthy and we can keep him safe and fed and warm once he’s born.”  
  
“It’s definitely no small feat.”  
  
“Tell me about it,” Rick added, leaning back with his tea. “Pray he ain’t colicky. That’s a nightmare.”  
  
“I never understood what colic was,” Tyreese commented. “Your son or Hope ever have it?”  
  
Rick looked over at Jo and smirked ruefully. “Carl had it bad. It was a very stressful and tiring time in mine and Lori’s lives. Hope had it a little bit in the beginning.”  
  
“I think she was just sensitive to her surroundings,” Jo offered. “I think she knew when everyone else was stressed or upset. She cried a lot up until after the attack at Woodbury. Once we returned and brought the others back with us, and everyone was settling in, Hope calmed down, too.” Glancing over at Karen, she remembered seeing the other woman for the first time, stepping off that bus, helping one of the elderly newcomers. But then her mind drifted to her daughter again and tears instinctively began to brim her eyes. Trying to be preemptive, she wiped at her eyes and smiled through it. “I just hope she did well for Shane after they got away from the prison. I hope she didn’t cry a lot for him, draw unwanted attention. I hope crying isn’t what caused her to, uh…”  
  
Rick turned in his chair, sensing his wife becoming distraught. When he moved to reach for her, to pat her leg soothingly, Jo pushed back from the table and excused herself as she got up and left the room. Cutting through the infirmary, she made her way up the back stairs to her and Rick’s room where she closed the door behind her.  
  
Once she was alone, she walked around to her side of the bed and looked out the window with her arms folded under her blossoming bosom. She was forcing herself not to cry but tears were starting to roll down her face regardless. She would not give in to sobbing, though. She refused to give in to her grief which would never truly go away. As broken as she was about losing Hope, she couldn’t dwell on it, for the sake of this new baby. She didn’t want the new baby to grow up living in the shadow of their deceased older sister. She wanted to be able to give this new baby all of her love and attention. She didn’t want to be distracted by the past anymore.  
  
Jo clenched her eyes shut and focused on the darkness before her, trying to mentally push the sadness away and focus on what it would be like to hold the new baby. She tried picturing what he or she would look like, growing up here at Mount Vernon. Learning to walk and run and play out in the gardens, chasing butterflies and climbing trees.  
  
However, those images she tried to force were pushed aside by the altered images of what the future could’ve looked like instead if she’d still had Hope, how both her children could be running and playing together with Karen and Tyreese’s son.  
  
A soft knock to the door caused Jo to open her eyes and look through the sheerness of the curtain around the bed. She didn’t say for whoever it was to come in, knowing who it was and that they’d let themselves in.  
  
Rick stepped inside their bedroom, leaving the door slightly ajar. Crossing the floor, he made his way around the bed and stepped up behind Jo, placing his hands on her shoulders. “You okay?”  
  
Jo inhaled a deep breath and nodded. She supposed she would never be one hundred percent okay, but she was okay enough for the time being because she wanted to be okay enough. “I am. I just had a moment.”  
  
“I know.” Rick leaned down and placed a kiss upon her shoulder.  
  
“I feel a bit bad leaving the room like that. I didn’t mean to put a damper on Ty and Karen’s good news.”  
  
“They’re fine. They understand. Everyone loved her.” By her, he meant Hope. “Everyone misses her, too, and always will. Just as we do and will.”  
  
“Not as much as us.”  
  
“Never as much as us, but that’s pretty much a given.” Rick sighed. “We just take it one day at a time, like we have been, and when we have moments like this, then that’s okay. We’re entitled to these moments.”  
  
“We’re not the only ones who’ve lost a child, either. Mike and Alyssa lost their daughter, Morgan and Michonne both lost sons.”  
  
“And they’re entitled to moments like this, too.”  
  
“I might be the lucky one," Jo remarked, turning around to face Rick but keeping her eyes chest level. “I never had to see my child die. The rest of you have.”  
  
The image of Carl’s undead eyes looking back at him flashed before Rick’s mind and he frowned; mentally pushing it away. While he had come to embrace that horrible moment in his life, he tried looking at it as if he were an outsider looking in on someone else’s memory. He had been able to detach himself from it to make it more bearable and so that he could carry on with his life for himself and the others. Removing his hands from Jo’s shoulders, he snaked them around to her back and held her close, leaning his head against hers.  
  
“Let’s just try and focus on what’s ahead, not what we’ve suffered.”  
  
“I’m always trying.”  
  
Rick smiled affectionately. Lifting his hands up he smoothed Jo’s hair back away from her face and kissed her forehead, and then the tip of her nose. “And you’re doing an amazing job.” He placed a smaller kiss at the corner of her mouth and then leaned back until she was looking back up at him. “You carry yourself like a queen, so strong and resiliently. It helps me forget anything bad’s happened. And when I do remember, I just think about how I have you and we have the girls and the little one on the way and then the pain doesn’t hurt as much anymore. You’re like Vicodin.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “I’m you drug?”  
  
“You are, and I’m addicted with no plan for rehabilitation.”  
  
Inhaling a few staggering breaths to right herself once again, she breathed out slowly each time. Feeling that sense of calm return and the sadness ebb away for another while, Jo touched her fingertips down upon Rick’s waist and buried her forehead against his chest. “I’m gonna stay up here a bit longer if you don’t mind. Maybe read or something. I still feel awkward about the way I left the table, even if Ty and Karen understand.”  
  
Rick nodded, taking a step back. “Want me to bring your tea up? It’s probably cold now, though.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I can set the cup down next to the fire, heat it up that way if I need to,” she remarked, gesturing to the fireplace which was pretty much only hot coals now, since the fire that had been crackling over the night had died with no one adding more wood or stoking it. “I think it’s just gonna be one of those days.”  
  
Rick nodded again. “Okay.” Giving her shoulders a soft rub, he turned around and made his way toward the door. “I’ll be back up.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“I’m gonna try and make my rounds today as best as I can around the property, but then I’ll be back up,” he informed, gripping the doorknob and looking over at her. “I think spending time up here, just you and me, doing a bit of nothing, might be nice on a day like today.”  
  
Jo smiled and watched him return the gesture before slipping out of the room and into the hall. She listened to his footsteps descending the stairs and moved toward the fireplace. Beside it was a basket of wood from one of the dead trees on the property that had been chopped into small logs. Pushing aside the metal safety screen, she set three logs on and took the metal poker to rile up the heat from the coals so the logs would catch on fire. She stood there staring at it all for a few moments when she heard Rick’s footsteps again.  
  
“Here,” she heard him say before she even glanced in his direction.  
  
He was walking over toward her, but stopped short to set her cup of tea on the small table beside the wingback chair along with some toast with jam from the homemade bread Barbara had made and the jars of preserves they’d brought back from the gift shop the week before Christmas.  
  
Jo looked over her shoulder at the toast. “What kind of jam?”  
  
“Strawberry rhubarb.”  
  
“My favorite.”  
  
“I know.” Rick smiled at her. “You need anything else before I head out?”  
  
“If I do, I’ll holler for someone,” she insisted. “You never know what you might come across, so just be safe outside.”  
  
“I always am,” he winked, stepping back toward the door.  
  
“Mmm, no you aren’t.”  
  
Rick dropped his head down and shook it. “Yeah, well, it’s not like I go looking for trouble.”  
  
Putting the safety screen back in front of the fire, Jo walked over to Rick and grabbed the collar of his shirt, urging him downward more to her level so that she could give him a proper kiss. “Take someone with you, like Finn. He needs to get outside and do something instead of moping around.”  
  
“Alright.”  
  
“Rick.”  
  
He turned back just as he was about to slip out of their room. “Hmm?”  
  
“I love you.”  
  
Rick smiled. “Love you, too.”  


* * *

  
Two weeks after the New Year, the weather got even colder. While barely any snow seemed to fall, the temperature did. The remaining crops left in the gardens that could be salvaged were removed and brought up to the house, but most of what was left couldn’t be saved. Frost and likely small animals roaming the grounds had killed them. There was little to do for food. They were stocked up well enough with canned and boxed non-perishable foods, fruits and vegetables that Barbara had been helping teach Michonne and Tara to can and pickle as preserves, as well as whatever animal the Dixons (mostly) had gone out to hunt here and there for some meat in their diets. They were doing okay where food was concerned. There was also enough firewood for each room to keep everyone warm, but to cut down burning too much too soon, everyone was advised to wear extra layers of clothing, wear their coats and jackets indoors, or keep wrapped up in blankets and stay nearby to one another because of the benefit of body heat.  
  
The colder the temperature also meant any walkers out there froze or slowed to a snail crawl until the weather decided to break. In all Rick’s walks around the grounds since New Year’s Eve, he had yet to see one walker. It was almost surreal. Having gotten so used to the sight of walkers and the stench (though, there truly was never any getting used to that), to not see them or smell them was stranger than getting used to seeing and smelling them in the beginning. It was like a vacation, actually; a much needed break where Rick felt like he could stop worrying about the outside world for a while.  
  
Despite the death of Jen three weeks earlier, everyone seemed to be in fine spirits; Finn excluded, of course. He was still in mourning and rightfully so. There was never a specific time frame for the grieving process. It was different for each person.  
  
Take Alyssa for example. She and Mike’s daughter had died in the beginning, right before their eyes, and that was nearly two years ago now, and Alyssa still hadn’t properly gotten over that loss. Mike had spoken to Rick and Jo in passing, a short time after his group had come to Mount Vernon, that before his daughter was killed, even amidst the craziness of the world as they knew it ending, Alyssa had been such a vibrant personality. She laughed and joked freely. She had been the glue that kept their family together, especially when Mike was away from home, working long hours in the city. After their daughter died, a light had gone off. Or rather, where once there was a bright fire that burned, all that was left now was the embers. They still had their sons and she mustered everything she had left in her to keep it going for them and in doing so became extremely overprotective; utterly terrified of losing them.  
  
For the boys, who were coming of age in this new world the same as Sophia and Mika, this was all they would know from here on out. In time, the old world would be like a dream and the new, harsh world would be commonplace. Despite all that, it didn’t change the fact that they were still young adults, children, growing up and not wanting their parents clinging and breathing down their next twenty-four seven; the same as they wouldn’t have wanted in the old world.  
  
It was clear in their faces that the boys found comfort and solace in getting to hang out with Sophia and Mika; kids their own age that weren’t each other. And, for Taylor in particular, whether Sophia had caught on or not, he had taken a deep liking to Sophia, and it wasn’t just because she was the only age-appropriate girl around with a pulse. He genuinely liked her. He laughed at her jokes and smiled when she walked in the room. His entire being seemed to brighten when he was near her. She was the sun in the darkness of their lives and he gravitated toward her the same as any planet to its star.  
  
Two weeks after New Year’s, on the 15th of January, all four of the kids were bundled up warmly in coats, scarves, hats, gloves and boots, as well as a sharp weapon for safety just in case, and had approached Rick about the four of them taking a walk down toward the shoreline. They asked Rick, not just as their little community’s leader, but as Sophia and Mika’s parent.  
  
Seeing the hopeful glimmer in their eyes and the promises to be safe adamantly from their lips, it was hard to say no. It wasn’t like Rick would’ve anyway. He trusted them to stay warm and be safe. They were good kids, smart kids. They knew to how to protect themselves and each other, or to make a run for it if need be. And, the shoreline wasn’t far away.  
  
Rick said yes, and off the kids went with smiles on their faces.  
  
Standing at the window beside the door, he watched them walking down the sloping gradient of the property toward the direction of the Potomac with his own smile on his face.  
  
Until he saw Taylor reach for Sophia’s hand and Sophia accepting it.  
  
“What’s interesting out there?”  
  
Rick turned around and saw Finn standing a few feet behind him. “The kids are going for a walk down near the river.”  
  
The younger man nodded solemnly. Even though he was engaging in friendly banter, his tone was detached. He was still going through the motions while processing his own loss. “You look like you want to murder someone.”  
  
“I do?” Rick shrugged it off. “Force of habit, I guess.” Fiddling with solar calendar on the window sill, Rick threw one last look out the window but no longer saw any of the kids. “Taylor’s sweet on Sophia. I think she feels the same.”  
  
“Young love.”  
  
Rick winced. “I don’t think it’s that just yet. Young _lust_ maybe. They’re at the age now. Hormones raging faster than the speed of light,” he replied, placing a hand on his hip and walking off toward the dining room with Finn leisurely in tow. “Gonna have to have a talk with them two, sooner rather than later.”  
  
“The birds and bees talk?”  
  
“One in the same.” Grabbing a fresh roll leftover from breakfast off the table, Rick began to pick it apart and pop pieces of it into his mouth to eat. “Sophia gets her monthly visitor like the rest of the ladies. I think I might try scaring them into not having sex until she’s eighteen. So that gives me about three years hopefully.”  
  
Finn smirked. “What exactly do you plan to say?”  
  
“I’ll just tell them to suppress any urges because if they have sex, and Sophia gets pregnant, they’ll die.”  
  
“That’s a bit extreme. They’ll die?”  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded with a smirk of his own. “’Cause I’ll kill them.”  


* * *

  
Ironically, Sophia returned a short time later with Mika tagging along a short distance behind. The teen girl looked like someone had punched her in the gut the way she was hunched forward and holding her stomach. When Rick saw her darting by, he asked what was wrong but the girl said nothing as she groaned and made a beeline toward the infirmary, which made Rick more concerned. Mika, however, cut him off. She held up her hands and shook her head at him.  
  
“She’s got bad cramps and needs some Advil from Nicole,” the younger girl informed before turning tail to follow after her adoptive sister in a show of camaraderie.  
  
Rick didn’t need to know anything further than that. Instead, he made his way upstairs to his and Jo’s room where he found her reading a book in bed because some recent light spotting on her part had more or less caused Nicole to enforce bedrest for Jo.  
  
“You seem amused by something,” Jo remarked when she saw her husband appear in the doorway.  
  
He simply nodded and smiled; walking over toward the fireplace. Grabbing a single log, he tossed it gently into fireplace and then stoked it with the metal poker to keep the fire from dying and maintain the warmth in the room. “The kids went for a walk down near the river but the girls just came back because Sophia has cramps.” He threw a look over at his wife. “It’s shark week.”  
  
Jo laughed. “One of the joys of being pregnant.”  
  
“Don’t tell Sophia that. She and Taylor have moon eyes for each other. I don’t want them getting any ideas,” he commented, walking over toward the bed and sitting down on the edge beside Jo. “I want to live long enough to be a grandpa, but I don’t want to be a grandpa just yet, ya feel me?”  
  
“You’d be the hottest, youngest grandpa I’ve ever known.”  
  
“Shut it.”  
  
Jo merely laughed again.  


* * *

  
Merely thirty minutes later, laughter was a thing of the past.  
  
Daryl had been sitting outside, getting some fresh air because he’d been going stir crazy doing jack shit inside, when he saw young Ryan trudging up the snow-covered incline up toward the house. His cheeks were bright red from the cold air, tears falling down his face and snot plastered around his nose as he tried running as fast as he could toward the house, wailing in agony.  
  
Instinctively, Daryl ran for the boy and grabbed for him. He looked to make sure the boy wasn’t hurt or worse; bitten. After that quick, initial assessment assured the boy was physically fine, Daryl grabbed Ryan’s face in his hands and demanded to know what was wrong, as gently as possible. When the words were out of Ryan’s mouth, Daryl ushered him inside and then barked out for Rick and Mike and any other able-bodied man.  
  
In what was probably an innocent attempt to show off for his younger brother, Taylor had gone out onto the river, which was so cold it had frozen over. However, the ice wasn’t thick enough to maintain Taylor’s weight, unbeknownst to the teen, and Taylor had fallen through into the icy water underneath.  
  
Alyssa, upon hearing this, fainted as if on cue. Nicole was quick to act and Michonne assisted in carrying the unconscious mother to her bedroom which was formerly Finn and Jen’s. Despite his own impending grief, Mike took lead in storming out the back door to the 18 th century mansion with Daryl, Rick, Tyreese and Morgan quick in pursuit behind him. Poor Ryan was still standing there in the entrance hall, bundled up and sobbing. Karen was nearest and pulled him over to her while his mother was indisposed.  
  
It wasn’t long before the five men returned, slowly and grievously, and without Taylor.  
  
Alyssa had woken up by then and was being comforted by Michonne while Ryan still clung to Karen. Sophia had come downstairs from her room, where she’d been trying to rest while she waited for her cramps to subside, and immediately began to sob as well when she saw the look on the men’s faces.  
  
Taylor was gone.  
  
He had fallen through the ice and the current underneath had taken him.  


* * *

  
As the day progressed, Alyssa had shut herself away in her and Mike’s bedroom; closing all three doors that led to it. She was beyond consolable. Mike was left to tend to their younger son, their remaining child, who was blaming himself that he should’ve been able to save his brother, but there was no way the boy could’ve managed that on his own without also losing his life. It was an unfortunate situation, a horrible loss, and all Mike could do was be present for Ryan while Alyssa had checked out for the time being. Ryan needed at least one of his parents right now. Mike knew his wife had been at her breaking point when they’d lost their daughter and now she was broke. He had to be both mother and father for the moment. Fortunately, he had a large support system around him this time around.  
  
Rick was there to offer kind, supportive words; having gone through the loss of two children as well now. When Mike needed a moment to himself later on, there were plenty of others ready to step in and sit with Ryan, like Mika, his friend who was his own age, who had gone through losing both her real parents and her sister all by the age of ten. Sophia kept to her and Mika’s room, wanting to grieve privately, but not turning anyone away that came to check on her like Alyssa did. Barbara, who had spent the last year alongside Mike’s family and had gotten to know his boys and love them like they were her grandchildren, was broken as well, but she soldiered through her pain by way of heading to the kitchen to prepare food for dinner. Michonne, feeling at a loss for what to do, followed suit. Everyone else just found themselves milling aimlessly around the mansion; finding anything to keep themselves busy.  
  
Rick, frustrated by the loss of the teenager, had decided to chop some firewood and was soon joined by Daryl. When dinner was ready and brought into the dining room, Barbara left it there for everyone to help themselves. It wasn’t a sit down meal by any means. It was there to pick at whenever anyone felt like eating, or to fill the void until they went to bed for the night.  
  
Night couldn’t seem to come soon enough either.  
  
It was already decided that the next morning a cross with Taylor’s name would be erected the following day and added to their cemetery off the South Lane, beside Jen’s grave. A small box with one of Taylor’s outfits and one of his gifts from Christmas would be buried in the ground in place of his body as more of a memorial than a funeral.  
  
It would be a sad affair.  
  
Saying goodbye to anyone they cared about was always hard, but it was especially so when it was a child.  
  
At bedtime, Rick and Jo took special care to say goodnight to Sophia and Mika; to kiss and hug them goodnight as they tucked them in like children of a much younger age. Moments like this always made people take stock of what they still had and appreciate it all the more.  
  
As they shut the girls’ door and were about to cut through Nicole’s bedroom to get to theirs, the couple passed Mike coming up the stairs with Ryan; leading his son into the tiny bedroom kitty-corner to Nicole’s.  
  
“Hey,” Rick greeted. It was pointless to ask how father and son were doing. It had been less than eight hours since they’d lost Taylor.  
  
“Gonna be sleeping in here tonight with Ryan,” Mike announced quietly as the boy sauntered into the room and dropped dejectedly, knees first, onto the trundle bed. “He’s so used to sleeping near Taylor, and Alyssa still won’t let me into our room. We told her goodnight through a closed door but she didn’t say anything back to us.” He sighed, bringing his hands up to his face and rubbing it before pushing them to slick back his hair. “I don’t care that she’s shutting me out, but I wish she wouldn’t do it to Ryan. He needs her now, too.”  
  
Jo frowned sadly and placed a hand to Mike’s shoulder. “She’s just lost her firstborn; the first child she ever carried within her. Right now she just needs time to come to terms with this,” she assured. “Alyssa will come ‘round eventually. Just give her time.”  
  
“In the meanwhile, you and Ryan need anything from any of us, don’t hesitate to ask,” Rick added.  
  
“We will. Thank you.”  
  
With a solemn nod, all three adults parted ways; with Mike stepping into the tiny bedroom and closing the door behind him while Rick and Jo continued on through Nicole’s bedroom which was empty at the moment as Nicole was likely still downstairs in the infirmary, keeping herself busy. Once in their own bedroom, off the same small hallway it shared with Nicole’s, Rick and Jo removed their everyday clothes and changed into more comfortable sleepwear. For Rick, who naturally ran warm, he merely wore a pair of pajama pants he’d acquired one of the houses he’d scavenged not long after they’d claimed Mount Vernon. Jo found the most comfort in a nightgown and terrycloth robe. Despite the cold draft that was unavoidable in the house, even with fires roaring in the fireplaces, Jo still went without something on her legs and feet. It was too restricting for her, especially so no with her belly getting bigger by the day. She had a few pairs of maternity pants to wear now that she and Karen shared, but there were no maternity pajama bottoms for them.  
  
“I was not expecting today to go the way it did,” Jo remarked as she pushed aside the sheer bed curtain and slipped under the covers.  
  
“Tell me about it.” Rick was adding another couple logs to the fire and poking them around to get them in a good position to burn. As he returned the safety screen in front of the fireplace, he set the poker aside and turned around to look over at Jo. “I don’t know which is worse.”  
  
“What is?”  
  
“Witnessing your child’s death or never knowing exactly what happened.” As he made his way around to his side of the bed, Rick pulled back the curtain and climbed in beside Jo. Once underneath the covers, he gestured for her to roll onto her side so that he could spoon her. The position was old hat for them by now. With his left arm buried under his pillow and his right around draped over her waist so his hand could rest upon her stomach, Rick pressed his lips briefly against her right shoulder blade. “Mike and Alyssa had to watch their little girl get ripped apart by walkers right in front of them and there was nothing they could do about it. Now Taylor’s slipped and fallen through the ice on the river, his body lost, and they weren’t there when it happened.”  
  
“You’ve been through both situations now,” Jo muttered. “Watching your son die and then having to do what you did after he came back, and then the way we lost Hope. Honestly, I don’t think one death is any worse than the other. Either way a child is gone. One is more gruesome, but at least the child didn’t die alone. The other, we’ll never know how it was, because we weren’t there.”  
  
“Maybe that’s worse.” Rick sighed deeply, burying his face into her hair on the back of her neck. “If I have to live through losing another child of mine, I think I might follow Alyssa’s lead and just close myself off from everything and everyone for a while.”  
  
“Don’t you dare leave me alone in at a time like that.”  
  
“I won’t really. But it’s a tempting idea.”  
  
Jo frowned, grabbing Rick’s hand and pulling it up to her chest. “I know.”  


* * *

  
In the early hours of the morning, a short while before sunrise, Jo’s bladder woke her up like clockwork, as it had been for a couple months now. Grumbling quietly to herself, she lifted her head and looked over her shoulder to see that Rick had since rolled away from her while he slept so she didn’t have to worry about removing his arm from her and waking him up. Slowly and soundlessly, Jo sat up and pushed the covers aside so she could climb out of bed without disturbing Rick in the process; something she’d come to master. She often came and went from bed during the night and he was none the wiser every time.  
  
Padding softly across the floor, she pulled the door open slowly and left it open to keep from having to go through the ordeal of opening and closing it multiple times in case it creaked; something that tended to happen a lot more lately especially since they were living in such an old house.  
  
Jo slipped barefoot out into the hall, squinting her eyes in the darkness to see the steps as she descended the staircase. A cold chill spread up her spine from the draft, causing her to pull her robe closed around her a bit tighter. At the base of the stairs she turned left and walked into the infirmary and paid no mind to the contents of the room as she passed through it toward the dining room. With Alyssa closing off all three doors to her and Mike’s bedroom, it meant she couldn’t cut through it to the bathroom, which would mean less time to get to the bathroom so she could finally pee. Of course, that would’ve only been if it had been during the day. Even if things were fine, she would’ve never walked right through the bedroom during the night. For all she knew Mike and Alyssa, like her brother and Jen before them, could’ve been naked. Also, it was night and she didn’t want to risk waking anyone up.  
  
So, Jo made her way to the dining room and stepped around the table; mindful of the one chair that was not pushed in all the way. Out into the entrance hall she continued and just before she reached the door to the bathroom, she paused and squeezed her legs together as she sneezed. Crossing her legs had been necessary because if she hadn’t, she would’ve likely pissed herself and she was too tired for that nonsense.  
  
While she had turned her head to sneeze, she noted the door to Mike and Alyssa’s bedroom that led out into the entrance hall was ajar. For a brief moment she wondered if Mike had made his way downstairs after Ryan had fallen asleep and went to sleep beside his wife for the night after all. Thinking no further on it, she quietly opened and closed the bathroom door while she rubbed her nose with the sleeve of her robe. Not bothering to light the candle on the table in the corner to give her some light, Jo was content to do her business in the dark. She sat there, on the portable toilet, thinking about absolutely nothing as she stared off into the darkness of the room; just looking forward to getting back upstairs into her warm bed.  
  
When she was finished, she wiped and tossed the soiled tissue into the waste bin; the contents of which would be burned come morning in a small and brief fire outside. Cleansing her hands with hand sanitizer, she stood there rubbing her hands together until the antibacterial gel dried naturally and without her having to wipe the excess off onto her robe. While she was waiting on that, however, she heard the slight creak of a door, followed by the shuffling of feet out in the entrance hall and figured Alyssa had been woke by her own bladder as well.  
  
With a tired sigh, Jo stepped over to the door and opened it up, prepared to offer a small smile in passing to Alyssa, or whoever else it was approaching. Before she was even out of the room, and before she could even get a proper look at who it was, the person was reaching for her.  
  
Looking up, Jo saw that it was, indeed Alyssa, but the sluggish way with which she’d been moving out in the hall was not because it was the middle of the night and she was sleepily trying to make it to the bathroom. When Jo looked Alyssa in the face, she found undead eyes staring back at her.  
  
Before Jo could let out a yelp of surprise, Alyssa grabbed onto Jo’s arm and her teeth clacked together as she leaned in to try and bite at Jo’s face.  
  
Snapping out of her tiredness real quick, Jo gathered up enough of her strength to give Alyssa’s corpse a shove backward to by herself some time. She turned for the table in the hall that was covered in weapons there at the ready for this exact purpose, Jo grabbed for the first sharp object she could reach, which happened to be Michonne’s katana that was still sheathed in its thin, white scabbard. As Jo went about pulling the katana free, Alyssa was grabbing at her again; yanking her back by the collar of her robe. Jo spun around, letting the scabbard slip from the katana and drop to the floor with a clatter. She shoved her left arm upward to try and throw Alyssa’s corpse off balance again but found that to be of no use, so Jo yanked her arm free of the sleeve and quickly began to slip free of the robe altogether.  
  
Alyssa lunged at that moment, catching Jo by surprise as she back up into the weapons table, which caused several items to tumble to the floor. Jo groaned, knowing she’d end up with a bruise at the small of her back, but that was the least of her worries at this point.  
  
Jo cried out as Alyssa snarled at her and clawed at her shoulders.  
  
“Get…off…me…” Jo grunted.  
  
She could hear movement from upstairs and coming from the ballroom; several people waking up from the noise she and Alyssa were now creating in their struggle between literal life and death. The door to the connecting the ballroom and the blue parlor flew open and footsteps followed. As Jo backed up toward the side of the staircase, with Alyssa now clutching with a serious death grip on the front of Jo’s nightgown, Jo brought the katana’s blade up swiftly, just as Lewis darted out of the blue parlor and into the hall.  
  
The katana had cut upward, starting at just underneath Alyssa’s chin and severed the front of her face clean off. Blood splattered Jo’s face and the front of her nightgown as Alyssa’s corpse stumbled backward, but was not dead because her brain hadn’t been damaged in the process.  
  
As people Jo couldn’t see came clambering down the main staircase, Jo used the extra space now between her and Alyssa’s bodies. She raised the katana like a javelin and speared Alyssa through the front of her head with a simple jab which was enough to finally end Alyssa once and for all.  
  
Jo slumped back against the side of the staircase, and slid down to the floor with the katana still gripped in her hand while Alyssa’s corpse fell sideways like a sack of potatoes and blood from her opened face began to soak the carpet underneath her.  
  
Lewis was at Jo’s side in a heartbeat after stepping around Alyssa and crouched down in front of her. “Are you okay? Are you injured?” he asked her, brushing hair off her face to check for bite wounds, most likely.  
  
“Oh my God! No!”  
  
Jo was able to tell without looking that that voice sadly belonged to Mike and she felt horrible about what she’d just had to do, but she’d been left without a choice. She hoped he would understand that.  
  
“Jo, what happened? Are you okay?” It was Michonne, at Jo’s side, reaching for the katana and pushing it away.  
  
“I got up to go to the bathroom. I saw the bedroom door was open a bit but didn’t think anything much of it,” Jo began to explain. She lifted a hand and wiped some blood from her face. “When I came out, Alyssa was there and she was already dead. She was trying to bite me. I grabbed for the first weapon I could.” As she looked at Mike hunched over his wife’s dead body, she began to cry. “I’m sorry. I did what I had to do. She was already gone.”  
  
“It’s okay,” Michonne hushed, repeating the same process Lewis had just taken by making sure there were no wounds or bite marks anywhere on Jo. “It’s not your fault.”  
  
Mike dropped backward and sat there on the floor, looking away from his wife’s head and instead focusing on her hand he was holding; twisting her wedding ring around with his fingers. “She’s so cold.”  
  
“She’s probably been dead a couple hours,” Tyreese commented; one of those that had made it down the main staircase as quickly as possible and was now standing just behind Mike while Karen remained quietly on the steps.  
  
As Sophia appeared, she stood there on the stairs; stunned, but didn’t seem to question what had happened. It was pretty self-explanatory.  
  
It seemed everyone was coming out of the woodwork at this point, which then made Karen realize Ryan might be waking up and come to see what the commotion was all about. Wanting to spare the child the trauma of seeing his mother dead and in her current state, Karen turned on her heels and headed quickly up the stairs to prevent any of that from happening.  
  
The last one show up was Rick, who had been pulled out of bed by Nicole who had gone back upstairs to get him after she’d initially come down. Rick wasted no time in reaching his wife and pulling her up to her feet and into his arms. He didn’t need an explanation. He could see what clearly went down. Jo would’ve never attacked the grieving mother unless the woman was already dead  
  
Daryl and José were quick to grab for a bed sheet and wrap up Alyssa’s body, and that included the part of her face that Jo had sliced off. Barbara and Lewis had pulled Mike into the blue parlor to console him while candles were being lit to shed some literal light on the situation in the entrance hall. Michonne was first to head into the pantry and grab the cleaning products they had stored in there to get a jumpstart on cleaning up the blood. Sophia offered her help without being asked, and even after Michonne had insisted against it. Tyreese went about picking up the weapons that had fallen from the table and Tara ushered Mika back upstairs. Merle, who slept away from the house in the old Overseer’s Quarters off the North Lane would be filled in once he was up for the day and made it to the house for breakfast.  
  
It was Morgan and Nicole who went about trying to investigate what caused Alyssa’s first death to begin with while Rick brought Jo into the bathroom to clean her up. Her gown was covered in blood but her robe which had been discarded on the floor seemed fine so, after closing the door behind them for privacy, he had Jo slip out of her nightgown and then wrapped her up in just the robe. The robe could be washed later, and she could change into something clean once they got back upstairs to their room.  
  
Rick had her sitting on the only real chair in the room while he sat across from her on the closed lid of the portable toilet, hunched forward slightly. The muffled sound of Mike sobbing could be heard through the wall shared between the bathroom and the blue parlor and Rick could see how guilty Jo was looking.  
  
“It’s not your fault, what happened. Don’t beat yourself up over it.”  
  
“I know,” she insisted. “I just hate that it had to happen and that I was the one to do it.”  
  
“You didn’t cause her to die,” Rick replied. “You just put her out of her misery.”  
  
“She was healthy. She wasn’t sick. Even in all that commotion I didn’t notice any wounds on hers. I don’t understand how she died to begin with.” Looking up at Rick, should could see his face perfectly fine; her eyes having long since adjusted to the darkness and now with the assistance of minimal candle light from the table beside her that Rick had lit. “It doesn’t make sense.”  
  
A knock at the bathroom door drew both their attention toward it.  
  
“You can come in,” Rick announced to whoever it was.  
  
After a moment, the knob turned and Nicole was standing there in the doorway holding something her hand. On closer inspection, it was a medication bottle.  
  
“The murder weapon,” Nicole spoke, tipping the bottle upside down to reveal it was empty. “This thing was full earlier tonight. I do inventory of all our medication before I go to bed every night and this was full. It hadn’t even been opened yet.”  
  
“What is it?” Rick wondered, standing up and reaching for the bottle.  
  
“A generic brand of hydrocodone. This was originally a bottle of one hundred tablets and before I went to bed we had forty-two tablets left in it. Now all forty-two are gone.”  
  
“So, it was suicide,” Jo deduced.  
  
Nicole nodded. “Yep. She wanted to die. She just forgot that by overdosing that she would come back, undead. I don’t think she was in her right mind to even know what she was really doing.”  
  
Rick frowned and shook his head. “No. She knew what she was doing,” he insisted. “She knew enough to steal the entire bottle from our supply of medicine and then take the time to swallow all of them down. She might not have been thinking about what would happen after she died because she was just thinking about that she wanted to die.”  
  
“Poor Mike and Ryan,” Nicole murmured, casting her eyes toward the wall; knowing Mike was on the other side of it. “You want to tell him what happened or do you want me to do it?”  
  
“Would you?” Rick asked. “Jo having been the one to put Alyssa down, and me being her husband; it might be easier for him to hear it from someone who’s not either of us.”  
  
Nicole nodded. “I figured as much.” Taking the bottle back from Rick, she slipped away from the bathroom without another word.  
  
Rick watched as she stepped around Michonne and Sophia scrubbing at the carpet in the entrance hall and then disappeared next door into the blue parlor. Shutting the bathroom door, Rick turned to Jo while still gripping the doorknob in his hand.  
  
“I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep the rest of the night now.”  
  
“Neither will I,” Jo agreed.  
  
“We should get you upstairs and changed, though. You shouldn’t be sitting around in only your underwear and robe. It can’t be very warm.”  
  
“It isn’t.” She tried to smile, but the image of Alyssa’s head missing the face kept seeping into her mind.  
  
Tara came back downstairs then and made a beeline for Rick and Jo. “Mika’s fine, she doesn’t seem too distraught. She’ll bounce back.”  
  
“Well, it’s not exactly the first time she’s seen something like this,” Rick muttered quietly, knowing Mike was still in the other room and not wanting to be an insensitive asshole.  
  
“It’d be nice if it was the last, though.”  
  
Both Rick and Tara looked at Jo and nodded with agreement.  
  
It’d be nice if this was the last time _any_ of them had to see and experience something like this.  
  
But that was a pipe dream, of course.  
  
“We’re just gonna head upstairs, get Jo changed into something clean,” Rick felt the need to explain.  
  
“I’ll go with her,” Tara offered, eyeing Jo. “You should probably stay down here and delegate, boss.”  
  
With a knowing look at the brunette, Rick gave a slight roll of his eyes but nodded. Leaning in toward Jo, he pressed his lips to her temple and then sent her off with Tara before looking around the entrance hall. He moved toward the bedroom and stepped inside, noting that the door out into the hall but also the door leading into the back hall toward the back stairs and infirmary was open. Putting on his theoretical detective’s hat, he let his eyes scan the doors and then the bed, which was considerably disheleved. The sheets and the cover were so twisted up and from his past, attending to crime scenes involving overdoses, he knew that Alyssa’s death was painful.  
  
She might’ve thought taking a bunch of pills, forty-two to be exact, would make death quick and easy, but that amount does a number on your insides. From what he knew of those that had survived overdose attempts, many suffered severe abdominal pain, and were found contorted; just the same as those that overdosed and he’d found dead. On the table against the wall, across from the bed, there sat a bottle of water that was very nearly empty. The cap was off and missing. Rick figured Alyssa either sat or stood at that table, taking the pills, probably around five at a time in quick succession, and downing it all with thorough swigs of water. He wasn’t sure where Nicole found the pill bottle, but either way he knew by the contortion in the sheets and duvet that Alyssa made her way to the bed and laid down. After a while the pills kicked in and she might’ve gotten ill fast, from her body’s natural reaction to wanting all that out. Judging by how Rick saw no vomit anywhere on the bed or floor below, Alyssa held that in, should that urge to vomit have happened, that is. Most likely she got very sleepy, then writhed in pain before passing out and dying as she intended.  
  
What Rick couldn’t figure out was why the door leading out into the entrance hall was open like Jo had noticed. Alyssa had shut herself in, closing off all three doors into the bedroom. She would’ve gone out the door leading into the back hall to sneak into the infirmary to steal the pills and most likely closed that door again so no one saw what she was doing and tried to stop her. But why was the other door open?  
  
Rick shut it, listened to the handle mechanism click and then opened it again. The door swung inward it was either pulled open from inside the bedroom or pushed open from the outside, unless…  
  
Rick stepped out of the room, pulling the door closed behind him as he stepped out into the entrance hall. He began stepping purposely hard on the floor just in front of the door in a few spots, but nothing happened that he figured; thinking maybe a loose floorboard and a weakened doorframe could’ve popped the door open accidentally.  
  
He couldn’t figure it out.  
  
“Rick.”  
  
He turned to his right and found Karen approaching with her arms wrapped around her chest and resting atop of her stomach.  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
Leaning in, she spoke to him quietly. “I went upstairs to check on Ryan, to make sure he didn’t come down here and see his mother dead like that on the floor.” She gestured to the spot Michonne and Sophia were doing a pretty decent job and cleaning up. There would still be one hell of a stain, but at least it wouldn’t be blood red, just maybe a dark tan color; nothing a throw rug couldn’t fix. “He was already up. He’d heard the noise and asked what was wrong. I gave him the cliff notes version. Told him his mom got sick and died, as gently as possible. He cried a bit, so I sat down with him, but then he told me that at least he got to say goodbye to her.”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow. “He said goodbye to her? How—when?”  
  
“He said after everyone went to sleep. He kept his eyes closed and pretended to be asleep, and waited for his dad to fall asleep, too. Then he got up and came downstairs. He said he knocked quietly on the door and then walked in. He saw his mom asleep on the bed, kissed her on the cheek and told her he loved her and then walked out. Said he hurried up and went right back up to bed.”  
  
Rick nodded, looking back at the door. “That explains why the door was open. Ryan didn’t shut it all the way after him as he left.”  
  
“What happened to her?”  
  
“Suicide. Overdosed on forty-two hydrocodone tablets.”  
  
“You know specifically how many?”  
  
“Nicole takes inventory of everything we have before she goes to bed each night. We had forty-two hydrocodone tablets and now the bottle is empty,” Rick explained. “She found it in Mike and Alyssa’s room. Alyssa took all those pills, and eventually died in her sleep. Ryan must’ve come down to see her during that time between her being dead and risen.”  
  
Karen nodded solemnly. “It’s such a shame,” she remarked, casting a glance toward the blue parlor where they could just barely see Mike hunched over in a chair with his head in his hands as Barbara sat beside him while Lewis and Nicole seemed to be discussing something quietly. “He’s lost his son and now his wife. Ryan’s lost his brother and mother. There gonna need each other more than ever now.”  
  
“Yeah, but they have help,” Rick commented. “They have us.”  


* * *

  
By the time Rick finally made his way back upstairs to his and Jo’s bedroom, the sun had already risen. Some had tried to go back to bed for a little bit, while others just decided to stay up and start their day a little earlier. Mike had gone up to talk to and be with Ryan, and he said nothing to Rick on the way up. He wouldn’t even look at Rick, as if he was avoiding eye contact to prevent some inevitable argument. At least, that was the vibe Rick was getting. It pissed him off a bit, that vibe, but Rick shook it off as best he could by the time he reached his room and his wife.  
  
He found her sitting in the white, wingback chair, keeping warm near the fire. Tara was AWOL; likely having left not long before on Jo’s insistence that she didn’t need some babysitter, and Rick would be correct in that assumption. That was literally what Jo had expressed to Tara, who had been hanging around like a warden and she was a prisoner.  
  
Jo was now dressed in a pair of Rick’s pajama pants which she wore low on her hips because they wouldn’t reach up over her stomach without the waistband digging into her skin. She also had on a grey hoodie that said “Virginia” in white lettering across the chest. Whether or not she had a shirt on underneath that was yet to be seen.  
  
“You look much warmer now,” Rick remarked, noticing she still wore not socks on her feet, as usual.  
  
“I feel warmer.” Turning, Jo brought her attention up toward her husband. “So, what’s the what?”  
  
Walking across the room, Rick grabbed the back of the chair at the French writing desk and brought it over to where Jo was sitting and then sat down in it. The warmth from the fire was stronger now than it had been when Nicole had first woken him up, which told him that either Tara or Jo had thrown at least one other log on. It felt rather nice. “Alyssa overdosed on exactly forty-two hydrocodone tablets. Before you ask how I know it was that many, Nicole does inventory on every bit of medicine we have each night before bed. Alyssa took those pills and went to sleep, eventually dying. Before she came back, Ryan went down to see her. Kissed her goodnight and said he loved her, all while she was either asleep or already dead. He’s the reason the door was open into the hall. He never shut it on the way out. So, when you came downstairs, whatever little bit of noise you made was enough to drag her out of bed.”  
  
Jo sighed. “I guess I’m glad it was me that she accosted. What if it had been Ryan instead? He would’ve been no match for his undead mother.”  
  
“True, but it would’ve been even better if she’d just never killed herself. It’s selfish, is what it is. Now more than ever Ryan needed her, after just losing his brother.”  
  
“You told me once that you would want to die if you lost me.”  
  
“That was before I found myself caring and loving those girls as our own,” Rick spoke, referencing Sophia and Mika. “I’d want to be dead, but for them I’d carry on and get over it.”  
  
Jo leaned her head into the wing at her right. She smiled a small smile. “Would you ever marry anyone else?”  
  
“No,” he answered without missing a beat. “There is no third time’s a charm for me.”  
  
“But I wouldn’t want you to be alone.”  
  
“As long as I have my two hands, I’d never be alone.”  
  
Jo let out a quiet giggle. Having something to laugh about was always nice. “You know what I mean. Maybe not go the marriage route, but companionship. If I went tomorrow, or say I die in childbirth, I don’t want you to go it alone, and when I say alone, I mean as not having someone to share your bed. You don’t need to remain celibate the rest of your life.”  
  
“That’s even assuming I live much longer after you. Or hell, maybe I die first. I suppose I wouldn’t want you alone either.” Rick sat up a bit straighter in his chair. “Maybe you and Mike can find comfort in each other, raise the kids together as one big, blended family.”  
  
“Wow.”  
  
Rick cringed slightly at what he’d said. “Too soon?”  
  
“Uh, yeah. I think mere hours after Mike’s been widowed is too soon.”  
  
“Sorry.”  
  
Jo shrugged it off. “Maybe let’s not talk about these things right now.”  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded in agreement. Standing up, he offered his hand to Jo and helped her up to her feet as well. Pulling her into a hug, he placed his lips atop her head. “I’m gonna go dig a new grave with Tyreese in a little bit. We have a double funeral now to get ready for.”  
  
Jo nodded against his chest, taking comfort in his natural scent. “We don’t have to have two separate graves for her and Taylor. We can just bury that box we were gonna bury for him with her instead. We’ll still need two crosses made, though.”  
  
“I think Morgan’s already going to get that started.”  
  
“Good. One less thing to do, I guess.”  
  
“It’s kinda bittersweet having that solar calendar more so now, because now we can add the exact date of deaths to people we lose instead of just their names.”  
  
“Silver linings, huh?”  
  
“Yeah, something like that.” With a kiss to her forehead, Rick brought his chin downward to his chest so he could look at Jo and lean forward to kiss her properly. “You think, maybe, this is the downswing of our rollercoaster? Law of averages: we’re due for something good again…”  
  
Jo shrugged as Rick stepped back from her. “Hopefully. We were pretty lucky the upswing lasted as long as it did.”  
  
“Well, hopefully the next upswing lasts even longer.”


	56. Collide

_“_ _You never know what battles people fight.” —_ Francois Hougaard

* * *

  
  
The worst was over or, at least, that’s what everyone hoped.  
  
In the month since Alyssa and Taylor’s deaths, there had been considerable tension between Mike and Rick. Any task or chore that Mike found himself doing, he seemed careful as to make sure it was something separate from what Rick was doing. At meal time, Mike either waited until Rick had finished eating and left the dining room so he could get his own food, or he ate in the blue parlor, usually alone. If they were in the same room at the same time, Mike wouldn’t make eye contact, or would find some excuse to leave.  
  
Rick tried not to take any offense to it; realizing that Mike was grieving the losses of his wife and son. But after two solid weeks of this, it was getting annoying. He was getting the impression Mike seriously blamed Rick and Jo for the deaths, even though Mike hadn’t been giving Jo the same cold shoulder that he’d been receiving. Not until the very end of the month, anyway.  
  
When Jo had been coming from the bathroom and making her way across the hall toward the dining room, at the same time, Mike had been coming down the stairs in the entrance hall. She stopped and offered a polite smile, to which he scowled and muttered something under his breath. Be it pregnancy hormones or just that fire she already had in her, Jo stopped short and turned around sharply to look back at Mike as he stepped away from the stairs to head toward the bathroom she’d just come out of.  
  
She’d called out his name and demanded to know what he’d just said, and the argument began there. Mike went off on her, about how she could’ve called for help or just shoved Alyssa away and then locked herself in another room; that she could’ve waited to make such a drastic decision to kill Alyssa. Jo countered more logically that Alyssa was already dead and what she _had_ killed was no longer his wife. She did what she had to do, the way she had to do it and when she did it, because it was her only option. She threw it in his face that it could’ve been Ryan that had crossed Alyssa’s path instead of her and then he’d have lost both his children and his wife. Jo was infuriated by then. She’d been watching the way Mike traipsed around Rick, and even her at times, over those two weeks since the deaths and she took great offense to it. She was tired of Mike blaming them for deaths they weren’t responsible for.  
  
Taylor’s death was equal parts accident and his own stupidity for going out on that ice to begin with. Alyssa’s death was deliberate. She didn’t swallow forty-two pills with the goal of simply getting a good night’s sleep. She overdosed on purpose because she wanted to die. Her grief became too unbearable, and so she made the choice to leave Mike and Ryan behind in this world.  
  
The two of them shouting at each other had quickly drawn a crowd.  
  
Tara, who had been sitting in the dining room, eating a leftover pancake from breakfast while attempting to read a biography on Georgie Washington, was the first to spring into action, so to speak. She hurried out into the entrance hall and held her hands up like a zookeeper trying to keep a lion and lioness from tearing each other apart; and not just figuratively, either. Despite her vocal attempts to quell the arguing, Jo and Mike weren’t having it.  
  
It wasn’t until Rick was alerted that the fight was finally ended, by taking a rather harsh approach.  
  
Rick had been outdoors in the the summer kitchen, with his hands resting upon the doorframe, talking with Barb and Michonne about the loaves of bread they were making. He was genuinely interested in learning to make it at some point; believing that everyone at the house should learn how to cook and that the jobs shouldn’t fall to the same people all the time. Maybe they could all rotate chores, he’d suggested, to which Michonne joked that he just didn’t feel like being the one who always seemed stuck with emptying and cleaning out the toilet and wanted to pass the buck.  
  
When the walkie-talkie clipped to his utility belt crackled to life with someone calling his name, Rick lifted the device up to find Nicole was trying to call to him from inside the house on the other walkie-talkie kept inside for such purposes. When she informed him that Mike and Jo were fighting in the entrance hall, Rick went red with and immediately stormed off toward the house. Michonne, having overheard Nicole on the walkie and seen the change in Rick, knew shit was gonna go down. Wiping her hands on the apron around her waist, she ran out of the kitchen after him.  
  
From inside the entrance hall, those present were greeted by the slamming open of the front door and Rick stepping inside as he trailed clumps of snow in from his boots. He had just caught the end of whatever it was Mike had been shouting to Jo about and saw the way Jo was holding her stomach as she practically growled back. Rick’s own anger was fueled by the fear of what this kind of fighting and stress would do to Jo and the baby, and that was enough motivation for him to do what he felt was the logical step to end all this.  
  
Stepping forward, Rick called Mike’s. When Mike turned around, Rick punched him in the face. While Mike stumbled and fell back on his ass from both the force with which he’d been punch and the pain that quickly took hold, Rick dropped his fist and shook it while trying to ignore his own pain across his knuckles.  
  
Rick glared and crouched down over Mike; a stance that made him appear larger than life.  
  
“When I brought you here, I told you that if you ever put my family at risk, I would end you. This fucking argument you’re having right now? That’s putting Jo and our child risk.” Rick leaned in closer to Mike’s face and lowered his voice. He spoke so evenly and so calm, it was almost eerie. “Consider this your only warning. You try this again and I will send you packing. And that’s the nice option.”  
  
When Rick stood back up, he approached Jo and ushered her upstairs. When they were alone he reprimanded her, albeit gently, about allowing herself to be in that situation. She should’ve blown Mike off and walked away. What if the stress of that argument sent her into early labor and, if that happened, it could've put both her and the baby’s life at risk. That wasn’t a risk they could take.  
  
After calming down, Rick conceded and admitted he didn’t blame her for the argument, though. He was getting fed up of Mike’s bullshit as of late and knew it was matter of time before it all came to a head. He’d just been assuming any argument would’ve taken place between him and Mike, not Mike and Jo. He apologized that she had to even be wrapped up in it all to begin with, but Jo just assured him it was fine and he had nothing to be sorry for.  
  
“Shit happens,” she’d quipped.  
  
After that day, the tension seemed to break.  
  
Mike had retreated to the infirmary where Nicole checked on him to make sure his nose wasn’t broken, clean him up and given him a couple Ibuprofen for the headache he was due to feel. After a couple of days of mulling it over and thinking on his actions and the words expressed, Mike seemed to realize his fault in the entire argument.  
  
With his tail between his knees, he approached Rick and Jo while they sat together in the blue parlor, playing a game of checkers. He cleared his throat and began to apologize about his behavior and how he never meant to actually place blame on Rick or Jo. He just needed a scapegoat because in losing his son and his wife, he didn’t want to cast any dark shadows upon their memory. In finding blame in Rick and Jo, he could pretend Taylor and Alyssa hadn’t contributed to their own deaths out of their stupidity and selfishness, respectively. Mike said he was sorry, over and over, and when he began to cry, Jo’s leftover anger for him faded quickly away, as it did for Rick.  
  
Mike sank down onto the sofa against the wall with his head in his hands, so Jo stood up from the game table and sat down beside him. Placing an arm around his back, she pulled him in for a side hug and assured him it was fine; that she and Rick forgave him. Rick turned his chair around to face Mike to agree with Jo. He appreciated the apology and felt bad seeing Mike crying as he was, so he relayed how grief makes us a bit crazy sometimes. He brought up how losing his son, contributed to the breakup with his first wife and how every loss they’ve all felt along the way have each been terrible to go through in their own way. It had been about four months since losing Hope and they still weren’t over it.  
  
Like a wound, time would heal it, but there would still be a scar, and that scar would always be a constant reminder of what happened.  
  
Once amends had been made, the mood in the house seemed to lighten. There were still plenty of moments of sadness over the recent losses but, considering how many losses they had all experience firsthand since the beginning of all this, getting past any grief just seemed to get easier and easier these days. Perhaps it was like the old argument from before the fall, when parents railed against the media, blaming movies, television, video games and even songs for desensitizing the youth in regard to violence. Maybe it was the same thing now. After witnessing and even contributing to so many brutal deaths, that moving past it wasn’t as difficult as it once would’ve been.  
  
And now, another two weeks later, it almost felt as if life was finally back to whatever you could consider normal in times like these.  
  
According to the solar calendar on the window sill in the entrance hall, it was a Tuesday. More than that, it was Valentine’s Day. And, while they didn’t have chocolate or flowers to give to each other as little gifts, the latter mainly because flowers weren’t in bloom yet, the kids still had construction paper left over from Christmas. Sophia seemed to spearhead the task in cutting out several paper hearts in the leftover sheets of red and pink, and when those colors ran out, moved to purple. She used a pencil to poke a slight hole at upper center of each heart and slipped some string through to create a garland, which she hung up around the entrance hall using masking tape. While she’d been busy with that, she gave Mika and Ryan the job of creating Valentine’s Day cards for every single adult in the house.  
  
Since everyone had eaten breakfast that day quite early, and no one typically ever ate anything at a lunch hour, dinner was made and served a little earlier than normal. The meal was simple; stew made from a mix of a rabbit and a squirrel that Daryl had caught and a few fresh as well as canned vegetables. Fresh rolls had been made as well, but since there was no butter, to prevent from eating them dry, everyone took to dunking the rolls into the leftover broth from the stew. As usual, space was tight around the dining table, so the kids sat around the small game table in the blue parlor, and both Tara and Mike joined them so they didn’t feel excluded. For Mike, he just wanted to be near his son. Halfway through the meal, Mika had darted into the dining room to inform everyone that they couldn’t leave the table after they were finished eating because there was a surprise for them. So, when they were done, but the kids weren’t since the kids were slower eaters, the adults sat there waiting, letting their stomachs rest while enjoying some conversation.  
  
A few minutes later, Mika led Ryan and Sophia into the dining room with Tara and Mike in tow, and proceeded in handing out the Valentine’s Day cards. Everyone seemed quite amused by the drawings and doodles done in crayon and the little attempts at poetry inside each card. None was so pleased with his card, though, than Merle. In fact, for a brief moment, a few others were positive they might’ve seen a tear in his eye.  
  
He never read aloud or shared in anyway what the inside of his card said, but he beckoned Mika over and pulled her into a hug. When he realized eyes were on him, he cleared his throat and gruffly pushed his chair back to exit the room under the guise of having “shit to do.”  
  
Daryl snickered at his own brother’s expense. “And the Grinch’s small heart grew three sizes that day,” he remarked, bringing chuckles out of everyone.  
  
Rick looked at his best friend who sat at his immediate right and smiled; slapping him gently on the back. “It’s a Valentine’s miracle,” Rick added, joining in on the jest.  
  
After dinner, there was no dessert, primarily because those kinds of food supplies were running extremely low. They were all just thankful that the cold weather had finally broken and, although it was the middle of February, the snow was already melting, which meant they’d be able to start planting new crops in the garden and that the fruit trees would be blooming soon. They were all a little excited at the prospect of fresh fruit again after being left with the fruits that had been turned into preserves or purees to prevent them from going bad back at the end of fall and beginning of winter.  
  
While Tara tapped Sophia to help her clean the dishes in the summer kitchen, since Barb and Michonne had gone through the task of preparing the meal, Mika and Ryan were also tapped to clear the table first. It was time to give the kids more age appropriate chores, anyway.  
  
Most everyone else retreated to different corners of the house, to while away the rest of the night until they went to bed.  
  
Leaving it to the girls, as usual, to go to sleep at a reasonable hour, Rick and Jo said goodnight to them in advance and made their way to their bedroom where they made the most of the fact that it was Valentine’s by making love.  
  
Afterward, they lay naked in bed with their blankets only up to their waists while resting on their sides and facing each other.  
  
“You know what I was thinking earlier?” Rick asked.  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“It would’ve been around this time last year that Hope was born. I mean, we have no idea on what the exact date was, but it had to be around this time. We determined we found you and Sophia around January and you gave birth a month after that.”  
  
Jo sighed. “Yeah, I did.”  
  
“She’d be a year old.”  
  
“Yeah, she would be.”  
  
“Maybe we should pick a day for her birthday. With that calendar we can figure out when we lost her, that she died a week before we got to DC. We track backwards from when we got here and subtract a week, give or take a few days from then…”  
  
Jo rolled away from him and onto her back; staring up at the underside of the bed’s canopy. “I don’t want to know an exact date that she died. I don’t want to have that date come up every year on me like some dark storm cloud on the horizon. We need days to look forward to, not dread.”  
  
Rick shifted his body closer to Jo’s and draped his right arm across her stomach. At a few weeks past her halfway point of this pregnancy, and considering this was her second, she had already popped, with her stomach undeniably noticeable now. She approximately five and a half weeks pregnant, at least a month behind Karen, but already looked further along than Karen.  
  
Nuzzling the side of her face, Rick dipped his own face down and kissed the top of her shoulder and then her right clavicle. “I’m sorry. I know,” he whispered.  
  
“You don’t have to apologize, you idiot,” she smirked. “I’m just stating how I feel. I _do_ like the idea of deciding on a birthday for her.”  
  
“That would be a day we could look forward to every year, not dread.”  
  
“Yeah, exactly.”  
  
“Why not today?”  
  
Jo turned her head, causing him to lean back. “I like that,” she replied with a smile. “Now Valentine’s Day can be more than just a Hallmark holiday.”  
  
“Even though tomorrow will be the day after, maybe you and I can take a walk and do something nice for her, to celebrate.”  
  
“I’d like that,” Jo nodded. “Like what, though?”  
  
Rick shrugged, lying back onto his side of the mattress. “I dunno. Maybe if we had some helium and a balloon, we could fill it and release it into the sky.”  
  
“I think it would take more than a walk around this property or even to the gift shop to find those things.”  
  
“You don’t think the gift shop has balloons?”  
  
“I don’t remember seeing any when we went there before Christmas.”  
  
Rick sighed. “Yeah, me either.”  
  
“You could always take me on a little supply run to an abandoned dollar store. I know those places had latex and foil balloons that could be inflated in-store. No one would’ve taken something like that when the world ended. They weren’t a necessity.”  
  
“I don’t doubt those stores have something like that still, but I’m not taking you there.”  
  
Jo frowned. “Oh, come on. I’m not an invalid. You know very well how capable I am.”  
  
“I _do_ know, but it’s still a risk I won’t take. Not in your condition—and don’t argue with me that you’re not some porcelain doll just because you’re pregnant,” he looked right at her, knowing very well she was about to argue just that. “You _are_ a porcelain doll _specifically_ because you’re pregnant. It’s not just your life, it’s our child’s. I’m not risking either.”  
  
“Okay,” she relented in a soft voice. “Then we can just go for a walk and, I dunno—carve Hope’s name into a tree or something.”  
  
“Alright,” Rick agreed. “Although, with the weather getting so much nicer, now would be a good time to finally go on that run to a Home Depot for that barbed wire you wouldn’t let me go get before because you had a feeling something bad was gonna happen.”  
  
“To be fair, something bad _did_ happen. Jen, Taylor and Alyssa all died.”  
  
“Yeah, but it had nothing to do with me leaving on a supply run. That all happened right here, where we’re all supposed to be safe and sound.”  
  
“Alright, you don’t gotta rub it in.”  
  
Rick chuckled. “I’m not rubbing anything in. I’m just proving a point.” Turning to look at her once again, he smiled. “If you _really_ wanted me to rub something in, however…”  
  
With an amused cackle, Jo whipped her pillow out from underneath her head and walloped it across Rick’s face. He reacted initially with a cough and then growled playfully at her as he ripped the pillow from her hand.  
  
“Oh, is that how it’s gonna be?” he questioned teasingly.  
  
Knowing exactly what was going to happen next, she watched as Rick sat up and moved down the bed. As soon as he was kneeling between her legs, he lifted her ass up and stuffed her pillow under the small of her back for little for better leverage. Smiling down at her with heavy-laden blue eyes, Rick bit his bottom lip as he gripped her thighs with his hands and pulled her closer against him. As Jo moved her hands to cover his, Rick slipped inside her warmth without even having to look; like a blind man well accustomed to his world of dark.  
  
At the first, initial mewl from Jo’s lips, Rick grinned and leaned down over her, careful to propped himself up so that he didn’t put any of his weight onto her stomach. Then, slowly, he began to thrust inside of her, pull out almost all the way and then repeat the process over, and over, and over, all while watching the way only the light from the fireplace on the other side of the room caused their shadows to move together just as their bodies were.

 

* * *

  
  
The following day, Rick and Jo had kept to their plan by going for a walk on the property. They ended up down near the old Washington Tomb where their re-wedding ceremony had taken places a few months before. Instead of carving Hope’s name into a tree somewhere, figuring that a tree could end up cut down, they opened up the empty tomb’s unlocked door and walked inside the narrow space with its rounded ceiling. Pulling a black Sharpie out of her back pocket, Jo uncapped the marker and began to write on the wall.

  
  
**_Hope Dale Grimes_ **  
**_February 14, 2011 — October 2011_ **  
**_Forever our little girl_ **

  
  
After writing that and capping the marker, Jo began to cry. Sharing in her sadness, Rick pulled her into his arms and cried as well, but more silently. It was such a deep pain in their chests that was hard to get over. But there was more of it there for Rick he couldn’t shake and there was something he needed to do while they were in there. So, taking the marker from Jo’s hand, he stepped back from her, he removed the cap and turned around to write on the opposite wall.

  
  
**_Carl Grimes_ **  
**_1998 — 2010_ **  
**_My son, gone too soon_ **

  
  
Then, with a heavy sigh, he added:

  
  
**_Lori Grimes_ **  
**_1975 — 2011_ **  
**_Finally at peace with her son_ **

  
  
Jo looked at Rick and frowned. She wasn’t upset; she merely found it bittersweet.  
  
“Carl was buried, but I wasn’t awake for it. The others did it while I had passed out from bloodloss; from all the blood I’d had drained to give to him. A cross had been erected with some wood and twine, but there wasn’t a name on it. If anyone were to pass onto Hershel’s property now, they might find his grave where he was buried under a tree, but they wouldn’t know who it was. And Lori,” he remarked, casting a glance at Jo, “she never got buried. We left that prison, and we left her body behind.”  
  
Jo took the marker back from Rick and added another name to the wall.

  
  
**_Maggie Greene Rhee_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
**_Aged 24 years_ **

  
  
“We buried her, but there’s no name on that cross you made so no one would ever know who was buried there, just like your son. And, I don’t know when she was born,” Jo commented, wiping away a rogue tear. “I only know how old she was.”  
  
“Well, while we’re at it,” Rick spoke, taking the marker again and writing on the wall below Maggie’s name.

  
  
**_Shane Walsh_ **  
**_1973 — 2011_ **  
**_Devoted friend, until the end_ **

  
  
“I like that one,” Jo commented on Rick’s inscription and watched as he continued to add the following names of people they’d lost and been unable to bury:

  
  
**_Patricia, wife of Otis_ **  
**_Died 2010?_ **  
  
**_Bob Stookey_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
  
**_Zach_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
  
**_Carol Peletier_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
**_Mother of Sophia_ **  
  
**_Harriet “Harry” Bergdorf_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
**_Mother of Joanna Autry Moore Grimes and Finn Autry_ **  
  
**_Sam and Ana_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
**_Together Again_ **  
  
**_Piper_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **  
  
**_Milo_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **

  
  
“Am I forgetting anyone who didn’t get a grave?” Rick wondered.  
  
“Milton?”  
  
“Really?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “He redeemed himself in the end,” she replied. “Sacrificed himself at the hotel to save Jen.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Okay, then. What was his last name?”  
  
“Mamet.”  
  
“How do you spell that?”  
  
Jo shrugged again. “I dunno. Sound it out?”  
  
Snickering, Rick shook his head with a smirk.

  
  
**_Milton Mammit_ **  
**_Died 2011_ **

  
  
“I feel like I spelled that wrong, but at least he got anything.”  
  
“You won’t hear any qualms from me.” Then, scanning the names, she asked, “Who’s Patricia?”  
  
“She was a friend of Hershel’s that was with our group that left the farm. She didn’t make it when we were fleeing that storage facility we’d been staying at last winter.”  
  
“Why the question mark next to her name?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “I’m not exactly sure if it was still 2010 or 2011 when it happened.”  
  
“Oh.”  
  
Looking at each other, Rick placed the cap back on the marker and shoved it into his own back pocket. Once more, he pulled Jo into his arms; placing a kiss to her lips and then atop her head. They both took a moment to look around at all the names before settling lastly upon Hope’s and Carl’s. Placing her fingertips to her lips, Jo kissed them, and then placed her fingertips over Hope’s name.  
  
“Happy birthday, sweetie.”

 

* * *

  
  
Two days later, after some minor discussion and formulating of a gameplay, Rick could be found loading up one of their trucks for their latest supply run. Into the back bed he placed a canister of extra fuel, a backpack filled with water bottles and a few canned goods, as well as a few boxes of bullets. Jo was leaning against the truck, watching him load it up; finding slight amusement in the amount of concentration upon his face.  
  
“You’re so serious,” Jo smirked.  
  
Looking up at her through his eyebrows, Rick lightened his expression almost immediately. “Just thinking.”  
  
“About how much you’d rather stay here and let someone else go on this supply trip instead of you?”  
  
Rick rolled his eyes. “We had this discussion once and I agreed to call off this run then and stay. But the weather’s considerably better, yet still just cold enough where walkers should still be a bit more lethargic and slower to attack than normal.”  
  
“I know,” Jo pouted. Reaching out, she grabbed the front of his jacket and pulled him closer to her. “As long as you can promise you’ll come home to me, alive and in one piece, I think I’ll be fine.”  
  
“Just make sure this place doesn’t burn down while I’m away,” he teased, throwing a few rolled up blankets into the back bed to use along with the food and water, just in case they got stranded and had to stay overnight somewhere. “I happen to like this place.”  
  
Shaking her head with a chuckle, Jo shoved him away, but he grabbed her wrists and pulled her up to him so he could kiss her lips.  
  
“We still got the entire day if you wanna spare a few moments for a goodbye fuck,” Merle remarked, coming out of the front door with Daryl, Michonne and Finn behind him.  
  
The other four would be joining Rick on the supply run. Fortunately for them, the truck was a 2009 F-150 XL SuperCrew, which meant it was light duty with a backseat that provided plenty of room for all five of them to travel inside one vehicle.  
  
Rick shot a withering look at the older Dixon. “If I did that, I’d be more than a few moments,” he retorted.  
  
Merle chuckled and slapped Rick on the back with his only hand. “That’s my boy.”  
  
Looking at his wife, Rick rolled his eyes, and then leaned in to kiss her once more. “We’ll try to be back by tonight, but don’t get worried if we don’t. We got food, water and blankets just in case we get stuck somewhere overnight,” he assured her. “I will get back to you by tomorrow at the latest.”  
  
“Alive and in one piece.”  
  
“Alive and in one piece,” he repeated. His gaze drifted toward the front door to find Tyreese there with Sophia and Mika. “You cool being acting President, Tyreese?” he asked with a smile as the girls came up to him for a hug goodbye.  
  
“Just call me Obama.”  
  
Rick smiled, leaning down to give the girls proper hugs each while he heard Merle scoff. “Don’t get me started on Nobama.”  
  
“Oh for the love of God, the old world ended,” Jo groaned. “No politics.” Reaching her hand up to Merle’s ear, she flicked it. “And I proudly voted for Obama in 2008, numbnuts, so watch it.”  
  
Merle frowned as he looked at her, and when he looked over at Rick, Rick chuckled. “So did I.”  
  
“I did, too,” Michonne added.  
  
“Well, of course _you_ did,” Merle muttered.  
  
“And what’s _that_ supposed to mean?” Michonne glowered at him, just daring him to slip up and say the wrong thing.  
  
Merle, however, wasn’t as stupid as he looked so he kept silent.  
  
Finn smiled at all this; possibly one of the few times Jo had seen her brother really smiling since Christmas. “I forgot to vote,” he said with a laugh.  
  
“I’ve never voted,” Daryl, tossing his crossbow into the back bed.  
  
Everyone looked at Daryl and seemed unsurprised by his admission.  
  
“Anyway…” Rick trailed, looking at Jo and pushing some hair behind her ear. “I’ll see you girls tonight, fingers crossed.”  
  
“I’m counting on it.”  
  
With a smile, Rick leaned in and gave Jo one last kiss. “Love you,” he whispered, letting his hands linger down upon her coat-covered stomach.  
  
“Love you, too,” she replied, watching him step back away from her and open up the driver’s door.  
  
“Shotgun!” Merle announced. Eyeing his brother, Michonne and Finn, he added with a chuckle, “You bitches can take the back.”  
  
“And Rosa Parks is rolling around in her grave,” Michonne muttered under her breath as she through a knowing look over at Jo. Opening up the driver’s side cab door, she said, “I’ll keep an eye out for your boys; make sure they don’t get into any trouble.”  
  
Jo smiled appreciatively, casting glances at both Rick and Finn. “Thanks,” she replied. “Be safe, too.”  
  
“Oh, I’m like the Energizer Bunny. I keep going and going.”  
  
With a small laugh, Jo simply nodded and stepped back away from the truck, leading the girls with her as the rest of the supply run group climbed into the truck. With a wave, Jo watched as Rick started up the engine and as the truck drove around the gravel-covered circle in front of the house; heading off down the gravel-covered road alongside the Bowling Green, until it completely disappeared from Jo’s view.  
  
With a sigh, she looked down at her girls and placed her hands on either of their shoulders; turning them around and leading them back into the house.  
  
“Well, with Rick gone for the moment, that leaves you in charge,” Tyreese commented, shutting the front door behind them.  
  
Jo made a face at him as she began yanking her coat off. “You heard Rick. He said you’re acting president.”  
  
Tyreese snickered and shook his head. “Rick’s the king, and when the King is away, the Queen rules instead.”  
  
Jo smirked and rolled her eyes while opening the closest under the staircase and stuffing her coat onto one of the hooks inside. “I feel like being a king and queen in the home of a man who fought for this country to separate itself from an actual monarchy is a bit blasphemous.”  
  
“He’s a man who also owned slaves, like most of his contemporaries, so don’t mind me not giving a shit about being blasphemous in his house.”  
  
“Okay, then,” Jo chuckled as she gestured to herself. “All Hail the Queen Joanna, First of her Name.”  
  
Tyreese laughed and nodded. “Has a nice ring to it.”  
  
Grabbing her sword off the weapons table, she raised it and pointed it at Tyreese’s shoulder even though it was still sheathed inside its scabbard. “Shall I dub you? How’s Lord Tyreese Williams, Duke of Florida?”  
  
“Sounds good. I’ll take it. And I think Karen will enjoy being Duchess.”  
  
“Well, as long as you treat her like a queen, though.”  
  
“Oh, always.” Watching Jo set her sword back down onto the table, he asked, “So, Your Majesty, what would you like me to do?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “I dunno. I suppose we could always use more water from the river. We have that tub, but we all still mostly sponge bathe most of the time. The kids should get in some proper baths, I think.”  
  
“Okay then,” Tyreese nodded. “I’ll grab Morgan and we’ll go get that done.”  
  
Jo nodded back. “Okay.”  
  
Watching as Tyreese left the entrance hall to go wrangle up Morgan from wherever he was, Jo walked over toward the blue parlor. Following the sounds of Sophia’s and Mika’s voice wafting through from the ballroom on the other side, she decided to kill some time by seeing what the girls were up to so she didn’t dwell on what Rick and the others were doing instead.

 

* * *

  
  
After maneuvering around all the barriers and roadblocks the group had erected along any of the roads that could lead to Mount Vernon, Rick had brought the truck successfully out onto their allotted entrance on Route 235. No one was talking, but only because they were just enjoying the chance to finally get out and do something away from the estate. As nice and as safe as it was, the change of scenery was overdue. The road curved northwest and soon they arrived at a very large intersection with an Exxon gas station to their immediate right. With barely any abandoned vehicles at that particular intersection to drive around, Rick turned right onto Richmond Highway, all the while keeping his eyes peeled, because you never know when something or someone might appear out of seemingly nowhere.  
  
Of course, there were plenty of stragglers; walkers in the road, hanging around a few of the vacant buildings and even coming out from within the stark trees at the sound of the approaching truck. Rick wasn’t bothered by any of that. He figured that, after clearing Mount Vernon of literally hundreds of walkers, a few spread out here and there were no trouble at all.  
  
Almost immediately after turning right, they came upon a Shell gas station, which seemed less terrible in appearance than the Exxon on the corner. But they didn’t need gas or anything that might be inside its garage or mini mart. After the Shell station, there were two hotels, and Rick wondered just how many walkers might be trapped inside, or if there were survivors they had yet to encounter, making lives for themselves inside the buildings, just like at The Commune in Atlanta. Beyond all that was a small clusterfuck of vehicles, but there was enough of a gap that someone else had previously pushed through that allowed the truck Rick drove to slip through and continue on up the road.  
  
Looking toward the left side of the road, Rick spotted a store in the first plaza they approached and turned the truck into that lot. Off Merle’s questioning look, Rick muttered, “Detour.”  
  
“Dialysis Center? You got some trouble with them kidneys?”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow; the truck driving past said dialysis center, then a hair salon and an H&R Block. Fortunately for them, this small plaza was virtually empty of other vehicles and walkers. It seemed the living or the dead needed much from any of these places after the beginning of fall. Sure, a lot of the glass fronts were smashed open, especially the Aaron’s where people had looted and stolen electronics, as pointless as that ended up being when there was no more electricity to run any of those devices.  
  
Rick didn’t care about the Aaron’s store, or any of the others.  
  
He cared about the Dollar Tree that had caught his eye almost immediately; remembering his and Jo’s conversation a few days before in regard to balloons and helium. Parking the truck, he hopped out and then turned when he noticed Michonne hopping out after him.  
  
“It’s okay. Stay with the truck,” he insisted; not only to her but to the others as well. “I’m just going inside for two little things.”  
  
Michonne frowned. “Well, maybe I want to come inside anyway,” she retorted, ignoring his request.  
  
With a shrug, Rick pulled his machete out from at his side and walked toward the store’s double doors. One of the doors was smashed completely, so there was no need to actually open the door. He could just walk right through the frame. On the other side, he stepped down onto a pile of broken glass; the loud crunch echoing off the store walls and causing him to pause as he looked around to see if anything came out one of the aisles from the back of the store. A further step inward caused another noticeable crunch of glass from under his boots and he paused again; machete at the ready just to be safe. However, the sounds elicited no reaction from anything undead.  
  
Satisfied that the front of the store, at least, was clear, Rick walked over to the Balloon Center. Leaning over the counter, he glance down toward the floor on the other side and found nothing that might jump out at him. He looked down the aisle to at his immediate right and saw nothing else. The only other movement inside the store, aside from him, came from Michonne as she wandered around the shelves at the front right of the store where seasonal decorations had been set up before disappearing from Rick’s view. Focused on his goal, Rick walked around the counter and found two tanks of helium and he frowned. They were locked into some sort of structure that required a key to open the door thingamabob closing them, in that allowed only the tops with the nozzles to be freely used.  
  
Rick was stuck with the decision of either breaking the enclosure and trying to lug the two beastly containers out to bring back to Mount Vernon in the bed of the truck, or just filling up a balloon right then and there while running the risk of losing the balloon along the way and then all this detour being for nothing.  
  
“Michonne,” he called out.  
  
“Yeah?” her voice carried from the opposite side of the store easily enough, considering it was just the two of them inside.  
  
“I’m gonna need your assistance.”  
  
When Michonne appeared, she soon joined him at his side with a handful of greeting cards in one hand. “What’s up?”  
  
“I need one of these helium tanks.”  
  
Michonne raised an eyebrow at him. “Are we having a party?”  
  
With a sigh, Rick felt he could open up to her about why. “It’s for Hope. Jo and I talked about wanting to do something for her, ‘cause she was born sometime around this month last year,” he explained, resting one hand upon the counter after sheathing his machete. “We never knew the exact date she was born, so we decided to pick a date and went with Valentine’s and we wanted to do something special to celebrate her birthday. One of the suggestions thrown out was to fill a balloon with helium and release it so it floated up into the air. We ended up writing her names and how long she lived inside that old tomb where we renewed our vows, along with the names of the others we lost and never got to bury, but this is still something I want to do.”  
  
Michonne fully accepted this. “So we need to break open this wall thing and get one canister out.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Whack the hinges with your machete,” she suggested. “You get it lose, then we can pulled the wall off and get a canister or both out. There’s probably a dolly cart somewhere. We can load it onto that and bring it outside without breaking our backs.”  
  
Rick looked at her and smirked.  
  
“Glad I came inside, aren’t ya?”  
  
“I am,” he nodded. He glanced at the cards in her hand and gestured to them. “For any special occasion?”  
  
Michonne shrugged. “We know dates now, I figure why not grab some birthday cards for when it’s each person’s birthday.”  
  
“Mine just passed.”  
  
“It did? Why didn’t you say anything? We could’ve celebrated it.”  
  
“Because it’s not a big deal,” he replied, pulling his machete back out. “I only told Jo and we celebrated our own way.” With a rakish smile, he aimed the machete at the hinges and struck down pretty hard, but barely put a dent in it.  
  
“How old did you turn?”  
  
“Thirty-nine.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“Yeah. Why? Do I not look my age?”  
  
“If I said no, would you be mad?”  
  
Rick stopped and shrugged, giving her an aloof look. “No.”  
  
“I thought you were older,” she answered, gesturing to his face. “I think it’s all that grey in your beard and in your hair.”  
  
“Yeah, well,” he began taking a second, slightly more successful whack at the hinges. “I’m not aging well in this world, I guess.” Off a third whack, he added. “Believe it or not, when I first woke up into this world and had weeks’ worth of beard growth on my face, there was barely one grey hair to be seen.” After a fourth whack that finally broke the hinges off, Rick looked at Michonne with a smirk, then it faded as a curious expression took over. “Exactly how old did you think I was?”  
  
Mulling it over, Michonne raised her brow thoughtfully. “Forty-five, maybe older.”  
  
“Well, damn. Maybe I should try looking for some anti-aging cream on this supply run.”  
  
Smiling at each other, they both reached forward at the same time to grip the enclosure’s white fiberboard door and yanked it toward them.  
  
A few minutes later, Rick was lugging one of the helium tanks out of the Dollar Tree on a dolly cart while Michonne walked after him, eating a candy bar she’d found on a shelf. The others inside the truck seemed perplexed but didn’t question it. With Daryl climbing out of the truck to help Rick and Michonne lift the tank into the back bed, they were ready to head to their main destination.  
  
Upon leaving the small plaza, they made their way back onto the road, turning left to continue the same direction they’d originally been heading in; passing several more shopping plazas along the way. This, of course, also meant more abandoned cars and more walkers in the way, as well. Things got dicey around a block of apartment buildings. The road was completely blocked off across all lanes which meant Rick had to drive the truck through the apartment complex’s parking lots, running down numerous amounts of walkers in the process until he was able to come out onto the road again, on the other side of the roadblock.  
  
The scenery eased up a little, with less buildings and walkers around, for a few minutes, but then they came upon a much larger shopping plaza with a Costco and a Walmart. The amount of vehicles and walkers in the large, joint parking lot was astounding. Fortunately, they needed nothing from either of those places; at least, not at this point in time. Now that they’d finally come this way and were familiar with its surroundings, they could better prepare themselves to plan a trip to Walmart or Costco down the line, if need be.  
  
Only a quarter mile more up the road, they came upon the next plaza that boasted a large Home Depot sign close to the road near the plaza’s entrance. Slowly, Rick turned into it; catching sight of the Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant on the corner of the plaza; which made his stomach growl at how the memory of eating buffalo wings was now making him hungry. After passing a dry cleaner’s, a T.J. Maxx, an Advance Auto Parts and a Payless shoes store, they were soon greeted by the sight of the Home Depot’s outdoor garden center. Parking in front of the outdoor garden center’s entrance, Rick looked toward the fencing. There were walkers inside and outside that he knew they’d have to take out, and who knew how many would be inside the store.  
  
Looking over at Merle, he then looked behind him into the backseat. “We ready to do this?”  
  
“I’d say I was born ready, but that’s cheesy as all fuck,” Merle remarked, climbing out of the passenger’s seat while attaching his bladed prosthetic onto his right arm. “Let’s get this shit done. I’m a literally overdue for killing me some walkers.”  
  
Rick gave a shake of his head as he, too, climbed out of the truck; followed by Michonne, Finn and Daryl.  
  
“What’s the plan once we get in there?” Finn asked, pulling out his hatchet and sidling up beside his brother-in-law. “I know you wanted barbed wire, but should we look for anything else?”  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded. “Cleaning products; any and all you think we can use, be it dish soap, laundry detergent, disinfectant, hell—even some lemon Pledge furniture polish. We’re living at Mount Vernon, it’s our home. It’s stood for about two and a half centuries. We should keep one less thing from falling apart in this world.”  
  
“Check for toilet paper,” Michonne asked. “Tissues, paper towels, anything like that, too.”  
  
“I doubt there’s any generators left, but it doesn’t hurt to look,” Rick added. “We’ll load up some carts, pack it in as best as we can into the truck.”  
  
Checking the chambers of his Colt out of habit, Rick holstered it and instead reached inside the bed of the truck for the AK-47 assault rifle just lying there, waiting for him. It had been a while since any of them had the need to fire a gun and this seemed like the day they’d need them, what with a large, unsecured building like this they were about to enter. Keeping the weapon strapped around his chest and shoulder, he let it hang down at his side before settling on using his machete for the initial melee of walkers that would be inside. Leading the way toward the front entrance instead of making a ruckus to get the fenced in gates of the garden center open, Rick beckoned to Daryl to help him pry the door open. Once they succeeded in that task, they kept it propped open with a garbage bin once everyone had slipped inside. Repeating the process with the inner doors, they used a shopping cart to keep the door open this time before slipping into the darkness of the store.  
  
“Flashlights,” Rick whispered, as everyone pulled their flashlights out that they’d had tucked into pockets and belts so they could see.  
  
Taking a few steps forward, Rick used his machete and began smacked the metal handles of an orange platform cart. The sound of metal on metal echoed throughout the silent store until one by one, walkers began to approach from every direction, and every aisle.  
  
Bracing himself, Rick looked over at each face and then nodded. Inhaling a deep breath, he led the charge forward.

* * *

  
  
Somewhere in the vicinity of two hours later, Rick came staggering out Home Depot the same way he came in, pushing a full, orange shopping cart and covered head to toe in blood and guts; none of which was his, thankfully. What’s more was that he was smiling like he’d just won the lottery.  
  
A few seconds behind him, Finn came hurrying out, looking just as disgusting at Rick and purposely smashing his own cart into Rick’s. “Damn, I needed that.”  
  
Rick nodded in agreement. “Tell me about it. I never thought I’d actually not mind looking like shit and smelling like death.” As Finn laughed at each other’s appearance, now that they could properly see in the light of day, Rick slapped the younger man gently on the arm. “It’s good to see you happy again.”  
  
“Well, today’s a good day.”  
  
“Yeah, it is.”  
  
As they brought their carts over to where they left the truck, they began to load up what they had with them. In Rick’s cart was two 1,320-foot spools of barbed wire and a 14-foot trampoline still packaged in its box which he wanted to bring back for the kids; to give them something fun to do. When the snow was completely gone and the weather much warmer, he’d set it up outside somewhere near the house. Until then, he could probably set it up in the ballroom, since the space was large enough. Though, he had a feeling Jo my nix that idea.  
  
In Finn’s cart was a blue, 20 gallon tote filled with the cleaning products they needed, though he was having some trouble gripping the handles and yanking it out of the cart, so he required Rick’s assistance in maneuvering it out and up into the bed. Michonne came out next with Daryl; the latter pushing the cart while Michonne simply gripped the side of it. The two of them weren’t as messy as the previous two, but they weren’t actually clean either. Their cart contained a third spool of barbed wire, a few pairs of safety gloves for handling the barbed wire, wire cutters, and a 30-count package of toilet paper. Merle, the last one out, carried only one box of black garbage bags with him and was also the cleanest of the five.  
  
“That went better than expected,” the older Dixon remarked, literally tossing the box of garbage bags into the back bed without regard for where the others were loading everything else.  
  
With a minor frown, Rick, who was now standing in the back bed, cast a glance down at the box and picked it up to toss it into the 20-gallon tote with the cleaning products.  
  
“We made out pretty well,” Finn commented, stepping back to allow Daryl to lift the third spool into the back bed.  
  
“Yeah, we certainly did,” Rick nodded. “I’ve also been thinking maybe we could do another run, not necessarily today since we need to get this home and unload it, and not necessarily tomorrow either. But, I think we should start checking the nearby homes; the ones we’ve already been through for the main items we’ve needed, like food and medicine. This time, though, we take this truck and maybe another, even if we have to take a few trips back and forth, and we break down some furniture. It’s nice having beds to sleep in, but these 18th century reproductions are a tight fit and not exactly functional. The girls, especially; I’d like to find them maybe some twin beds and mattresses. We don’t necessarily have to get rid of the current beds. We can break them down and store them somewhere.”  
  
“Maybe we can find some couches, too. _Proper_ couches, not like that small, uncomfortable thing in the blue parlor,” Michonne added.  
  
“I wouldn’t mind a nice, leather recliner,” Merle spoke, his mind already wandering at the image in his head.  
  
Everyone nodded at this idea and all seemed in agreement that getting better beds and mattresses were part of the next phase of making life at Mount Vernon feel even more like home. Once everything was loaded into the back bed in such a way they were sure nothing would tumble about, they all began to climb back into the truck and get ready to roll out.  
  
As they began to backtrack the way they came down Richmond Highway, the drive went more easily since they were prepared for the figurative bumps in the road. The roadblocks they’d already encountered, they knew where and how to get around them. And the drive was relatively quiet, too, until just before they reached that first intersection where the hotels and gas stations were from earlier, when Michonne spoke up.  
  
“Um, can you pull over, Rick?”  
  
“What, why?” he asked, slowing down.  
  
“I need to go to the bathroom and it can’t wait.”  
  
Glancing up at her in the backseat by way of the rearview mirror, Rick smirked. “You should’ve gone before we left,” he teased.  
  
“I didn’t have to go then, and since we have toilet paper with us, I’m taking advantage of this opportunity.”  
  
Obliging her, Rick pulled the truck to a stop right in the middle of the four-lane road. Finn stepped, who’d been sitting behind Rick, climbed out so that Michonne, who’d been stuck in the middle between Finn and Daryl, could get out. Putting the truck into park and turning it off as not to waste gas, Rick just sat there with his left elbow propped up beside the window while his right hand still gripped the steering wheel. Using his side mirror, he watched as Michonne walked toward the back of the truck with her katana strapped to her back and a gun strapped to her hip. The truck lurched when she disappeared from his immediate view, letting him know that she had climbed up into the back bed and was beginning to rip open the package of toilet paper to retrieve a roll to use.  
  
With Finn’s cab door was open, Rick didn’t need to turn the truck back on so he could roll his window down when he called out to Michonne.  
  
“How long you gonna be?” he asked, a teasing tone still in his voice.  
  
“As long as I need,” she retorted. “Never rush a woman.”  
  
“Sometimes I forget she is one,” Merle quipped, quietly. “Bitch is tough as nails.”  
  
Rick watched Michonne retreating over the guardrail on the left side of the road to slip into the privacy the tree coverage provided. “Probably not best to call her a bitch then,” he reasoned, bringing his attention over to man beside him. “She’s likely to cut off your other hand with as little effort as possible, before you could even blink an eye.”  
  
“I meant it in a good way.”  
  
Daryl grunted from the back and then shifted around. “Well, I might as well take a piss while we’re waiting.” Pushing his door open, he climbed out and shut the passenger side cab door behind him. Moving to his right, he reached into the back bed and reached for his crossbow, but then moved his hand away from it to pick up Rick’s AK instead. Stepping around the front of the truck, he crossed to the opposite side of the road from where Michonne went as not to disturb her privacy.  
  
Rick sat there, watching his friend climb over the guardrail and slip slightly as he walk further into the trees; wondering why Daryl took an automatic rifle instead of his usual crossbow. The wind picked up then, bringing a breeze inside the truck from Finn’s opened door, which forced the scent of rotting, walker’s blood that was stuck upon both Rick and Finn’s bodies to swirl around the inside of the truck.  
  
“Fuck,” Merle grimaced, waving his lone hand in front of his face. “Y’all smell like the underside of a dead dog’s sack. If it wasn’t for today, I might’ve forgotten what walkers smelled like, what with how long it’s been since we really had to kill any.”  
  
Turning to his right, Merle reached his left arm across his chest and pushed his own door open so that the air could pass through and properly air the inside of the truck out. He then just sat there, facing the woods, to try and pinpoint where his brother had gone, while simultaneously glancing at random debris on the ground outside.  
  
Rick’s attention was diverted almost immediately by something moving in the distance; a few somethings, actually, and moving closer with each passing second. Sitting up straighter and tensing up when he realized what was coming into view, Rick reached his right hand out and slapped Merle on the arm.  
  
“We have company,” he muttered, gravely.  
  
At the intersection up ahead, coming toward them, was a convoy of about eight men on motorcycles. The closer they got, Rick could tell they were packing heat. It had been months since they’d encountered any hostiles that their guard was unequivocally down and not completely prepared for what might happen. Rick knew these men weren’t going to just continue on down the road past them. They were going to stop and interact.  
  
“You think they might be Sarge’s men?” Finn asked, leaning forward between Rick and Merle’s seats.  
  
Rick exhaled heavily in reply, his right hand dropping from the steering wheel to his Colt holstered at his side. He clenched his jaw and began to chew the inside of his bottom lip, running through all the scenarios that might take place in his head; focusing on the negative scenarios because it was always best to prepare for the worst.  
  
When the convoy came to stop a mere hundred feet in front of the truck, the men on their motorcycles turned off their engines and braced themselves in a stationary position. The man that was front and center smiled across the way; eyeing Rick through the truck’s windshield.  
  
“Hello, there!” The man called out, climbing off his bike to stand beside it; using the handlebars as an armrest as he beckoned toward the truck. “Why don’t you come on out, join us in the road?”  
  
Rick hesitated.  
  
“C’mon now. Let’s not dilly dally.”  
  
Feeling anxious and frustrated, Rick reached for his door and pushed it open. As he climbed out of the truck, with his hand resting upon his Colt, Merle and Finn followed suit. All three men each took a step away from the truck and one step forward.  
  
“That’s great. Doing well right out of the gate,” the head biker remarked, very condescendingly. “Now step two, hand over your weapons.”  
  
“Why should we?” Rick questioned, wondering a million things at once. To name a few: could Michonne and Daryl see what was going on, and was this an altercation Rick would get out of? Would he walk away from this so he could get home to Jo? He’d promised her he would.  
  
“Well, they’re not yours.”  
  
“Whose are they?” Merle asked, mentally preparing himself for a fight. Tucked into his back pocket was his gun and he was ready to pull it out at a moment’s notice.  
  
Taking a step closer, the head biker stared back at Merle, holding his gaze. “Your property now belongs to Negan.”  
  
The other bikers had the advantage; that much was for sure. They had automatic weapons point at Rick, Merle and Finn and there was no doubt they’d be able to shoot them before Rick, Merle and Finn could grab their own weapons.  
  
Walking right up to Rick, the head biker gestured to his Colt. “Let’s get those sidearms, shall we?” Beckoning Rick, he pressed, “Right now.”  
  
Sneering, Rick hesitated again; wondering if any attempt to fight back would be worth it right now. Likely he’d end up with a bullet to the head if he tried anything. If he had to lose his beloved gun to this man in order to get home, then that was a sacrifice he was prepared to make. He looked down at the Colt and, with a begrudgingly sigh, removed it from its holster and handed it over.  
  
“Thank you,” the head biker spoke. As Rick stood there, seething, the biker then stepped to Rick’s left and held his hand out toward Finn, who removed his own gun and handed it over. “Thank you.” When the biker walked across the front of the truck and moved to stand directly in front of Merle, he took a moment to appreciate Merle’s arm prosthetic and then just looked up at him expectantly. “If you have to eat shit, best not to nibble. Bite, chew, swallow, repeat. It goes quicker.”  
  
With a snarl, Merle reached behind him with his left hand and pulled his gun out. Holding it out in front of him, he watched with a hateful eye as the smaller man took it.  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
“You’re not welcome,” Merle bit out.  
  
The biker just gave him a smirk and walked back over to his own men; handing off all three guns for safekeeping.  
  
“Who are you people?” Rick demanded.  
  
“I get the curiosity, but we have questions ourselves. And we'll be the ones asking them while we drive you back to wherever it is you call home.” The biker turned and looked back at Rick with a sly smile. “Take a gander at where you hang your hats. First, though, your shit. What have you got for us?”  
  
“You just took it,” Rick replied, gesturing toward the man holding their guns.  
  
The biker tutted and rolled his eyes. “C’mon. I mean, can we not, okay? There’s more. There is _always_ more.” With a sigh, the biker turned and gestured to another of his friends. “T,” he muttered, and said ‘friend’ hopped off his own bike and began to step forward. “Take my blonde friend to the back of the truck; check the bed, inside the back bumper, and work your way to the front.”  
  
The second biker — T — approached Finn and shoved him back. “Go.”  
  
“Bite, chew, swallow, repeat,” the head biker echoed.  
  
Watching his brother-in-law disappear toward the back of the truck out the corner of his eye, the muscles in Rick’s jaw tightened as he brought his gaze back forward and stared the head biker down. “Who’s Negan?”  
  
The biker sat back down on his motorcycle, he lifted his own gun and pointed it directly at Rick. “Ding dong. Hell’s bells,” he sang. “You see, usually we introduce ourselves by just popping one of you right off the bat. But you seem like reasonable people. And, like I said, we're gonna drive you back to where you were. I mean, do you know how _awkward_ it is carpooling with someone whose friend or friends you've just killed? _Oof_. But I _told_ you not to ask any questions. And then what does this asshole do? So that's that. I don't want you to get the wrong impression of me.”  
  
As the hammer clicked, Rick winced. “Wait,” he muttered anxiously. Mentally urging himself to remain calm, he repeated, “Wait. You don’t have to do this.”  
  
The head biker reacted by removing a second gun from inside his jacket to aim both at Rick.  
  
“Shut up,” Merle hissed.  
  
“I am _talking_ to the man,” Rick replied, shooting the older Dixon a look. In doing so, he caught the slightest glimpse of movement in the trees to his right and he knew it wasn’t a walker.  
  
“No, you’re not,” the biker taunted. As the hammer of one of his guns clicked again, he stared Rick right in the eye and then, after a moment, dropped his arms with a sigh. “I’m not gonna kill you.”  
  
Rick emitted a small sigh of relief.  
  
“Wait, wait,” the biker muttered. “Yes, I am.”  
  
As he raised his guns again, a barrage of gunfire rang out from the direction of the woods to Rick’s right. A few of the bikers dropped like flies almost immediately and, using that distraction to his benefit, Rick dropped down and took cover behind his truck door; trying to remember if he had another gun tucked away inside the front cab of the truck. Not having time on his hands to look, Rick turned and looked toward the back of the truck and ran at the biker who had taken Finn back there with him. A shot fired from the biker’s gun before Rick had a chance to reach him.  
  
“No!” Rick shouted. Without a moment’s notice, he whipped out his machete and brought it down against the crux where the man’s neck met his shoulder. The biker cried out in pain and before he could turn around and retaliate against Rick, Rick pulled the machete back up and sliced the man’s head off.  
  
There was gunfire everywhere now, coming from so many directions; from the surviving bikers and from both sides of the road, from within the woods, where both Michonne and Daryl were.  
  
Dropping down to his knees, Rick hovered over Finn, who was lying on the pavement on his back and holding a hand to his shoulder. The younger man was yelping in pain and bleeding pretty badly while Rick frantically hovered. Grabbing Finn’s hand, he pressed it more firmly against the wound. “You need to keep pressure on it,” Rick urged. “If you bleed out and die on me, your sister is gonna kill me.” Twisting around where he knelt, he reached for the beheaded biker’s gun and stood back up with it. “I’ll be right back, stay there.”  
  
Finn scoffed through his pain. “Where am I gonna go?”  
  
Hunching down, Rick walked forward carefully; not even sure if Michonne, Daryl or Merle were still alive at this point. As he neared his driver’s door, Rick popped his head up to look across through the inside of the truck and could see Merle was very much alive and stabbing the shit out of a biker with the blade sticking out of his prosthetic.  
  
“Keep _shooting_ them, brother!” Merle shouted, which alerted Rick to the fact that Daryl was still alive, too.  
  
“This thing’s out of bullets,” Daryl shouted back. “I need my _crossbow_.”  
  
When Rick turned his gaze back forward, he was met with the frame of the door against the bridge of his nose and the upper part of his right cheek. A slight crack in the frame was sharp enough that it cut into Rick’s skin; causing him to wince in pain while stumbling back from the hit. Before gaining his fully gaining his balance, he realized the head biker was the one attacking him.  
  
The biker kneed Rick in the crotch and held a hand to Rick’s throat to choke him with one hand while aiming his gun at Rick’s head. All the while, Rick found himself reminded of that last fight with the Governor and how it be really nice if someone would come up behind this biker and stab him through the chest any time now.  
  
When that didn’t seem to be in the cards at the moment, Rick fought through the pain in his crotch and struggled to breathe while reaching up to hit the biker in the head with the gun he held in his own hand, but the biker blocked the hit with his own gun hand which, in turn, knocked the gun away that Rick had been holding.  
  
“Just fucking give up and die already, will ya? You’re making this so much harder for me,” the biker quipped, clicking the hammer to his gun and aiming it at Rick’s head.  
  
Just as the biker’s finger came down on the trigger, in that split second, Rick’s eyes went wide and he shot his hand up. Covering the muzzle of the gun with his hand, Rick jerked his head to the right and the saw nothing but white hot pain. Screaming out in agony, Rick only reaction was to lift his leg up and knee the biker in the crotch as he’d done to him. When the biker rolled over and instinctually cupped his balls, Rick rolled over as well and clambered to his feet.  
  
As he whipped around to find himself face to face with the biker once more, Rick closed his eyes upon noticing the biker aiming the gun in his face and, in that moment, resigned himself to death.  
  
But death didn’t come for him in that moment.  
  
Before the biker could pull the trigger, his body dropped lifelessly to the ground.  
  
Opening his eyes back up, Rick looked down to find the biker lying there with a bolt from Daryl’s crossbow sticking through one of his eye sockets. Whipping around, Rick looked toward the back of the truck, only seeing Finn’s legs, but also seeing Daryl standing there with his crossbow aimed.  
  
“Th-thank you,” Rick stuttered; the pain he was feeling in his hand becoming excruciatingly unbearable.  
  
“Holy shit,” Daryl exclaimed. “Rick, your finger.”  
  
Taking a moment to comprehend the words Daryl had just said, Rick looked down at his left hand and was startled by the amount of blood he saw. What was even more startling was the sight of his pinky finger, completely obliterated, and what was left was just a bloody flap of skin and a jagged piece of bone, dangling from the rest of his hand like a limp, wet noodle.  
  
“Fuck,” Rick muttered.


	57. Bubble

_“We're just a bubble in a boiling pot.”_ — Jack Johnson

* * *

  
  
He didn’t know why, but for some reason all Rick could think about was lemon meringue pie. The odd thing about that thought was that he’d never even been a fan of pie, let alone anything lemon-flavored. While he never disliked pie, per se, he’d always preferred cake where desserts were concerned. Maybe it was simply because, while growing up, he had always enjoyed licking the excess batter from the bowl or off the beaters when his mother had finished baking; just before she began to wash the dishes. Maybe it was simply because he loved the sugary frosting his mother made from scratch and how Rick and his brother would complain that they wanted the store-bought frosting like all the other kids, even though they secretly enjoyed the homemade kind better.  
  
Or, maybe—just _maybe_ —Rick was thinking about lemon meringue pie because it was a hell of a lot better than thinking about the fact that his pinky finger had been shot the fuck off and the pain of it had him seeing stars.  
  
After realizing what had happened to him, adrenaline kicked in for a few moments; allowing him to ignore his own pain to return to Finn’s side and see if he was okay. Finding him still quite alive and cursing his own gunshot wound while Merle was helping him up, Rick stood up straighter and began to stagger backward. He was losing blood and needed to get home. He was also terrified that those men would have others coming to look for them and somehow follow Rick’s group back to Mount Vernon, so he just wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible.  
  
He couldn’t drive though. Not now, anyway. The pain was becoming increasingly blinding, and he didn’t want to risk crashing the truck if he blacked out. In a rush of movement, Michonne helped him into the backseat, scooting him toward the middle while she came to sit beside him. Merle began barking orders to his younger brother and got Finn up into the middle of the front seat; climbing up into the passenger’s seat and keeping the younger man up against him to keep him conscious while Daryl took to driver’s seat.  
  
“Finn, you okay?” Rick mumbled.  
  
“I think I’ll live,” Finn groaned through his pain. “Don’t worry. Jo won’t kill you now.”  
  
Rick let out a sharp breath and winced when he realized Michonne was wrapping his left hand with the scarf she always used as a headband. “Ow, fuck!” he yelped, as she pulled it tighter around demolished digit.  
  
“We gotta keep pressure on it somehow,” she insisted.  
  
“It hurts.”  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
The pain was so terrible that it was like his nerve-endings were stabbing knives up his arms, just under his skin. Rick panted, tears stung his eyes and he felt quite lightheaded, but that could be just from the bloodloss.  
  
Unaware that the truck had already been moving and driving down the remainder of Richmond Highway, around the biker’s now-abandoned motorcycles and their dead bodies, Rick was only aware they were finally headed home when Daryl turned the truck left, back onto Route 235 where that Exxon gas station was.  
  
The rumble and hum from the engine and the throbbing pain in his hand was actually beginning to lull him. Rick’s eyelids began to droop and he slumped backward against his seat; letting his head tip backward against the rear window.  
  
The sudden echoing slap of leather against leather caused Rick’s eyes to pop back open and for him to tip his head back forward. He blinked a few times and turned toward Michonne, realizing that the sound had come from her slapping her fingerless glove-covered hands together. She was also staring directly at him.  
  
“Don’t fall asleep.”  
  
“I didn’t even realize I was,” he muttered, gruffly. “I was thinking about pie.”  
  
“Seriously?” Merle questioned. “Pie? Right now?”  
  
“Lemon meringue,” Rick specified. “I don’t even like lemon meringue. Or pie, in general, for that matter.”  
  
“Who doesn’t like pie?” Finn asked. “That’s un-American.”  
  
Michonne leaned forward, reaching an arm over the front seat and patting Finn’s good shoulder. “No, that’s good. Keep talking about pie. Let’s keep you both conscious so you don’t pass out from all the blood you’ve both lost.”  
  
“I like cherry,” Daryl remarked, keeping his eyes on the road he was speeding down at a paltry seventy miles per hour.  
  
“Pecan,” Finn spoke, his voice sounding incredibly tired. “Michonne? What about you?”  
  
“If I have to pick one? Pumpkin.”  
  
Rick made a face. “I think I’m gonna vomit.”  
  
“C’mon, it’s not that bad. Have you even tried—”  
  
“No, I’m _really_ gonna vomit,” Rick insisted. Hunching forward, Rick turned his head and began to cough up the contents of his stomach on the floor behind the passenger’s seat.  
  
Leaning close, Michonne placed a hand upon the back of Rick’s neck and rubbed down between his shoulder blades in comforting circles. “Sorry,” she murmured.  
  
“Ugh,” he groaned.  
  
“S’alright, brother,” Daryl assured. “We’re almost home.”  
  
“Finn?” Rick called out. “You still awake?”  
  
“I haven’t passed out and died from bloodloss just yet if that’s what you’re asking. This fucking hurts, though,” the younger man complained. “I don’t recommend getting shot. Ever.”  
  
“This is my third time, but who’s keeping score?”  
  
Finn snickered, thankful for some humor to alleviate the seriousness of their situation. “Clearly you are.”  
  
“So, I’m winning, then. Do I get a prize?”  
  
“You got my sister. What more do you want?”  
  
Rick wiped his mouth with the back of his right hand and leaned back again. “You’re right,” he sighed, closing his eyes even though he expected Michonne would slap her hands together in a few moments when she realized he was doing that..  
  
_I don’t want anything else_ , he thought. _Jo’s all I want._

 

* * *

  
  
The sound of tires tearing up dirt and gravel caught Jo off guard while she was standing in the Infirmary with Nicole. She had been recently decided she wanted to help do something productive around the house that the former ER nurse would approve of. Taking inventory of the medical supplies was considerably easy and if, for some reason, Jo found herself worn out or in some sort of dire, medical situation, Nicole was right there to assist. All Jo was really doing, took little effort, though; she was merely taking bottles of medication from what had once been George Washington’s built-in bookcase and handed the bottles to Nicole, who would empty the bottles to count how many were inside compared to her last inventory check. When Nicole was done counting, she would return the pills back into the bottle and Jo would return the bottle to the bookcase, and then repeat the process with the next bottle.  
  
“We could switch. You can sit here and count the pills out and I can stand there handing the bottles to you,” Nicole offered, looking up from where she sat at the secretary; the roll-top desk that had its own, small hutch-like bookcase-like stacked above it.  
  
“All I ever seem to do is sit or lie around. I’m tired of practically being an invalid.”  
  
“I know, but it’s for your—”  
  
And that’s when the tire sound snapped Jo’s attention away.  
  
Slapping the bottle in her hand back onto the shelf she’d been taking it from, Jo placed a hand upon her stomach as she hurried out of the room. Passing both the doorways to the butler’s pantry on the left and the dining room on the right as she stepped into the small hall that connected all three rooms, Jo pushed the outer door open and stepped outside. The cold February breeze smacked her right in the face and sent an immediate chill up her spine, causing her to wrap her arms around her chest just as the truck that Rick and the others had left in came peeling around the forecourt and then came to an abrupt stop right in front of where Jo stood.  
  
Her Spidey senses were immediately tingling as she rushed down the steps and headed for the passenger door, just as Merle shoved it open; almost accidentally striking her in the head. Jerking her head back in time, she was greeted by a very frustrated Merle who barked at her for get out of the way, but not before she noticed her brother slumped over against Daryl, who was in the driver’s seat, and with blood staining the front of his shirt.  
  
“Oh, god—Finn!” Jo cried out, gripping the door as Merle leaned back inside the truck to help the younger man out.  
  
“Hey, sis,” Finn greeted, as if everything was peachy keen.  
  
“What the fuck _happened_?”  
  
“He got shot,” Merle replied, throwing Finn’s right arm around his shoulder, allowing his left arm, where he was shot in the shoulder, to hang down. “Where’s Nurse Ratched? We’re gonna need her expertise.”  
  
“Oh god, oh god,” Jo echoed, making sure to give both Merle and Finn a wide enough berth as they walked forward together toward the same door she had just exited.  
  
The chaos didn’t stop there, either.  
  
The slamming of two doors on the driver’s side of the truck drew Jo’s attention across the hood as she watched Daryl and Michonne hurry around to the other side where Jo was.  
  
“Where’s Rick?” Jo asked, only just then realizing he hadn’t been the one driving and hadn’t exited the truck yet. “Daryl…” Jo could feel her heart beating faster and faster in her chest as she reached out and grabbed onto Daryl’s shoulder. “Where’s Rick, Daryl?”  
  
“He’s in here,” he muttered gruffly, opening up the back cab door to reveal Rick slumped over on the seat. “He passed out just before we pulled up.”  
  
“What happened?” Jo demanded; her tone a mix of anger and fear.  
  
“We ran into some assholes on motorcycles. There was a firefight,” Michonne answered, pulling Jo aside and placing her hands on her shoulders. “It’s gonna look bad, but he’s fine. This isn’t anything that will kill him.”  
  
Jo was unconvinced as she shifted her gaze away from Michonne and over to Daryl as he slapped Rick gently upon the face to awaken him.  
  
“Rick, buddy, wake up. We’re home.”  
  
As Rick stirred and began to lift his head, revealing a cut across his nose and the right side of his face, with dried blood streaking down from the wounds. With Daryl’s assistance, he was sitting up straighter and scooting forward along the seat to exit out of the car; looking down only briefly to make sure he didn’t step in the small pile of vomit on the floor. As Daryl gripped his upper arms, Rick climbed wearily out of the truck, holding his left hand, wrapped in Michonne’s headband around, against his chest.  
  
“Rick, are you okay?” Jo asked, sidling up to her husband; placing her hands on either side of his bloodied face and ignoring what a complete mess he looked like despite wondering how much of the blood he was wearing belonged to him. “What happened to your hand?”  
  
A little dazed from the pain, Rick followed the sound of her voice and finally focused on her face; knitting his brow together and sighing in relief over just seeing her again. He was prepared to telling her exactly what happened but, instead, he ended up blurting, “It fucking hurts.”  
  
Dropping a hand down upon his, Rick hissed and recoiled back.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Jo apologized earnestly. “Is it cut bad?”  
  
“More than that,” Daryl remarked as he began to lead Rick toward door.  
  
“What?” Jo pressed, desperate to know as she followed behind both men with Michonne just behind her.  
  
Once they were inside, they all rushed into the Infirmary, where Morgan had already joined to offer his services, having been some advanced first aid by Nicole over the last few months. Finn was lying down on the cot; the same one where Jen had died nearly two months before. That small detail wasn’t lost on Jo either as she found herself torn between who she should fawn over; her brother or her husband.  
  
“Alright, fucking answer me, al-fucking-ready!” Jo shouted, immediately catching everyone’s attention. “I’m freaking out here,” she added, more quietly before deciding to drop down to her knees in front of Rick who had been sat down into Nicole’s desk chair.  
  
“Keep your hand elevated, Rick,” Nicole advised, while Morgan helped her carefully remove the lightweight khaki jacket Finn was wearing so she could get a good look at his gunshot wound.  
  
“Rick, what happened?” Jo asked, looking up at him.  
  
“It’s okay. Don’t freak out. It’s not good for you or the—”  
  
“Rick, I _swear_ to god…” She scowled but there was more worry to her expression than any anger.  
  
“I got into a scuffle with one of those bikers Michonne mentioned,” he began to explain, slowing unwrapping the scarf from his hand. “Bastard had me pinned down, had his gun in my face and was about to take the shot. I threw my hand up to the muzzle and looked away as he pulled the trigger.” When he removed the last bit of the scarf from his hand, he revealed the bloodied, mangled mess that was left of his pinky finger.  
  
“Oh god, Rick,” Jo grimaced; staring at the carnage like it was a car wreck she couldn’t bring herself to look away from. Part of the bone was sticking out, along with shredded cartilage, coagulating blood and a single flap of skin that somehow still held on to the top two thirds of his finger. “On a scale of one to ten, how bad does it hurt right now?”  
  
“Is fifteen an option?” he frowned, despite trying to make light of the situation. “At least it wasn’t my ring finger, right?”  
  
“It’s still an entire finger, Rick.”  
  
“Hey, if cartoon characters can manage with four fingers on one hand, so can I. I mean, clearly, there’s no saving that thing. There’s no reattaching it ‘cause there’s nothing to reattach.”  
  
Nicole stepped away from Finn for a moment to inspect Rick hand and frowned. “Yeah,” she muttered, leaning down to look more closely. “You’re gonna lose the top half, just above the proximal phalanx.”  
  
“Try that again in English,” Daryl grunted.  
  
Nicole sighed and rolled her eyes, shooting a look over at the archer. “The three little bones that make up a finger are called phalanges. Phalanx, singular. The intermediate and distal phalanges are the middle and top bones. The _proximal_ is the bottom bone still connected to the hand, to the metacarpal,” she explained in detail, pointing out each section as she went along. “The intermediate and distal phalanges have to be removed. I have no way of reattaching that with the damage Rick’s sustained. But there is excess skin hanging there that I can use to fold over and sew up so the bottom portion can heal properly. I have to do this now, though. Leaving the wound opened like this is leaving it prone to infection, which could lead to other complications.” Throwing a look over her shoulder at Morgan, she asked, “Can you handle removing a bullet and sewing Finn up?”  
  
“I can,” Morgan assured.

“Okay, then I need you to do that for me while I see to Rick. His wound is more involved.”  
  
“No,” Rick shrugged. “Take care of Finn. This isn’t even my good hand.” As if to make a point, he raised his right hand and wiggled all five fingers.  
  
“Rick,” Nicole spoke, looking him dead in the eye. “If I don’t treat your finger now, you’re running the risk of infection; septicemia, tetanus. And we all learned from losing Jen that something like that can linger in your body for weeks and weeks before it finally kills you. Your nerve endings in your hand could die and you could lose the use of your left hand completely. Considering we’re not in a hospital and I don’t have that same equipment or sterile environment to work in like I would’ve two years ago, let’s not take any chances with your life, okay? You have an unborn child you don’t need to leave fatherless before she’s even born.”  
  
“She?” Rick repeated, pulling his gaze away from the nurse to his wife.  
  
Jo smiled, despite everything else going on. “Nicole gave me another ultrasound just after you left. We hadn’t discussed wanting to know the sex yet, but I figured, while she was looking…”  
  
“We’re having a girl?”  
  
Jo nodded. “Yeah. Another girl,” she replied with a chuckle. “You’re gonna be sorely outnumbered.”  
  
“I’m okay with that,” Rick murmured. Then looking away from Jo, he instead looked up at Nicole. “Okay. Do whatever you gotta do.”  
  
“Good,” Nicole muttered. “Okay, everybody not mending a patient or related to either one of them, kindly get the fuck out of my Infirmary.”  
  
Stepping forward, Daryl reached around to the back of Rick’s head and leaned forward to place a platonic kiss upon his friend’s forehead. “Shout bloody murder if you need anything.”  
  
Rick nodded. “I will.”  
  
Merle and Michonne began to slowly exit the room, too, heading in the direction of the dining room as Jo used the desk to pull herself up off her knees. She turned and noticed Tyreese and a few others had been peering into the Infirmary from opposite doorways into the room, but had slipped politely away to give Nicole’s patients privacy while she and Morgan took care of them.  
  
“Jo, if you’re staying and still want to help me, get some scissors for Morgan to cut open Finn’s shirt and that bottle of hydrogen peroxide from the cabinet,” the ginger-haired nurse directed while she went in search of needles and thread. “Also, there’s a pair of surgical forceps on that table in the corner. Give those to Morgan so he can fish that bullet out of your brother.”  
  
Nodding, Jo began to busy herself with all the tasks she was given. Once she acquired the supplies asked of her to retrieve and after handing them off to either Morgan or Nicole, she wandered over to the head of the cot, out of Morgan’s way and crouched down so she could kiss her brother’s forehead.  
  
“I love you, Foofy.”  
  
Finn smiled. “Love you, too, Dodo.”  
  
Rick, wincing as he moved his right hand the wrong way, looked over at the brother and sister duo. “Foofy and Dodo?”  
  
Jo grinned, running a hand through her brother’s floppy blonde hair. “Nicknames from his childhood,” she replied. “My dad called me JoJo, but Finn couldn’t pronounce his J’s as a toddler, so it came out as Dodo, and it kinda just stuck over the years. As for Foofy—I don’t even know how that came to be. He was around three years old, though, I think, when I started calling him that.”  
  
“How come I’ve never heard you call him Foofy before now?”  
  
“And ruin his post-apocalyptic street cred?” Jo teased. “Never.”  
  
“My sister’s good like that.”  
  
Rick smiled through his own pain. “Yeah, she is,” he agreed.  
  
“Jo—”  
  
The blonde mother-to-be stood up straight and looked over at Nicole who was sterilizing Rick’s demolished pinky finger by pouring a little bit of hydrogen peroxide over it, which made him grimace from the sting. “Yeah?”  
  
“In the closet behind you, on a shelf are some towels and a bottle of Scotch. Bring out both.”  
  
“Scotch? Are we partying after?” Jo asked, slipping into the closet and perusing the virtually bare shelves in the dark of the small room, if it could be called that. A few white bath towels were right in front of her face, but the Scotch was behind her, hidden in the corner. Grabbing those items, she came back out into the Infirmary a mere moment or two later.  
  
“There’s no time to give Finn and Rick any sort of pain meds to numb them while we stitch them up. The Scotch is to get them drunk, quick; to help them feel less.”  
  
Dropping the towels down to the ground beside both Morgan and Nicole, Jo twisted the cap off the Scotch and stepped over to her brother first. “Open up.”  
  
Catching her drift, Finn lifted his head and opened his mouth just as she began to pour the amber-colored liquid down his throat. She did it at a slow but steady pace so he didn’t choke, and then stepped over to Rick. Bringing the bottle to his lips, she watched as he looked up at her and held her gaze. Once he parted his lips for her, she tipped the bottle up and let him the alcohol fill his mouth. When he had too much, he swallowed it back and then let her do it again.  
  
“You boys ready?” Nicole inquired.  
  
“Ugh,” Finn groaned. “No.”  
  
“Tough shit,” Morgan remarked with a smirk, cutting the fabric of the younger man’s shirt open with the scissors and then reaching over for the bottle of hydrogen peroxide.  
  
“Your bedside manner is appalling,” Finn quipped.  
  
“And that’s why I drove school buses for a living and never took any Hippocratic Oath.”  
  
Off Finn’s groan of uncertainty over the pain he was about to still feel once the forceps began digging around for the bullet still lodged in his shoulder, he craned his head toward Jo. “I could use more of that Scotch, Dodo.”  
  
Obliging her brother one more time with a generous portion, she stopped when he choked slightly. Jo stepped back over toward Rick and offered him more. “Gimme something to bite on,” he said with a shake. “Scotch isn’t gonna keep me from grinding me teeth together and we don’t have the luxury of dentist to fix a broken molar or two.”  
  
Crouching down, Jo picked up an extra towel and held it in front of his face. “Bite down on this, then.” When he did, she leaned toward his face and pressed her lips to his temple and whispered, “I love you.”  
  
Rick closed his eyes at found some solace in the sound of her voice.  
  
A moment later, his muffled cry of pain alerted Jo that Nicole had just removed the top two thirds of his ruined little finger. The profanity he began to spew was also muffled, but duly noted as Nicole continued forward.

 

* * *

  
  
Finn had been tended to and finished up with well before Rick. The younger man had groaned in anguish when the bullet was removed, but it had come out with little effort. Either it wasn’t that terribly lodged in his shoulder or Morgan was just that good with surgical forceps. Nicole had taken a moment to inspect Morgan’s work and believed it was fine and that Finn would heal just fine. Of course, they wouldn’t know for sure right away. Because of where Finn had been shot, there was that possibility that he’d sustain permanent nerve damage. Finn didn’t seem to care, as long as he didn’t lose mobility in his arm. Nicole assured he wouldn’t. He just might lose feeling in that section of his shoulder, like if he scratched at the skin there, he might not actually feel it; he’d feel the pressure from the scratching but not the scratching sensation itself.  
  
Afterward, Jo handled giving her brother one pill for pain relief and another to prevent infection, and then sent her brother on his way with the advisement of no heavy lifting with that arm for a while. Finn tried to find amusement in the situation by joking about passing chores off to someone else while kicking back and relaxing with some more of that Scotch; but there was something sadder in the younger man’s eyes.  
  
Jo wondered if it still had anything to do with Jen, or the simple fact that he’d been shot; his first time ever experiencing something like that for himself. Or maybe it had to do with whatever they’d all just been put through on the road back to Mount Vernon that had seen them in a firefight with some bikers.  
  
Once Finn had left the Infirmary, Jo was able to give her complete focus back to Rick, who had nearly passed out, twice, from the pain. After the prison, Rick had found a way to power through the pain of the gunshot to his leg, which he had dug out with his own finger as he and Jo fled with Maggie’s dead body. He’d never actually mended that wound, either. He hadn’t had the proper supplies to do so, except for a bottle of water to clean it out or the sleeve of his shirt he had ripped and tied around his leg to suppress the bleeding. He’d had no medication for that then either, and somehow came out on top.  
  
This wound was much different. He was actually losing a physical part of him; most of a finger. Everything was so exposed and such a mess that Nicole had to be very intricate in how she proceeded. Jo couldn’t even grasp how Nicole was able to do it all and stay so calm.  
  
When Jo had watched the top two thirds of the finger clipped free from the bottom third and set aside on the desk, she nearly vomited a little in her mouth. Rick seemed unnerved by it, too, which then seemed to make him angry and frustrated. To take his attention off what was happening, Jo turned his face away so that he was looking at her and then let him lean his face against her chest. She didn’t even care about the tacky, drying blood on his face transferring onto her shirt. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d had a shirt ruined by blood or guts.  
  
When Nicole had managed to fold the excess flap of skin over the exposed stump that was all that was left of Rick’s pinky finger and stitched it up, Rick pulled his face away and looked tiredly down at his hand and then back up at Jo. He watched how Jo began to move around; grabbing a bottle of water and a clean towel, as well as the hydrogen peroxide. She set it all on the roll-top desk beside Nicole’s inventory notebook and then searched for bandages. Once Nicole was finished doing all she could for Rick’s lost finger, Jo took over in tending to the cuts on Rick’s face.  
  
She’d asked how he’d received the cuts and, after the towel he’d been biting down on had been removed, Rick said it was from getting hit in the face by the frame of the truck door. Apparently there was a small, sharp crack in the outer frame; jagged enough that it acted much like a knife and his face happened to get hit with it in the wrong spot at the wrong time.  
  
Jo deduced there would be deep scars that wouldn’t go away. Nicole offered to stitch him up there, too, but Rick shook it off; insisted a couple of bandages would be fine. He didn’t care about scars. And so, Jo cleaned the wounds and then applied butterfly bandages to help pull the skin on either side of the cuts closer together so that it would heal a little better.  
  
Rick was given pain medication and an antibiotic for infection as well afterward. When he finally stood back up and looked down at his hand; at how Nicole had stitched it up and wrapped the entire hand up with gauze bandaging to further protect it while it healed, Rick’s knees buckled slightly from all the bloodloss and just the overall pain that he was still feeling because the pain reliever still needed time to kick in. He was so drained, physically and emotionally, that he had to sit right back down.  
  
Jo had watched Morgan helping Nicole clean up and then gave her full attention to Rick. She offered him her arm and let him lean on her once he finally stood back up. As they walked out of the Infirmary, Rick led them through the dining room and then out into the entrance hall, following the voices coming from the other side of the house, in the ballroom. Once they reached that place, Rick stood there in the doorway between the ballroom and the blue parlor, looking at all the faces staring back at him; having been waiting anxiously to see how he was and what his reaction to what had happened and what their next step was.  
  
“Those men—those men were organized,” Rick spoke after a moment. “They were more or less clean, they seemed well-rested, well-fed. They were like us in that they had to have come from someplace not far from here, where they’re living with shelter and food, with safety. We were fortunate today to get away with our lives, simply on the dumb luck that Michonne and Daryl both had to use the bathroom. If they hadn’t been hidden within the trees on either sides of the road with their own guns, I might not be standing here right now. Merle and Finn wouldn’t be standing here right now.”  
  
As Rick paused, Sophia came walking up to him and threw her arms around his waist and hugged him, with her face pressed against the right side of his chest and not caring how dirty he was. When she’d seen him come into the ballroom, she seemed so relieved and hearing him speak about almost dying, and the fact that he’d lost a finger, had made her feel a bit emotional. Tears stung her eyes at the thought of having almost lost the only father she ever really loved.  
  
Feeling overwhelmed by his surrogate daughter’s embrace, Rick looked down at the top of Sophia’s head and brought his lips down to kiss her hair before looking back up at everyone else. With a heavy breath, he narrowed his gaze while determining what he was going to say next.  
  
“We’ve been living in peace here at Mount Vernon, in our little bubble, for four months. We’ve barely had to even deal with walkers anymore in that amount of time. The only other people we’ve encountered since leaving DC behind was Mike and the others, and we got lucky in how that all worked out. Mike, Lewis, José, Barb…they’re good people. They’ve become family. But, as today has shown, sooner or later luck runs out. We were foolish to think we could live here and start fresh and forget about the outside world, because the outside world hasn’t forgotten. We’ve been self-sustainable for a while, but there’s gonna be things we’re gonna need which is gonna require us to go further from here to get, and today proved that danger stills lurks; not just in the dead, but in the living.” With a sigh, Rick looked down at his left hand and how Jo had wrapped her arm around his. He looked at her with love and appreciation, but also with the seriousness of what he was saying to the others. “Finn got shot today, almost killed. I lost a finger. I could’ve lost more than that; my entire hand, my life. We’ve lost our own since then, and it’s been hard, but this is different. _This_ is a pressing threat. Somewhere out there are more of those bikers. They came from somewhere and they are not friendly. They will take what they want from you and kill you in the process if they need to. They don’t care. These are not good people. _We_ are good people. We might end up encountering more of them soon. I don’t know. If we can keep that from happening a little while longer, though, then that’s what we’ll attempt to do.”  
  
“How?” Karen asked, holding her stomach protectively, as if someone would lunge out and attack her right there in the ballroom.  
  
“First, we need to go back to where we left those bikers; get their bodies off the road and hide them so that anyone coming to look for them doesn’t trail us back here.”  
  
“What about all those bikes?” Finn wondered. He was sitting down in a chair along the wall to Rick and Jo’s left; taking it easy as instructed. “Seems a waste to just hide them.”  
  
“We don’t need them,” Rick replied. “They’re obnoxiously noisy, for one. They draw too much attention.” Casting a glance over at Daryl, he attempted to smirk. “Sorry, Daryl, I know you used to love your bike and had to abandon it when we lost the prison. And I’m sorry to say—I’m kinda glad. It really used to draw more walkers to the fences whenever you came and went.”  
  
Daryl shrugged. “Whatever. Water under the bridge.”  
  
“That bike was mine, first, I’ll have you know, baby brother,” Merle interjected.  
  
With a scoff, Daryl reached out and punched Merle’s upper arm. “You never came back for it. Finders keepers.”  
  
“I was chained to a rooftop in Atlanta and had to cut my own hand off. I didn’t abandon it. Y’all abandoned me.”  
  
“We been down this road before. We came back, but you’d taken off.”  
  
Rick held up his right hand to silence the brothers from further bickering. “As I was saying,” he spoke. “We don’t need the bikes, but we can syphon them for their gas.”  
  
“Did these bikers work for Sarge, do you think?” Tyreese wondered; an arm around Karen’s shoulders.  
  
Rick shook his head. “No. They mentioned a different name. Someone named Negan.”  
  
“So, there’s another militant asshole out there?” Tara asked rhetorically. “That’s great.”  
  
“Rick, you asked me to be in charge while you left, so I’m gonna have to extend that authority right now and insist you stay behind,” Tyreese spoke. There was no room for negotiation in the tone of his voice. “I’ll go back with a few others, help get rid of those men off that road and hide their bikes. You got a kid on the way and you almost died today. Plus, you’re injured. You can’t afford to risk yourself anymore right now.”  
  
“And you _can_?” Rick questioned. “You’ve got a kid on the way, too, don’t forget.”  
  
“So it’s okay for _you_ to risk your life and leave behind the people that depend on you, your wife and children, but _I_ can’t?”  
  
Jo knitted her brow together. Slipping her arm out of Rick’s she held both her hands up and just looked between both men; appearing rather amused. “This has got to be the most _ridiculous_ argument I have ever heard.” Catching Karen’s similar expression, Jo took a step forward and eyed Tyreese. “You and I also decided that even though Rick put you in charge while he was away, that I’m the one who actually holds the power around here, did we not?” She wasn’t really serious in her tone or mood. In fact, she still seemed amused by this discussion.  
  
The corner of Tyreese’s mouth curled up in a half smile and he gave her a nod of his head. “We did,” he acknowledged.  
  
Turning to Rick with a knowing raise of her brow, Jo placed her hands on her hips and took half a step forward. “You’re not going anywhere and neither is Tyreese,” she remarked, loud enough for Tyreese to hear her while placing the palm of her hand gently upon Rick’s chest. “You two can have your pissing contest later. Right now, this queen is decreeing that someone else can take your place for once. We have other people here to lend a hand. It can’t always be you doing everything. We’ve had this discussion before.” Any amusement or lightheartedness left her voice and her face then. Turning away from Rick, she clapped her hands together to make sure she had everyone’s attention and then rested those hands on her hips, standing there, arms akimbo. “Okay, so here’s what’s gonna happen. Daryl, Michonne; you were there, so you two will lead a small group to return to the road.”  
  
“I’m going,” Merle commented.  
  
“No, you’re not,” she shot down without batting an eye. “No pun intended at all, but you’re handy with that blade on metal stump when you need to be and you can handle a gun just fine with your left, but this calls for people with two actual hands and I apologize for how much of a bitch that might make me sound right now.”  
  
Merle smacked his lips together and frowned. “Best give me something else to do, ‘cause I ain’t gonna just sit around on my only hand, doing jack shit.”  
  
“There’s plenty to do around here. Has the truck y’all came back in been unloaded yet? I saw vomit on the floor inside the back of the cab. That can be cleaned up. You can bring in more logs for the fireplaces, or go down to the river and collect some more water. Take your pick, Dixon.”  
  
“Damn woman,” he replied; a smirk creeping up on his lips. “Crack that whip, why don’t you.”  
  
With a roll of her eyes, she scanned the faces of everyone else; noting how her brother seemed to be holding back a chuckle. She then brought her gaze solely upon the younger Dixon. “Daryl, how many people do you think you and Michonne would need to take with you?”  
  
Daryl shrugged. “I dunno. Two others, I guess.”  
  
“Alright,” Jo nodded. She then pointed at both Lewis and José. “You two. You’ll go with them. Can you handle that?”  
  
José nodded right back. “Yeah,” he assured. “I’m down.”  
  
Lewis caught Jo’s expectant gaze; noting she was awaiting a verbal answer from him. “Wha—oh. Yeah. I’ll go.”  
  
“Good. You two do whatever Daryl or Michonne tell you to do, make sure you’re properly armed, and, most importantly, be safe.”  
  
“When do we go?” José wondered.  
  
“No time like the present, right?” She looked over at Rick who seemed to be mulling something over, so she brought her focus back to the others. “We don’t want to run the risk of this Negan guy or any more of his men finding the bikers that were killed earlier. So, we make the most of daylight.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “Alright, let’s go,” he announced. Walking over toward Lewis, he slapped him on the shoulder as he headed for the door that led straight outside from the ballroom without having to go through the blue parlor to use the main entrance. Before stepping outside, he paused in front of Rick and nodded to his friend. “Glad you’re okay, man.”  
  
“Well, I’m gonna be, anyway,” Rick remarked, holding up his bandaged hand. The pain medication that Nicole had given him had finally seemed to have completely kicked in. Though, while he wasn’t feeling much of anything in the way of pain, there was a feeling of nausea and lightheadedness that was creeping up on him. He wasn’t sure of that was from the medication or the trauma from losing his finger and the bloodloss. “Be careful out there.”  
  
“We will,” Daryl assured. “You should lie down, get some rest.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah, I will.” Watching as he friend slipped out of the house, Rick turned and looked down at Jo. Without another word, he turned around and headed out of the ballroom through the blue parlor.  
  
Jo looked after him and frowned; the thought in her head of what she would’ve done if he’d been shot fatally instead of just permanently losing an appendage. Likely, she would’ve collapsed in grief and shut herself away from everyone else for days, barely wanting to eat, and walking through her life like a walker; just ambling mindlessly around. She didn’t want to imagine what it would be like to roll over in bed each morning and not have him there; to never see his face or hear his voice, to feel his touch or smell his skin again. He left her intoxicated. He was her drug and to give him up cold turkey would surely send her body into shock.  
  
She thanked every deity in existence, regardless of whether or not they actually existed, that he was alive, but she was still sad about it all. She’d known deep down something terrible would happen if and when he went on that damned supply run to Home Depot and, sure as shit, it did. After the deaths of Jen, Taylor and Alyssa, she had begun to agree with him that those feelings of dread she was feeling were confirmed when they died, but now she knew she’d been right in the first place.  
  
It wasn’t like she had some psychic ability. That was just ridiculous, but she knew feelings she’d had were widespread. It was like when a parent sensed something wrong with their child, or someone knowing their twin who lived across the country was in pain. It was a feeling that went along those lines. Actually, it reminded Jo of the story her grandmother had told her about the day she’d first met her grandfather when she was fourteen, so long ago, and how a voice whispered in her grandmother’s ear, telling her “that’s the one you’re gonna marry.” And, four years later, it did happen.  
  
As Lewis and José followed Michonne out of the house, after Daryl, Merle left as well to go unload the truck with Tyreese and Morgan’s assistance, and also to clean up Rick’s vomit. Daryl would likely round up another vehicle for his group to take to rid that road of the bodies.  
  
It seemed like everyone was spreading out around the house, to find something to occupy them, instead of thinking about the possibility of another negative faction out there. Or maybe they wanted something mundane to focus on after today’s excitement.  
  
Rick was right in that they’d all been living in a bubble.  
  
The world hadn’t forgotten the danger that still lurked, but they seemed to have forgotten or at least willfully put it out of their minds.  
  
After insisting Finn go lay down, Jo saw to the children keeping busy with a quiet task of making get well cards, with the last vestiges of construction paper, for Finn and Rick. She took her own leave then, slipping away from the ballroom, toward the entrance hall, stopping when Morgan came in carrying a 40-gallon tote.  
  
“What's inside?” she asked.  
  
“Cleaning supplies,” he replied. “Tyreese should be coming in with the toilet paper and paper towels. Where do you want all this?”  
  
Placing her hands upon the small of her back, Jo looked toward their bathroom. “Anything for the bathroom just set on the table in there. The rest can go in the butler’s pantry for now, I guess.”  
  
“Alright.”  
  
As Morgan slipped into the bathroom with the tote, Tyreese came in through the front door. “Rick brought back a trampoline for the kids,” he remarked with a smile, a package of toilet paper under one arm while paper towels were under the other. “Kids will get a kick out of that.”  
  
“Yeah they will,” she agreed. “Toilet paper in the bathroom, paper towels in the pantry.”  
  
Tyreese nodded and headed for the bathroom first; almost bumping into Morgan in the process. As Jo turned toward the dining room, Karen came waddling out of the blue parlor and smiled a small smile at the younger woman.  
  
“How you feeling?” Karen asked.  
  
Jo shrugged. “My back’s aching a little right now.”  
  
“No, I meant about Rick and Finn. I feel so bad they got so badly hurt. And poor Rick, losing his finger.”  
  
“Yeah, well, at least that’s all it was.” Jo sighed and looked toward the base of the staircase, watching out the corner of her eye as Tyreese stepped out of the bathroom and slipped behind her into the dining room with the paper towels. “I was just gonna go check on Rick. I’m not sure exactly where he went, but I’m assuming either the Infirmary or upstairs.”  
  
“Oh, yeah, of course. Didn’t mean to keep you.”  
  
Jo smiled. “It’s okay.”  
  
She didn’t bother saying anything else as she followed Tyreese’s path through the dining room, and then nearly bumped into him as he was coming out of the pantry. With an apologetic smile, he stepped out of the way as she turned left and crossed through the Infirmary, where Nicole was busying herself with reorganizing the medication in the built-ins. Neither woman said anything to each other, but they acknowledged each other with a polite smile as Jo made her way out into the back hall.  
  
After ascending the back stairs, Jo turned right and found her bedroom door closed; knowing that Rick was definitely inside. When she opened the door and stepped inside, she found him slouching in the white wingback chair; facing the fireplace with his legs outstretched. He was propping his head up with his right hand, blocking his peripheral view of Jo, while his right hand was draped across his stomach.  
  
“Are you in any pain right now? Have the meds kicked in yet?”  
  
Lifting and turning his head to look at Jo, while dropping his right hand in the process, Rick sighed and nodded. “Yeah. I’m not really feeling anything right now. On the downside, I’m dizzy and feel like throwing up again.”  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
Rick shrugged.  
  
“Rick. Do you…do you want to talk about it or anything?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Jo frowned. “Well, I want to talk about it,” she replied, walking across the room and pulling out the desk chair to sit on. She stared at him, studying his left side before letting her eyes roam toward his bandage which was stained a bit with blood that had soaked through from the wound before it had completely clotted for him. “You almost died today.”  
  
“I know.”  
  
“You almost died and I wouldn’t have been there to say goodbye. This is what I feared happening months ago when you first mentioned this run. I felt it in my gut that something like this could happen.”  
  
Turning to looked at Jo, Rick almost seemed angry. “Anything can happen at any time. I could’ve tripped over my own two feet on the stairs this morning and broken my neck. I could’ve gone to check on Bessie and been attacked by a walker when my back was turned. I could’ve been overpowered by the shit ton of walkers at Home Depot and mauled to death,” he rattled bitterly. “How was I—how were _any_ of us—to know exactly what would’ve happened today? How could we have expected that a group of assholes would try to take our shit and try and kill us?”  
  
“Well, no…”  
  
“Well, something happened. I didn’t die. I came so damn close, but I didn’t, though. But, you were right. Something happened on our run,” he muttered, turning to stare back at the fire. “You can go ahead and say ‘I told you so’ if you want.”  
  
“I _don’t_ want to say that,” she insisted, feeling suddenly defensive. “I didn’t want something bad to happen. It’s not like I willed this into being, Rick. It’s a feeling I had and couldn’t shake. I’m sorry I ever mentioned it. Maybe you would’ve been better going when you first intended. Maybe you would’ve been fine then instead of now. Or, you know what? Maybe it would’ve been worse then. Who the fuck knows? I don’t. You don’t. I’m sorry.”  
  
Shifting in the chair, Rick sat up straight and then hunched forward; letting his hands dangle between his knees. “Don’t apologize,” he said, his voice softer as gaze lingered down to the floor.  
  
“Well, I feel like you’re blaming me.”  
  
“I’m not,” he assured. “I’m not blaming anyone. Shit happens, remember?”  
  
Jo sighed. She was still looking at him, studying him. As she went to speak, she found her voice stuck in her throat. Her chin began to quiver, her lips pursed and her tears stung her eyes. Looking away, toward the bed, Jo quietly emitted a small sniffle, which caused Rick to turn and look over at her; seeing how distressed she seemed.  
  
“I can’t even be mad about this, because you’re the one who actually suffered,” she finally spoke. “Your face got cut, you lost a finger and you nearly died. Meanwhile, here I am, lucky you didn’t die and that I still have you in my life where so many have lost the one they love. But I can’t help still _feeling_ angry.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” he apologized this time.  
  
Jo shook her head and looked down at her hands, which she rested upon her stomach, as she began to pick at her fingernails. “I think I’m angrier at the situation than anything else. The fact that that you almost died, that you’ve been permanently disfigured; it’s unsettling.”  
  
“Permanently disfigured,” he repeated, staring at his bandaged hand. “You make it sound like I’m Sloth from _The Goonies_.”  
  
Jo looked back up at him and noticed the small trace of a smile at his lips, which help lighten the mood in the room. “You know that’s not what I mean.”  
  
“I know.” Turning to bring his gaze back toward Jo, Rick noticed she was already looking at him and gave her a half smile before looking back down at his hand. “I know it’s been about two hours, but I think already have that phantom limb feeling. I keep expecting to see all five fingers. Maybe it’s the bandage wrapped around my hand, preventing me from seeing any of it.” With a sigh, he tipped his head back and frowned. “God, it was a mess. All that shredded skin and cartilage, broken bone and blood. It was disgusting.”  
  
“Nicole did a good job cleaning, removing the broken bits and stitching up what was left. I mean, at least you have that little nub. It’s better than nothing.”  
  
“At least it was just the pinky and not the ring finger, and at least it was my left hand and not my right.”  
  
“Those silver linings.”  
  
Though he was trying to look on the bright side, his tone was anything but. “Yeah.”  
  
They fell quiet after that; both staring off toward the fire for several minutes. The silence was nice, but it also allowed their minds to become very loud with all the thoughts swirling around their heads. After a while, minor noises from downstairs echoed up through the drafty back staircase; the sounds reverberating, albeit muffled, against the old walls and floorboards. There were the plodding and shuffling sounds of feet walking around. The more pronounced the sound, the closer Rick and Jo could tell they came from. With the Infirmary directly underneath them, it was easy to tell when someone — usually Nicole — was walking around or messing about. She was also the only other person who ever bothered to come up the back staircase for anything other than to pay a random visit to Rick and Jo’s room, and that was only because her room had a second entrance off the same second floor hallway. It was easier for her to come and go that way from her room to the Infirmary and vice versa.  
  
Muffled voices echoed, but they seemed monotone, which meant there was nothing amiss going on. If there was an issue, the voices would be louder and with more urgency. And if Rick and Jo were needed for anything, someone would shout for them or come get them, personally.  
  
Right now, that wasn’t the case.  
  
Everyone figured that the physical trauma Rick’s body had sustained, that he needed to be left alone to rest, as well as just mentally recharge his batteries.  
  
Jo jerked slightly a little while later and let out a small chuckle while rubbing her stomach with one hand. “She’s moving,” she muttered.  
  
Snapping out of his daydream, Rick sat up straighter and looked left at Jo with a raised brow. “Kicking?” he asked.  
  
“Somersaults, I think,” Jo replied. “This one might be a gymnast.”  
  
“We should get started on those Olympics plans.”  
  
“Maybe we should seek out Mary Lou Retton. If she’s still alive, we can ask her to be the coach.”  
  
Rick smirked. Pushing up off the wingback chair with his right hand, he stood up and walked over to Jo where he knelt down in front of her. He sat back on the heels of his boots and rested his left hand upon his lap while his right hand he placed upon her stomach.  
  
“Hello, little girl,” he muttered. “You cozy in there?”  
  
Jo chuckled again. “She’s probably just riled up because I got riled—ugh.” Making a face, she rubbed the right side of her stomach. “Don’t kick down there, missy. That’s my bladder. You’ll make me piss myself.”  
  
Rick smiled, glancing up at Jo. “Let me give her a-talkin’ to.” Leaning forward, Rick placed both his hands gently upon either side of Jo’s stomach before lifting her shirt so he could kiss the bare skin underneath her belly button. “You listen to your mother, understand? She’s sacrificing her comfort, normal placement of her internal organs and general well-being for you. The least you can do is be more considerate. And stop waking her up in the middle of the night while she’s trying to sleep just so you can play. That’s rude.”  
  
Letting out a heartier laugh, Jo moved one of her hands away from her stomach and brought it to the side of Rick’s face. She pushed her fingers through his salt-and-peppered curls and waited until he lifted his gaze toward her face before she smiled. When he smiled back, she bit her bottom lip and began to let everything going on hit her like a wave. Be it the fear, worry and anger she felt about Rick’s and her brother’s injuries, or the wonderful moment they were currently having; her emotions suddenly felt out of whack. Her nose tinged red with color as she knitted her brow together. A small whimper barely concealed a small sob, but the tears stinging her eyes again were plainly obvious.  
  
“Hey,” Rick whispered; understanding her fears, worries and emotions were getting the better of her again. “It’s okay. I’m gonna be okay. Finn’s gonna be okay. The baby’s gonna be okay. _You’re_ gonna be okay. _We_ are gonna be okay.”  
  
“I hope so.”  
  
“I know so.”  
  
“No, you don’t,” she shook her head.  
  
“Yes, I do,” he insisted. “You wanna know how?”  
  
“How?”  
  
“Because I love you and you’re my everything, that’s how.”  
  
“That’s terribly sweet, but also a shit explanation.” A small smile broke through her saddened façade.  
  
“Maybe, but it got a smile out of you, didn’t it?”  
  
“Only because you’re a dork.”  
  
“Hey, it’s not nice to call people with permanent disfigurements names.”  
  
“Oh god.” Jo rolled her eyes; giving his head a slight shove to the side, followed by another, coyer, smile. Reaching her hand around the back of his head, she fisted the curls at the base of his neck and moved closer to the edge of her chair. “Well, you’re my dork, though.”  
  
“That’s right,” he agreed with a nod. Standing up, Rick grimaced slightly from the ache in his knees due to how he’d been kneeling on the hard floor. Offering Jo his right hand, he helped her up to her feet and encircled his arm around her waist to pull her close. However, her burgeoning stomach wedged a larger gap between their bodies which didn’t allow them to stand as close together as they’d been able to mere months before. “I _am_ your dork. I’m Officer Rick Grimes, otherwise known as Nine Fingers; the fastest gunslinger in the apocalypse.”  
  
“I doubt that,” she remarked with a small chuckle.  
  
“Hey,” he whined with mock offense. “Now I know where the little one gets her rudeness from.”  
  
“Yeah, well…” Jo shrugged and looked at him knowingly. “That’d be both of us, for sure.”  
  
Rick smiled. “I suppose you’re right.”  
  
“I know I’m right.” Touching a hand to his chest, she muttered, “Mr. Right.” Then, she touched her own chest. “Mrs. _Always_ Right.”  
  
“Yeah, okay. Keep thinking that.”  
  
With a small, pleased smile, Jo leaned her face forward against his chest and released a small sigh. After a moment of comfort in his arms, she spoke again. “You smell horrible.”  
  
“Compliments of my sweat, my blood and walker blood.”  
  
Pulling back from him, Jo scrunched her face up; looking as if she wanted to vomit. “I think you should take a bath and change clothes. Maybe throw those damn jeans out. They’re so old. You have other pairs of pants you never wear.”  
  
Rick looked down at his favorite pair of black jeans that felt like a second skin to him. Despite the fact that the color was more faded now, and the holes popping up here and there and slight fraying at the cuffs, they still fit him well and were comfortable. He washed them, occasionally. There was no point that he could see in tossing them away, but he could understand Jo’s point of view.  
  
“They’re like a best friend. You don’t just throw best friends away when they get old and dirty,” he remarked. “I mean, l still keep Daryl around.”  
  
Jo laughed. “Oh my god, that boy is always dirty. He’s like Pig-Pen from the Peanuts.”  
  
“He really is.”  
  
After a moment, Jo grinned up at him and patted his chest with the palms of her hands. “Seriously, though. You need a bath.”  
  
Rick pouted, taking a step back. “But my hand’s all injured and bandaged up. How am I supposed to get clean with only one hand?” Raising an eyebrow at her, Rick gave Jo a rather suggestive smile.  
  
“Really? You’re being sexual? Now?”  
  
Still pouting, he shrugged. “I’m injured,” he repeated, holding up his hand as if to make a point.  
  
With a roll of her eyes and an exaggerated sigh, Jo gave in to his insinuation. “You’re lucky we still keep those big buckets of water up here for washing up.”  
  
Rick grinned a small grin of victory. “The last time I had a sponge bath I was in a hospital with a coma and couldn’t enjoy it.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes again before pointing at the desk chair she’d been sitting in. “Bring that into the closet with the buckets and get undressed. I’ll find you something clean to wear.”  
  
“Yes, ma’am.”  
  
Watching as Rick lifted the chair up with his right hand and dragged it into the closet that was closest to their bed, Jo felt a sense or renewed hope. This banter that had just been exchanged between them pushed some of those dark clouds away. She was still worried about everything that happened that day, and it wasn’t likely to completely go away overnight, and there was the worry about that possible threat the man named Negan and his men might pose for them down the line but, for now, she felt hope.

 

* * *

  
  
As the last week and a half of February faded away and March began, the earth and the air were warming up. The snow had since melted and the days were scattered with either sunny skies or dense fog. The air seemed fresh and, with spring around the corner, everything was starting to feel brand new.  
  
Rick was getting used to having lost his pinky and most days he was dealing with some mild pain in what was left of that appendage. It wasn’t because the medication Nicole was giving him wasn’t doing its job, it’s just that he kept forgetting about the wound. He would accidentally bang it into something or try and grab something with his left hand and whatever he grabbed would knock against the little stump that was still healing. The wound itself was bandaged separately from the rest of his hand now, to allow him better movement, and, after three weeks, the bruising that had developed around the last vestige of his finger was almost nonexistent.  
  
Finn seemed to be progressing at the same rate. He couldn’t do any heavy lifting with his left arm due to the gunshot wound in his shoulder, but pain medication and changing out his bandages regularly helped considerably. There had been no significant damage to his mobility, but Nicole was worried there may still be nerve damage. Finn had claimed he was fine to Nicole but, in private, admitted to Jo that when he scratched at the back of his shoulder using his right hand, his skin felt numb and that he barely felt any sensation from his fingers. He could move his arm and his shoulder around without much discomfort, so that’s all that mattered to him.  
  
As for the biker gang, their bodies had been tossed over the bridge and into the creek below where Daryl and José shoved them into some steel culverts to further hide them. The motorcycles, after being drained of fuel, were shoved down into the slight ravine on either side of the bridge and then positioned under the bridge and therefore out of view.  
  
Fortunately, Daryl and the others encountered no one else on the road the rest of that night except for the occasional, curious walker. They wasted no time returning home after that and, when they did, Rick was present with a pleasant surprise.  
  
His Colt Python.  
  
Daryl had removed it from the body of the biker that had taken it before doing away with the body and brought it back to its rightful owner. In fact, Daryl and the others brought back all the weapons the bikers had on them; guns, knives, pockets full of bullets and even a hand grenade. All were brought back and stored safely away in the small closet in the small hall that connected the dining room, Infirmary and butler’s pantry.  
  
While Daryl’s group had been gone, Tyreese had helped Merle bring the spools of barbed wire to his humble abode in the overseer’s quarters. It had been the first time Tyreese had actually been inside the place since Merle had claimed it and wasn’t surprised at all to see the pictures of naked women duct-taped to the walls. Merle clearly must’ve found a few old Playboy magazines at some point.  
  
Now that the weather was nice, the trampoline was being set up outside in the circular, grassy area in the front of the house since it was the only flat terrain close enough to the house. That way the adults inside the house could easily look out and check on the kids and make sure they were okay from time to time, and so that it was close enough to get them inside if one of them fell off and broke an arm or something to that effect.  
  
Gardening was also beginning, and that was something Rick could do and found comfort in without exacerbating his injury. The superficial injuries he’d sustained were also healing well, but would leave permanent and noticeable scars; the cuts across his nose and right cheek from the truck door striking across his face.  
  
Rick was crouched in the lower garden, tossing seeds into small unearthed holes where vegetables would begin to sprout from in the coming weeks and months. The sun on his back was nice and warm, the air off the river was pleasantly cool and he was just having a real good day. Like at the prison, Morgan was helping him, accept this time there were others, too. Michonne, José, Lewis and Nicole were there with him. As for farm _animals_ , all they had still was Bessie, who seemed a picture of health now, but since she was their only cow, and they had no bull, they couldn’t attempt to breed her. They also couldn’t kill her for her beef, but they kept her for her milk, which meant they would have butter. The idea of it seemed so foreign, and quite exciting, too.  
  
Daryl had taken it upon himself to head up the supply trip to neighboring homes to get beds, mattresses and couches for the estate. Tyreese, Merle and Finn joined on those. They stay in the cul-de-sacs of the homes on the roads they had also blocked off from the outside world to cut off possible traffic toward Mount Vernon, so the only outside threat came from a walker here or there. Though, by then, they had swept through those same cul-de-sacs so many times already that there were barely any walkers left by this point, which only added to that bubble of safety they were all so stuck in.  
  
Jo, who was approaching her seventh month of pregnancy, felt like a beached whale now. She waddled practically everywhere she went. At her latest ultrasound exam with Nicole, Jo and Rick got to see their little girl sucking her thumb and jerking slightly at the sound of Rick’s voice when he got close to Jo’s stomach and spoke.  
  
On this particular day, she was sitting in the front of the house on one of the Windsor chairs from the back piazza, fanning herself with a book she was attempting to read while the temperature was slowly rising. As she looked straight ahead, she was watching Sophia, Mika and Ryan laughing and talking amongst each other as they jumped on the trampoline. Mike sat near her, too, with Karen, enjoying weak glasses of Kool-Aid (due to dwindling sugar) while they watched the kids having fun. Meanwhile, Barb and Tara were busy in the summer kitchen, baking loaves of bread and contemplating what else to prepare for the main meal everyone would eat later that evening. There was some fish Morgan had caught the day before that Barb had smoked. So, that was the likely solution, and they’d probably added some greens with it, as well as the bread. While the food was usually on the bland side, it was always better than nothing.  
  
They didn’t take anything for granted these days. They knew just how lucky they were with what they had at Mount Vernon; the protection and safety they had fought to ensure for the property, the space to grow crops, having fresh water and the ability for fishing at the river, plenty of wooded spaces for hunting smaller animals so they had meat. They had a roof over their head, mostly comfortable beds to sleep in, a nurse and medication, ammo they never ran out of because they hadn’t needed to use it, and the ability to keep their clothes and themselves cleaning with items they’d scavenged and stocked up on.  
  
Aside from the few deaths at the height of winter, they still had their health; their lives.  
  
And life was really good.  
  
If only they were aware, as Daryl’s crew returned with a load of bedroom furniture, that the outside world was watching.  
  
The outside world was curious and wanted to know why the truck with the bedframes, box springs and mattresses was headed toward Mount Vernon.  
  
The outside world wanted a closer look.  
  
After all,

sooner or later,

bubbles pop.

 

 


	58. Necessary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shout-out to the TWD comics for helping me write this chapter by way of me adapting it to suit my own storytelling needs. As always, enjoy and R&R!
> 
> xoxo —Holly

_“We have always held to the hope, the belief, the conviction that there is a better life, a better world, beyond the horizon."_ — Franklin D. Roosevelt

* * *

  
  
Jo smiled as she stepped out the front door and into the warmth of the sunlight high overhead. It was the first week of April already and on this day, like most days of late, the temperature fluctuated between the low sixties and low seventies. Jo hadn’t checked the temperature on the solar calendar but she could tell just by standing outside that it was going to be a pleasantly warm either way. Having just entered her eighth month of pregnancy, she was glad she wouldn’t have to worry about dealing any summer heat while with child. Karen felt relief with that, too, especially since she only had about three or four more weeks to go until the bun in her oven was done baking.  
  
Currently, though, Jo wasn’t thinking much on the little girl still growing within her. Her focus was on taking advantage of this nice day. After they’d been cooped up inside the house most of the winter, and even before then, Jo hadn’t really had the opportunity to explore the grounds like everyone else. Karen, too, but Karen seemed more of a homebody than her anyway. Jo wanted to see the progress of the gardens, maybe go see Bessie the cow. Really she just felt like taking a walk and finding some peace and quiet. As much as loved everyone in their group, sometimes being inside with so many different people felt claustrophobic, even in a house as large as Mount Vernon.  
  
Before she went anywhere, she headed for the summer kitchen, pushing the door open to find Barb pulling a fresh loaf of homemade bread out of the oven and setting it onto the wooden prep table beside another loaf that had already had slices cut off of.  
  
“Afternoon, Jo,” Barb greeted with a smile. “How ya feeling?”  
  
“Good.”  
  
“Hungry?”  
  
“No, not really. Still full from breakfast,” Jo replied, placing a hand upon her bulbous stomach. “And I can’t get over how great it was; having butter to go on our pancakes and syrup now? It’s like Christmas every day.”  
  
“So, then, what can I help you with? Have a dinner request?”  
  
“No, actually, it’s got nothing to do with me. I was just going to take a walk and I figured Daryl’s been down at the West Gate all day so far, at the RV, working on that ATV he found at one of those houses nearby last week. He’s gotta be working up an appetite; thought I’d kill two birds with one stone and bring him something to eat. Do you have anything for a sandwich?”  
  
Barb paused and placed her hands upon her hips and looked around at the food supplies she had readily available around her. “There’s some smoked fish in that other room and we have some fresh spinach already from the garden. I can mash the fish up and make something akin to tuna fish; put it on some bread with the spinach.”  
  
“That’s sounds good.”  
  
Jo stepped further into the room and sat down on a stool at the table watching as Barb went about preparing the food. She watched as Barb brought a single smoke fish over and began removing the meat with a thin knife and tossing the bits into a bowl. Using some sort of seasoning and homemade butter, Barb mashed it altogether with a mortar and pestle. Afterward, she cut two decent slices of bread from the first loaf and placed them side by side. On one piece, Barb spread the mashed fish, butter and seasoning. On the other piece, she laid out a few pieces of fresh spinach. After putting both halves together, Barb grabbed a small wicker basket and set the sandwich inside.  
  
“Here ya go,” the older woman said, handing the basket over to Jo.  
  
Struggling somewhat to stand back up, Jo smiled and accepted the basket with a nod of thanks, as well as a verbal thanks.  
  
“You remind me of Little Red Riding Hood, going off to grandmother’s house,” Barb quipped.  
  
“Are you saying Daryl’s the Big Bad Wolf?” Jo snickered as she headed for the door.  
  
“No, but make sure to keep your eye out for anything dangerous like a wolf. You really shouldn’t be going that far down the estate by yourself anyway.”  
  
Catching Barb’s knowing look, Jo simply shrugged. “I’m carry a knife and a gun,” she assured. “This ain’t my first rodeo.”  
  
“Maybe consider taking someone with you.”  
  
“I’m fine. I really just wanted to go for a walk by myself; enjoy some peace and quiet.”  
  
“Alright,” Barb muttered; unconvinced. “Just be careful.”  
  
Jo smirked, stepping out the door. “Yes, mother.”  
  
Holding the basket in one hand at her side, Jo walked back out into the sunlight and was rather relieved. The heat from the fires going in both the fireplace and the bake oven inside the summer kitchen were getting to be a bit too much for her. She figured that was why Barb stayed in there almost all day, every day. The dry heat likely did wonders for her arthritis. Although, Jo couldn’t imagine kneading all that do and preparing all that food for everyone helped much. Then again, she did have Michonne and Tara’s assistance at any given moment throughout the day.  
  
Walking along the dirt and gravel lane, around the circular lawn in front of the house, Jo looked briefly at the trampoline which was empty of the children at the moment, only because she had all three of them learning to sew with Michonne. She had resumed her past life as an educator, to an extent; bringing education back into the kids’ lives, but only having them learn things that were necessary in the world now. She had tapped different adults to teach the kids different things; sewing, fishing, cooking, and safely handling weapons as well as how to properly clean them. If Mount Vernon fell, for whatever reason, and the children ended up on their own, they needed to know how to survive without an adult around. Of course, there were the normal school lessons Jo still wanted to have them learn. Basic math would always come in handy; adding, subtracting, multiplication, long division and fractions. Reading and writing, and even some science and history were going to be covered. The later would be easy, given where they were, and the fact that, like the saying, “those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Jo had only resumed her role as educator two weeks ago, and had been enjoying it. It was a nice sense of normalcy again and gave the kids more to do.  
  
The only other major changes in the month since the altercation on with those bikers, was that most of the bedrooms in the house were equipped with modern bedroom furniture and mattresses. The 18th century-style beds had been carefully dismantled and stored inside the attic space off the third floor bedrooms. Jo had overseen all of it, making sure the beds weren’t ruined in the process. She figured that, in the off chance the world ever found its way back from where they were now, that if it somehow returned to some semblance of the world before, then Mount Vernon could return as a living museum; a place for future generations to continue to learn about the past.  
  
Sleeping arrangements had changed again. With the warmer weather, Mike had decided to move him and Ryan out of the main house and into the smaller gardener’s house that stood at the top of the North Lane and faced the summer kitchen. There was a living space as soon as you entered, and two extra rooms off of it. The old-style canopy bed in the bedroom was taken down and two twin beds were brought in for father and son. A couch was set up in the living space, the small desk already inside was shoved to the side; a place for Ryan to do the little bit of homework Jo had given the kids here and there. The extra room didn’t have a purpose yet, but there was talk of Mike trying to get a portable toilet like the one inside the main house. Daryl had taken to sleeping in the RV at the West Gate instead of the third floor bedroom he’d been occupying all winter while his brother remained comfortably in the overseer’s quarters, especially now they he got himself a Serta memory foam mattress to sleep on. Lewis had taken over the small, closet of a bedroom with the canopied twin bed that Mike and Ryan had been previously occupying while José had also moved out of the main house and into the clerk’s quarters, which was just behind the storehouse and completely parallel with the gardener’s house across the forecourt. This also cleared up the ballroom now of all sleeping bodies at night since Barb had long since taken over the downstairs blue bedroom that Finn and Jen had occupied, and then Mike and Alyssa occupied, since it allowed her to not have to worry about climbing the stairs every night, what with her arthritis.  
  
The only other change to a sleeping arrangement, at the moment, actually came as a rather amusing surprise. Karen had been the one to discover it one night when she had been returning back to her and Tyreese’s room after going to the bathroom downstairs. Her door hadn’t been all the way shut when she heard someone coming down the stairs from the third floor. Curious to know who it was, Karen stood there waiting, keeping her door open just a hair and peeking out into the upstairs hallway to find Morgan stepping out into the hallway and knocking lightly, twice, upon Michonne’s bedroom door. Karen stepped away from her own door but listened as Michonne opened up and Karen heard what sounded like a kiss. When Michonne’s door shut again, Karen looked back out into the hall and saw no one, and was able to put two and two together.  
  
That had been a week ago and, although neither Michonne nor Morgan formally announced it, he had moved into her room and it became obvious they were now together. No one commented on the new development either. It was just nice to have people happy, and even nicer to see people in love.  
  
Jo thought on that with a contented smile as she carried on along the path alongside the bowling green. It would be a long walk, upwards of twenty minutes to the West Gate, but that was only because of how she waddled and how she wasn’t in much of a rush either.  
  
By the time she did reach the West Gate, stepping out from the curving, tree-lined path, she found Daryl crouched down at the front tire of his new ATV, twisting a lug-nut wrench clockwise. With the warmer weather, he’d taken to wearing shirts without sleeves and now his arms were covered in dirt and grease and the red bandana sticking out of his back pocket looked as if it had been recently used in an attempt to clean Daryl’s hands.  
  
“How’s the ATV coming along?” Jo asked, announcing her presence.  
  
Daryl squinted and looked over his shoulder. “D’you walk all the way down here by yourself?”  
  
“Oh, don’t get on my case about it,” she replied with a smirk. Stepping forward she set the basket in her hand down upon the seat of the ATV. “I brought you something to eat.”  
  
“You didn’t have to do that.” Standing up, Daryl wiped his hands upon his pants and kept his gaze on Jo. “And you shouldn’t have walked down here alone. What if you went into labor?”  
  
“Then I’d call for help and if no one heard me shouting, I’d shoot the gun I’m carrying in the air. Someone would come running.” Jo placed her hands on her hips. “And I wanted to go for a walk, get away from the house for a little while and see the property on this lovely day. I figured I’d kill two birds with one stone and provide you with some food. No doubt you’re working up an appetite, working on this thing and with that sun beating on you.”  
  
Daryl nodded. “Thank you,” he muttered. “Still didn’t have to do it.”  
  
“No, I didn’t. I _wanted_ to. That’s what families do for each other, right? Do nice things for the ones they love without having to be asked.”  
  
With a small smirk, Daryl peered inside the basket. “What is it?”  
  
“A sandwich.”  
  
Daryl smacked his lips. “No shit. What kind of sandwich?”  
  
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Jo teased. “Nah, it’s just something I had Barb throw together real quick. Smoked fish mashed up with some butter and seasoning, and some fresh spinach. Nothing much, really, but enough to fill the void until dinner tonight.”  
  
“And what’s for dinner?”  
  
“Probably smoked fish and fresh spinach.” Jo smiled, watching Daryl reach into the basket and pull the sandwich out and then smell it before taking a bite. “She was making bread as well, obviously. So we might have buttered bread, too. Or maybe she’s got something else up her sleeve. I don’t know. So, anyway, how’s the ATV coming along?”  
  
Daryl made a face as he chewed a second bite of his sandwich and it was clear he wasn’t a fan of it. Tuna fish, it was not. However, it was food and none of them were ever in any position to turn food away unless they had an allergy to it. “ATV runs fine. Turns on and runs without a problem. It has a full tank of gas. Some of the lug nuts just seemed loose so I was tightening ‘em.”  
  
“I rode on one once with my dad,” Jo smiled, recalling a nearly long forgotten memory. “Back in Georgia, up in the mountains near Ellijay, my aunt and uncle had this cabin and one summer my dad took Finn and me up there for a week. Finn was barely four at the time. I remember rolling him around in a wheelbarrow. My uncle had an ATV and my dad decided to take me for a ride on it. I remember being so nervous, I was clinging for dear life to my dad’s sides, but at the same time it was so fun.”  
  
“I figure this is the closest I’ll get at having a bike again, since Rick thinks motorcycles are obnoxious.”  
  
“They are. The loud, constantly rumbling engines of those things—just not conducive to this kind of life unless you want to draw attention to yourself and put others at risk.”  
  
Daryl grunted and shrugged, and then set the rest of his sandwich back down inside the basket. “You gonna walk all the way back up to the house now?”  
  
“Well, I sure as hell can’t fly.”  
  
“Nah, I was just gonna say I can give you a ride up there. You’ll be able to say you’ve ridden on an ATV more than once.”  
  
“Actually, yeah,” Jo nodded. “I think I’ll take you up on that. As much as I wanted to take a walk, I didn’t take into account how sore my bloated feet were gonna feel. I’m in no rush to head back, though. You can go ahead and finish eating if you want, unless you’re not hungry anymore.”  
  
When Jo gave him a knowing look, he shook his head and smirked. “No, I’m good. I’ll finish it, unless you want the other half?”  
  
“Is that your subtle way of saying you don’t like the sandwich?”  
  
“I don’t hate it.”  
  
“But you don’t love it.”  
  
Daryl shrugged. “What right do I got to turn down food, though, y’know?”  
  
With a teasing roll of her eyes, Jo held out her hand. “Alright, give me the other half. I’m past the nausea phase. I can stomach it.”  
  
Reaching down into the basket, Daryl carefully pulled the sandwich in half; giving Jo the portion he hadn’t eaten from. He watched as she mimicked him in smelling it first before taking a bite. He continued to watch her, with expectant eyes as went about finishing off his half. “You don’t mind it?” he asked, with a mouthful.  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, I think it’s kind of good. Then again, I’ve always been a fan of seafood and spinach, so I guess I’m biased.” Once she finished her half off, she brushed the crumbs that had stuck to her hand onto the sides of her pants and nodded at Daryl. “I’m surprised you didn’t care much for it. I mean, you’ve eaten all varieties of rodents or amphibians; sometimes raw. I’ve seen you eat a worm.”  
  
“I think it’s just the butter mixed with it, throwing me off. If it’d been mayonnaise, like a tuna fish sandwich, then I probably would be all for it.”  
  
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” she remarked with a small smile.  
  
“Yeah, yeah. I know.”  
  
Continuing her smile, Jo let her gaze wander over to the side, beyond the RV, where she noticed movement on the roof of one of the porter’s lodges that stood at either side of the West Gate. Her smile left her face immediately and was replaced by anxious concern as she reached behind her and pulled her gun out, aiming it up at the roof.  
  
Daryl noticed her movements and responded in kind, by reaching quickly for his crossbow and holding it up in the same direction she was aiming. When Jo pulled back the hammer to the Smith  & Wesson in her hand, Daryl finally saw what she saw.  
  
On the roof, using the chimney and a narrow tree trunk for balance, was a man with long brown hair, wearing a dark knit cap on his head, much like Tyreese, and a white scarf around his face.  
  
“Off the roof, _now_!” Daryl barked. “Get down here, slowly, unless you want a bolt or a bullet between your eyes.”  
  
Adrenaline was kicking in for Jo. She hadn’t felt this way since they first cleared Mount Vernon of all those walkers. She hadn’t needed to be on the offensive like this in a long while, but it was just like riding a bike, to be honest. In a way, she almost missed it.  
  
The man adjusted his foot, looking briefly down at the roof before looking back at Jo and Daryl with his hands raised defensively. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to alarm you,” he called back.  
  
“Down! Now!”  
  
“I could just shoot you in the leg and let you fall down,” Jo declared with a shrug. “Either way, you’re coming down from that roof.”  
  
“I’d rather you didn’t,” the man replied. “I was just waiting for the right moment—”  
  
“The right moment for _what_?” Daryl demanded.  
  
“To talk. I swear. Just to talk.”  
  
“Keep your hands up like that and jump down. You try and reach for a weapon and you’ll be dead before you hit the ground.”  
  
“Okay, take it easy. I’m coming down.”  
  
Never faltering in their stance, Jo and Daryl kept their aims on the man as they watched him scoot down closer to the edge of the roof; his feet sliding slightly on the reddish orange shingles. Leaning forward slightly, the man gazed down at distance between him and the ground below, and then shrugged. Lowering his hands slightly for balance, he jumped off. As soon as his feet hit the ground, he barrel-rolled forward and then sprung back up all in one swift move. He staggered slightly to the side when he righted himself before facing Jo and Daryl and resumed holding his hands up.  
  
“Alright, I’m down. Seriously, I’m not here to cause harm. I just want to talk.”  
  
“So, talk!”  
  
“Are you the man in charge?”  
  
“I’ll be in charge of your death in a minute,” Daryl retorted. “How’d you get here?”  
  
“Is there anyone else with you?” Jo asked.  
  
The man looked between both. “I drove here and I’m alone.”  
  
“How did you find us?”  
  
“I wasn’t looking for you, not exactly. Not at first.”  
  
Daryl narrowed his gaze. “What’s _that_ supposed to mean?”  
  
“A few weeks ago I was headed this way, looking for supplies. I noticed all the road blocks and I thought it was from another group of people. I wanted to get a better look, so I climbed over the trucks and cars blocking the road and hid when I noticed a truck heading toward this gate. I saw it hauling some furniture, mattresses. I wanted to get a better look but I still had to make a drop at another community before dark. I didn’t have the extra time to stop and look around. So I turned back,” the man explained. “Two days ago I left to make a drop with a second community and figured I would take the extra time and come back here.”  
  
“Why?” Jo questioned. As the man took a step forward, she reaffirmed her aim at him with her gun, causing him to take two steps back. “What do you mean by drops with other communities? Who _are_ you?”  
  
“The community I’m from is about twenty miles west of here. We have a trade route established with a few other communities. Each group is always in need of certain supplies and we help each other out where we can. It’s a good community, lots of nice people. It’s a great place to live…”  
  
“Other communities?” Jo muttered, in a bit of disbelief.  
  
The man nodded. “Yeah. Why? Did you guys think you were the only survivors out there?”  
  
“We know there are other survivors out there. It’s just been a while since we’ve encountered good ones.”  
  
“The lady asked who you are,” Daryl grunted, seemingly more angry than curious.  
  
Pulling the scarf down from over his face, revealing a thick beard, the man smiled. “My name is Paul Rovia, but my friends have taken to calling me Jesus.”  
  
“Well, _Jesus_ , we don’t have a lot to give, but I promise you we’ll fight to keep you from it,” Jo remarked.  
  
Jesus looked down at Jo’s stomach and chuckled. “Again, I’m only here to talk. I’ve got no evil plan to take anything from you. I’d actually just like to establish a trade route with your group and mine.”  
  
“How do you know it’s not just the two of us?”  
  
“Why would only two people be holed up in Mount Vernon? I thought this place was overrun with the dead, anyway.”  
  
“It was. We cleared it out,” Jo replied.  
  
“The two of you? Or your _group_?”  
  
Daryl stalked forward, keeping his crossbow trained on Jesus. While Jo maintained her aim as well, Daryl grabbed Jesus by the shoulder and shoved him to the ground. “Jo, get the rope inside the RV.”  
  
After throwing her friend a quick look, Jo lowered her gun and headed for the motor home. Throwing the door open, she looked left and right before spotting some rope on the table. Taking it, she let out a huff of exertion as she stepped out of the RV and over toward Daryl.  
  
“Keep your gun on him while I tie him up.”  
  
Jo did as Daryl advised, watching as he jerked Jesus around and began tying Jesus’ hands together behind his back. Roughly, Daryl hoisted Jesus back up to his feet and began to shove him forward toward one of the trucks parked near the RV. Pulling his handkerchief out of this back pocket, he folded it over a few times and then brought it across Jesus’ eyes and tied it behind his head to block Jesus’ sight.  
  
“Is any of this absolutely necessary?” Jesus asked with a groan as Daryl resumed shoving him forward and then helped push him up into the back bed of the truck in question.  
  
“You bet your fucking ass it’s necessary,” Daryl grunted, grabbing up his crossbow. After he climbed into the back bed after Jesus, he turned to Jo. “Keys are in the ignition. Get in and drive us back to the house.”  
  
“You sure about taking him up there? We could lock him in the RV. I can stay here and keep watch while you go and bring Rick back here.”  
  
“And have Rick disembowel me for leaving you alone with this piece of shit? No thank you.”  
  
“Well, then I’ll drive back.”  
  
“Nah, I ain’t leaving him in the RV with my shit.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes and headed around the truck to the driver’s door. Before she opened it, she looked down at her gun and unloaded it because she had already cocked the hammer and she didn’t want to risk it going off now that she wasn’t about to use it. Free of ammo, Jo let the hammer strike, causing only an audible click as nothing fired from the barrel. After shoving the bullets into her pockets, only then did Jo climb up into the driver’s seat upon opening the door, and then set the gun down on the passenger seat beside her. Turning the key in the ignition, Jo reached behind her and opened the sliding rear window so she could talk to Daryl and vice versa, if need be.  
  
Putting her foot to the gas pedal, the truck lurched forward and she swung it around onto the dirt road that led toward the house.  
  
“What’s your plan once we get to the house?” Jo called over her shoulder, careful to avoid potholes in the road so neither Daryl nor Jesus went flying out of the back bed.  
  
“We’ll throw him down in the cellar and keep someone guarding him, like Tyreese or Merle. Ain’t no one gonna fuck with either of them.”  
  
“You know, as first impressions go, I can honestly say this isn’t one of my worst,” Jesus quipped, lying on his back, staring upward at nothing because of the handkerchief blocking his sight.  
  
“Shut up,” Daryl bit out.  
  
The drive up toward the house didn’t take long at all. By the time the truck reached the base of the Bowling Green, Jo veered the truck right, heading up the dirt around alongside the animal pens and the fruit gardens and then turning left onto the South Lane; passing the stables, their small cemetery, and the other small, white buildings. Upon reaching the circular road of the forecourt, Jo brought the truck to stop and turned off the ignition.  
  
Rick was the first person she noticed approaching the vehicle; already looking stern and he hadn’t even been told about their “guest” yet.  
  
“You went off walking alone?” was the first thing out of his mouth, opening the door for her.  
  
Taking her gun off the seat beside her, Jo turned her body to face him and accepted his help to climb down out of the truck. “I don’t need permission to go on a walk.”  
  
“You could’ve at least told me where you were going.”  
  
“We got a problem,” Daryl announced, climbing down from the back bed. He gestured Rick over to the back of the truck.  
  
“I’m not a problem,” Jesus insisted, trying to sit up. “I’m offering a solution to a problem you have.”  
  
Rick’s gaze steeled. “Who the fuck are you?”  
  
“I’m Paul Rovia, but my friend’s—”  
  
“His friends call him Jesus,” Jo interrupted. “Probably on account of the beard and the hair.”  
  
Jesus nodded and turned in the direction he heard Jo’s voice coming from. “Actually, yeah, that’s literally the reason why.”  
  
“He says he’s from a community twenty minutes west of here. Says they got trade routes with other communities in the area,” Daryl explained. “We found him spying on us down at the West Gate.”  
  
“I wasn’t spying, per se.”  
  
“Shut up.” Turning toward Rick, Daryl leaned closer. “I say we toss him down into the cellar and question him there. I’ll get Tyreese or Merle; someone more imposing to guard him.”  
  
Rick nodded, reaching forward and gripping Jesus by the ankle. Daryl followed suit, grabbing the other ankle, and both men proceeded in dragging Jesus forward toward the edge of the back bed. Helping the bound man down to his feet, they were caught off guard when Jesus pulled his hands apart from behind his back, revealing he’d somehow undone the rope binding him. Yanking his blindfold down, Jesus winked at Rick.  
  
“Hi,” Jesus smiled.  
  
Rick looked at Jesus, then to Daryl.  
  
“I tied him good,” Daryl insisted.  
  
Jesus let out a chuckle. “Just not good enough, obviously.” Holding a hand out, he waited expectantly for Rick to shake it. “So, you know my name, but I don’t know any of yours. Maybe we can rectify that.”  
  
Rick glanced down at the hand offered and smiled. Reaching forward, he accepted Jesus’ hand, but in one swift movement, he yanked Jesus forward and kneed him in the stomach. When Jesus dropped to his knees, Rick let go of the other man’s hand and instead punched him in the side of his head so hard that he fell backward, unconscious.  
  
“Was that necessary?” Jo asked, mirroring Jesus’ earlier question.  
  
Rick ignored her question and gestured to Daryl to help him lift Jesus up. “Let’s get him down into the cellar.”

 

* * *

  
  
“What if he belongs to that group of bikers you encountered on the road last month?” Tara asked, sitting on one of the couches now occupying the ballroom. “If we let him go, what if he goes back and tells them where we are? I mean, even if he was taken away from here blindfolded, he still found this place on his own and found us. It’s not like we’re holed up in some abandoned school. This place is pretty well known.”  
  
“Yeah, but he was also surprised to find people here,” Jo remarked. “He commented on how he knew it had been overrun with walkers.”  
  
“Any survivors in the area might’ve just not bothered trying to loot this place, simply because of that reason,” Rick added, standing there with his hands on his hips, looking around at everyone staring back at him. “They all probably think it’s _still_ overrun, which has clearly been working to our advantage. Except now the world is getting smaller and starting to close in on us. The outside world has finally caught up to us. Here, not just on a road somewhere. Right now, though, we have him under lock and key, so to speak. We got him tied to a chair in the basement, and Tyreese and Merle are both watching him. I must’ve hit him harder than I thought because he’s still out cold. When he wakes up, I’ll question him further about these claims of his; about being from a community that wants to open trade with us. Personally, from what Jo and Daryl told me and what little I’ve interacted with this man so far, I don’t buy it. Whether or not he’s part of the group that attacked us last month, however many people he has back at his community, that’s an unknown amount of people that could be preparing to attack us and take what we have here.”  
  
“You really think that’s something that might happen?” Finn questioned, sitting on the armrest of the couch beside Tara.  
  
“Jo and Daryl said this guy—Jesus—found us a few weeks ago, but didn’t approach then. I’d be willing to bet he went home and told his people about us, and they’ve spent all this time working out a plan to come back here. Jesus might’ve simply been their Trojan horse. I mean, it’s not like we got anyone on that gate. We haven’t _needed_ anyone on that gate. I thought barricading any roads leading to this area would be enough, and it has been, but now it’s not. The outside world found its way in.” Rick allowed his shoulders to droop slightly, noting several people were tensing up. “Now, I’m not trying to needlessly alarm anyone. Right now, we just gotta prepare for the worst. If Jesus and his people want this place—we’re not going down with a fight. We know this place. It’s our home. We need to be prepared to defend it and not let it fall. We’ve already lost homes we knew to be secure to the outside world. I won’t let that happen again.”  
  
“We should be utilizing the cupola. We can see for miles in every direction from up there. We put our best sharpshooter up there with a rifle and a walkie. If they see anyone or anything of concern, they radio down to us and we get ahead of this,” Jo remarked. “I mean, even if we can see smoke of any kind, we could probably pinpoint where other communities might be and how close they are to us, in case they pose an actual threat.”  
  
Rick nodded. “That’s a good idea. Tara, you’re a pretty damn good shot. Think that’s a task you’d be up for?”  
  
Leaning forward, the younger woman nodded. “Yeah, I’m down.”  
  
“Nicole, I’d get the Infirmary ready; prepare a triage center of some kind. Morgan, help Nicole,” Rick continued. “An army of walkers is one thing, but an army of people is another. Be ready for anything. We should also take inventory of all our weapons and all our ammo; what we have, where we have each piece, how low we are on things. Finn, Michonne and José—the three of you can walk the perimeters of the property. Make sure no entrance has been breached. Check the grounds for any spots you think people might still be able to get in from.”  
  
“We have sickles, axes, saws and pitchforks a plenty in the storehouse. Basically, a lot of sharp objects,” Mike offered. “If we need an alternate to the weapons we have or just need more of what we have, that’s an option for defending ourselves should the time come.”  
  
Rick turned and looked at the other man and nodded. “That’s good. That’s a good thought. I’ll leave you to taking an inventory of all that’s in there, then.”  
  
The walkie-talkie on Rick’s hip suddenly crackled with static.  
  
_“Rick. Sleeping Beauty is awake,”_ came Merle’s voice over the radio.  
  
Removing the walkie-talkie from his utility belt, Rick brought it up to his lips and pressed the button on the side. “Alright, I’ll be down in a minute.”  
  
Without much of anything else to say at the moment, he nodded at the others and headed for the door that led out of the ballroom and onto the piazza at the back of the house. As he slipped out the door, Jo was on his trail; reaching out and touching her hand upon his arm. When he turned around to look at her, he stopped.  
  
“I just wanted to say, I know you’re being cautious, and that’s _good_. We _should_ be. But the more I think on this...this guy is offering us supplies. We have a shitload of farming equipment, but we have little need of most of it. He really could simply be wanting to make contact with us, to trade, and that can’t be easy, so…”  
  
“So, what are you saying?” Rick questioned.  
  
“What if he’s right?” Jo asked. “If he’s part of this community he claims he’s from, and what he’s saying is true, the last thing we’d want to do is piss them off. Good people or not, there’s likely more of them than there is of us. If we have to fight, it could end up being an uphill battle and I don’t know how prepared we are for that, regardless of what weaponry we have or how well we know this place. We can’t all fight, don’t forget. Karen and I are very pregnant, we have three children that need to be protected as well…”  
  
“I know all this, Jo. These are all things I’m considering, too,” Rick huffed. “I’m not gonna lead us headfirst into something without taking the necessary precautions.”  
  
Jo looked back at him and let out a small sigh. “Okay. I know.”  
  
“Then, why—” Rick cut himself off. With a smirk, he shook his head and turned away; giving Jo a slight wave with his hand. “Never mind. I’ll be back up in a little bit.”  
  
Walking off the rest of the piazza, Rick stepped down onto the grass and turned left. Walking the down the slight sloping of the land just there, he approached the outside entrance to the cellar. Pulling open the door, he descended the brick steps down into the darkness of the cellar. Even though, it was still early enough in the day, there was very little in the way of natural light coming in. At the opposite end of the cellar, at the other entrance, there was a window that was ground level with the outside but at normal height from within the cellar. The only other light came from the lantern hanging from one of the pipes on the ceiling, located centrally in the brick and stone corridor, across from one of the old, dry storage rooms.  
  
Rick walked forward, keeping his eyes ahead of him as the sound of his bowlegged gait proceeded him. Merle and Tyreese were standing outside the dry storage room, each one leaning against either side of the entryway, and they both turned to see Rick approaching. Neither said a word as Rick stepped front and center, placing his hands on his hips while staring forward at Jesus, who was covered in Rick’s shadow.  
  
“How long do you plan on keeping me here like this?” Jesus asked.  
  
“As long as we have to.”  
  
“I get it, y’know. It’s scary out there in the world. You got a guy telling you about these other places, full of other people and this new way of life—why would you believe me? Like I told the other two, I’m not here to take anything from you. I just want to establish a trade partnership between both of our groups. I’m sure we have things you could use and you have things _we_ could use.”  
  
“Like what?”  
  
“Well, ammo, for instance. A place like this, so far from a main road, you’d have to have guns to protect yourselves from anything that might approach; anything you could pick off easily at a safe enough distance. That requires ammo. And considering this place used to be overrun with hundreds of the dead and the other two said you cleared this entire place; I think it’s safe to say that required a decent amount of gun power.” Jesus stared up at Rick; briefly glancing at Tyreese and Merle. “I don’t know how you haven’t run out of ammo yet, but if you’ve got some kind of hook-up, our guns ran dry a long time ago. When I carry one around, it’s just for show.”  
  
“And what do _you_ have?” Rick wondered, taking half a step closer.  
  
“Well, we’ve got a set-up a bit similar to yours, but on a smaller scale, land-wise. We don’t have the acreage you must have here, but we’re pretty stocked up on various food products. But if you’re well stocked, we have clothes, tools and plenty of other items in the offing.”  
  
Rick seemed amused by this. “You expect me to believe that all your people are interested in is finding new _partners_ to trade with?”  
  
“Well, it’s the truth—so, yes.”  
  
“And you came all the way here…just to let us know about this?”  
  
Jesus shrugged, crossing his feet at his ankles and tucking them under the chair. “Not exactly. I scout for other groups, _yes_ — but, again, like I told the other two, I had to make a few supply drops at a couple other communities on my way here. There’s a place a few miles north. About a month ago they said they heard gunfire while out scouting. They didn’t go investigate; figured it best to not stick their nose in something that didn’t concern them. But it got me curious. On my trips after that, I started checking out this area, and then I came upon the road blocks. I climbed over the trucks and cars you have in place and when I noticed a truck coming, I hid between some trees and watched the truck head for your front gate. I watched the vehicles blocking the gate get moved out of the way and then I watched this truck, hauling bed frames and mattresses, allowed in through the gate and disappear as the blocking vehicles were returned in place,” he explained. “One of the women at my community—Bertie; she came to Mount Vernon at the beginning. She witnessed the mass suicide take place. Or, rather, it was more like a mass murder. She says no one seemed to realize that’s what they’d signed up for. Everyone came here to survive, to escape the horrors and death that was starting to happen everywhere; not be poisoned and die. Bertie was one of few who managed to get away without being shot and killed like other deserters. So, when I saw people coming into this place, willingly. I got more curious. Once the truck was far enough away that it wouldn’t see me, I climbed up onto that one school bus you have on the road. I took out my binoculars and couldn’t see any empties.”  
  
“Empties?”  
  
“The dead. That’s what I call them, anyway, on account of them basically just shells of the people they once were. Empties.” Jesus smirked. “What do _you_ call them?”  
  
“Walkers, mostly. ‘Cause all they do is _walk_.”  
  
Jesus let out a small chuckle. “I guess that makes sense, too.”  
  
“Some are lurkers,” Rick continued. “Those are the ones that hide in the dark, just standing in one place until provoked or attracted by potential nearby victim.”  
  
“That also makes sense.”  
  
Rick cleared his throat, bringing the conversation back on course. “So, let me get all this straight—you’ve got a network of communities that trade goods and communicate with each other? And you’d like us to join this network?”  
  
“That’s right,” Jesus replied with a nod.  
  
Taking a step back, Rick looked to Merle at his left and then to Tyreese on his right; trying to gauge their feelings on all this without having to come right out and ask them in front of Jesus. Pursing his lips together in thought, Rick shifted his weight from one foot to the other, tapping the fingers of his right hand against the handle of his Colt. “Okay, so what would be the next step for us then?”  
  
“I’ll escort some of your group back to the Hilltop so you can see what we have to offer. I’ll show you a clear route between here and the Hilltop you can use for trade—get you set up.”  
  
“I want you to know, I still don’t trust you as far as I can throw you; so if we go with you, if I get the _slightest_ inclination you or your people are planning to attack us, I’ll shoot you before you get the chance to blink.”  
  
“My group is _twenty_ miles away, and they don’t _attack_ anyone,” Jesus persisted.  
  
“Yeah, well,” Rick shrugged and tilted his head to the side. “We’ll see.”

 

* * *

  
  
That evening, Daryl and José had switch places with Tyreese and Merle, taking over guarding Jesus down in the cellar. Rick got pissed off at Jo when he’d returned from checking on Tara up in the cupola and found out that Jo had gone down to bring Jesus something to eat. What made it worse, in Rick’s eyes, was that with the Jesus’ arms bound by rope on the chair he was sitting in, it meant he couldn’t feed himself, so Jo helped him.  
  
“I had Daryl and José there with me. He wasn’t going to try something, especially to a pregnant lady,” Jo remarked.  
  
“You don’t know that!” Rick bellowed from the confines of their bedroom. Even with the door closed and no matter how low they tried keeping their voices, the house was old, so sound still carried. “He got out of the ropes tying his hands in the back of that truck with Daryl there with him, completely unaware. He could’ve attacked then.”  
  
“And did he?”  
  
“No, but that—”  
  
“But _did_ he?” Jo repeated.  
  
Rick paused, staring at her, and then huffed. “No, he didn’t.”  
  
Jo sighed. “Rick, I get you’re doubtful. I have my doubts, too, but I don’t think Jesus is lying about any of this. I think he really is from some other group, and really does just want to set up a trade relationship with us. I _do_ believe there are other like-minded communities out there. They can’t all be bad.” When Rick didn’t reply to any of that, Jo pressed forward on a slightly different topic. “Did Tara see anything up there? Any smoke from fires in the distance?”  
  
“No. Nothing,” he replied, sitting down on the edge of their new, queen size bed; the canopied 18 th century replica stored away with the other 18th century beds. “All’s quiet. Not even a walker. No large groups, no sign of any gathering armies as far as the eye can see.”  
  
“So, then, maybe you could safely assume that Jesus was being honest about everything he told us?” she questioned.  
  
Rick leaned forward, clasping his fingers together while resting his forearms upon his knees. “He speaks clearly and confidently, even though he’s restrained, helpless. That’s not a good sign to me.” Off Jo’s withering look, he continued. “The guilty man sleeps in his cell while the innocent man climbs the walls with worry, unable to relax.”  
  
“That’s stupid logic.”  
  
“He’s hiding something,” Rick insisted. “His demeanor is setting off all kinds of alarms.”  
  
“And yet, Tara hasn’t seen anything from that cupola that should cause us any concern.”  
  
“Maybe they know our line of sight and are avoiding it. Maybe Tara wasn’t looking _hard_ enough.”  
  
“Or maybe you’re becoming too pessimistic. We had one instance a month ago, a terrible altercation for you and the others that left permanent damage for you and my brother, but those men were taken care of, Rick. Jesus showing up doesn’t mean he’s part of that group. We shouldn’t let our guards down, but we also shouldn’t just assume he’s bad.” Walking up to Rick, Jo placed a hand on the side of his head, pushing back a loose lock that was resting against his temple. “We could try giving him the benefit of the doubt. _You_ could try.” Watching the way, he stared down at the floor, knowing he was listening carefully to everything she said, Jo couldn’t help but smirk a little. “The dead walking around…dealing with that…we’ve got that down. Now I think it’s time for something else. This guy, Jesus—his people are either waiting to attack us or they’re not. Truth be told, I’m not even scared of that. Maybe this is arrogance, but after everything…I feel like we’d have a hard time finding _anyone_ more dangerous than _we_ are. I think that. The things we’ve done to fight back, to survive…”  
  
Rick lifted his head and looked up at Jo. He curled an arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him; her full stomach pressing gently against his side. “You’re not wrong,” he muttered.  
  
“Our community is safe. We’ve made a life here, but we’re always gonna need resources and a steady stream of supplies to keep us going,” Jo continued. “We might have the space for farming, but it’s still going to be a while before we see any harvest, and we only have the one cow. Jesus’s community might have more fresh produce, maybe even eggs and meat aside from the random squirrel or rabbit Daryl manages to hunt. Maybe that’s out there, not just in Jesus’ community, but the others he’s mentioned exist. We can look at it as an opportunity; a way to keep us going. We could work with these people out there to make our world safer, our lives _better_.” Sitting down beside him, Jo felt his arm shift upward a little so that it still encircled her waist. He was still keen on holding her close as they sat there together, listening to her speak. “It’s safe here on this property, but we’ve lost sight of what’s out there: a _larger_ _world_. It’s all around us, waiting on us to become a part of it again. We just have to be brave enough to _accept_ it.”  
  
Rick nodded, turning his head slightly to look at her, mostly out the corner of his eye. “I agree that there’s a chance Jesus is right. Tara has seen no sign of anyone out there. All indications are that he’s telling the truth. If his people end up being good people, we’ll work with them. We will,” he remarked; his voice low and quiet. He looked her directly in the eye; keeping his expression serious. “But if they’re _not_ good people, we’ll just take everything they have and leave them for dead.”


	59. Conviction

_“It takes but one person, one moment, one conviction, to start a ripple of change.”_ — Donna Brazile

* * *

  
  
“You’re not going.”  
  
“Like hell I am.”  
  
“You’re not going and that’s final.”  
  
“Watch me.”  
  
Jo stormed out of the house, sheathing her short sword into its scabbard and then tossing the scabbard around her shoulder. Hot on her tail, Rick followed after; ripe with anger. Just ahead of them, Tyreese and Daryl were loading up the back of the passenger van; the very same passenger van their group had brought with them to Mount Vernon nearly six months before.  
  
“Don’t walk away from me when we’re having a conversation, Jo,” Rick growled, reaching for her arm.  
  
“No, we’re having an argument, not a conversation, and you’re losing.” Pulling away from him before he could grab onto her arm, Jo turned and stopped in her tracks so she could properly stare Rick in the eye. “This is not up for discussion or debate. You don’t get to tell me to stay put with my thumbs up my ass, waiting for your return like Rapunzel in the tower. All I am doing is traveling in a van with several other capable people, to a community to meet new people who can help us, and vice versa.”  
  
“We don’t know that the Hilltop is safe. We don’t know if the people there aren’t going to just greet us with a bullet to the head before we get so much as a hello out.”  
  
Jo rolled her eyes and turned away from Rick to slide open the back van door. “You’re grasping for straws, Rick,” she remarked, setting her scabbard down on the floor. “No place in this world is ever going to be one hundred percent safe for any of us. And we’ll have Jesus with us. Why would his own people open fire on us with him at our side? I mean, if he wanted us dead, he could’ve shot Daryl and me from on top of that porter’s lodge at the West Gate before we even realized he was there. He could’ve crept all the way up and hid, taking us all out, one by one, but he didn’t.”  
  
“He couldn’t have if he wanted to. No bullets in his gun.”  
  
“Which does nothing to back your argument,” Jo retorted. “If need be, we’ll hold him hostage and keep a gun to his head to ensure our safety inside their community, which I doubt we’ll need to do.” Reaching up, she gripped the grab handle on the ceiling of the van above her and used it to pull herself up into the van without anyone’s assistance. Once she was seated on the edge of the row immediately behind the front seats, Jo turned to face Rick again and sighed. “Look, I know we’ve always had this back and forth where I’m more or less the optimist and you’re more or less the pessimist in our relationship, but seriously? Can you just drink some of my Kool-Aid right now? The rollercoaster, remember? Bad happens, then good happens. That’s how it works. Law of averages and all that. This trip, going to meet Jesus’ community and joining a trade network with other communities can be our new good thing. I’d say we’ve earned this after Finn’s and your injuries last month, wouldn’t you?”  
  
“But why do you think it necessary to go?”  
  
“Because I want to.”  
  
“Jo, you’re pregnant.”  
  
Suddenly, she unveiled a look of shock; slapping both sides of her face gently with her hands like the kid from _Home Alone_. “I am? Holy shit, you don’t say.”  
  
Rick gritted his teeth together. Upon placing his hands firmly upon his narrow waist, he shift his weight from one foot to the other while ignoring the discreet looks the others preparing to go on this trip were shooting the bickering couple. “You know what I’m saying,” he replied, pushing her sarcasm aside.  
  
“Yes, I do. You’re trying to get me to stay put because you think I’m fragile and going to break,” she replied, leaning forward closer to him. “You know, after spending the majority of my last pregnancy, chained to a wall in a dark room along with the trauma that went along with it, and all the injuries I’ve sustained early on in _this_ pregnancy and somehow, for Lord knows what reason, me and the baby are healthy and doing fine, I think it’s safe to say I can handle a twenty-mile car ride. We got here to Mount Vernon, leaving behind the immediate DC area with that slight fear of maybe being followed by those Marauders and that thought of them possibly attacking us. We took off, heading for the unknown, toward unknown dangers. I fought with everyone else to rid this place of the hundreds of walkers that had it overrun. I refuse to sit idly by while you go off without me. I refuse to stay behind, making myself sick with worry about what’s going on and if you’re okay when I can be there at your side every step of the way.”  
  
“Jo, I—”  
  
“I am capable. I am not weak.”  
  
“The ba—”  
  
“I will not knowingly put the baby in any danger,” she interrupted him again. “Anyone attempts to harm a pregnant woman will meet their end very quickly by any one of us going. You know that, I know that, everyone here pretending they can’t hear us arguing knows that, too.”  
  
Michonne, who had stepped outside with her katana strapped to her back a few minutes ago, and had just been standing there trying to find something interesting with the dirt at her feet, looked up at Jo and smiled knowingly. She stepped forward then and placed her gloved hand upon Rick’s shoulder. “I’ll be her personal bodyguard if it helps ease your mind, Rick,” Michonne offered. “If anyone tries to get to her, they’ll have to go through me first.”  
  
“They won’t have to,” Jo interjected. “Because I’m going to be fine. The baby is going to be fine. _We_ are _all_ going to be fine. I feel it in my bones, in my gut.” Eyeing Rick until she knew he was truly looking back at her and not off to the side of her, she smirked. “You should know by now to trust my gut.”  
  
“Can we go already?” Merle badgered, resting his right arm on the hood of the van and staring at the couple and Michonne. “Y’all wanna get your asses inside the fuckin’ van so we don’t lose any damn daylight?”  
  
Jo and Rick both looked over at the older Dixon, and then back at each other.  
  
“I’m going, Rick, and that’s that.”  
  
Rick stared at her for a moment longer, and then down at his feet. Kicking at a random stone, he let out an aggravated, conceding sigh. “Fine. Whatever. You’re going.” With a flick of his wrist, he gestured for her to slide over. “Make room for the rest of us, then.”  
  
Smiling victoriously, Jo obliged her sourpuss husband and shimmied all the way to the left, behind the driver’s seat so Rick could climb inside. Taking the middle seat, Rick sat back and stared forward, mulling over his thoughts while Michonne climbed in and sat down at Rick’s immediate right. Having removed her sheathed katana from her back, she held it upright in front of her, between her knees, as everyone else began to file into the van as well.  
  
Daryl took to the driver’s seat and Jesus was allowed shotgun, strictly because he was the only one who knew how to get to his community and, therefore, was their de facto navigator. As for the rest going, it was only Tyreese, Merle, Finn and Lewis. Morgan and Mike were being left in charge to oversee the other staying behind; to keep them safe and batten down the hatches in case a threat from the Hilltop or any other group found its way to their doorstep after those in the van left.  
  
Finn, actually, wasn’t originally going. Up until Jo stormed out of the house, arguing with Rick, he had been planning to stay. However, if his sister was going, then he was, too. He was going for the same reason she was. She didn’t want to stay behind in case something happened to Rick and Finn didn’t want to stay behind in case something happened to her. Jo was his big sister, his “little mom” and his only true family left. She’d helped their father raise him, despite being young herself. She’d help teach him to walk and talk. She’d helped change his diapers and help him with his schoolwork. The least he could do now was help protect her the way she protected him in his childhood.  
  
Once the van was loaded up with a few necessary supplies for the travel and with all the people that were going, the doors were shut and ignition turned on.  
  
“How’s the gas level?” Rick asked, removing his Colt from his holster and resting it across his right thigh instead; just in case he needed to threaten or shoot Jesus on the off chance he tried fucking the rest of them over.  
  
“We’re good,” Daryl assured from the driver’s seat, putting the gear into drive. “Just above three quarters full.”  
  
Leaning toward the window at her left, Jo propped her elbow up on the sill and began to watch the scenery of property rolling by at a steady pace. The van drove around the forecourt’s circle in order to turn around to head down the South Lane. Once they reached the stables, Daryl turned the vehicle to the right, driving the dirt road alongside the fruit trees and the animals pens; only one of the latter actually containing an animal in the form of Bessie the cow. Eventually the scenery was nothing more than green pastures and full foliage on either side of the dirt road leading down toward the West Gate. Once they reached it, Finn and Michonne hopped out; knowing the routine.  
  
One person had to move the RV out of the way of the gate while the other had to move the school bus parked on the other side, along the road. Once both vehicles were cleared, the gate could be opened and the van could pass through. Then both the RV and the bus had to be returned to their places, and Michonne and Finn had to get back inside the van all before they could truly hit the road.  
  
After not even five minutes, the task was handled and the van was headed straight onto Old Mill Road. The first side street they approached was their only next viable route, since the rest of Old Mill Road had been blocked off by them months before with several cars. They turned left onto the side street and continued for a short while before turning right onto the second side street they approached. That soon curved around, merging with another residential side street before they were soon emerging onto Route 235. Just before they could turn left, the only way they could go on account of one of their other roadblocks to their immediate right, Jesus turned and stared at Daryl rather anxiously.  
  
“Wait, can you stop here for a few minutes?” he asked, before pointing west toward the other end of Old Mill Road that was split by Route 235. “The car I drove here in yesterday I left on the other side of that roadblock.”  
  
“You don’t need your car. We’re traveling together in this van,” Rick remarked, his thumb grazing the cylinder of his gun. “All of us.”  
  
“No, I don’t care about the car,” Jesus insisted, turning around to look back at Rick while Daryl brought the car to a slow halt; the brakes squeaking just slightly. “It’s what’s inside the car that I left behind that I need.”  
  
“What—like food and water?” Jo wondered, turning her attention away from her window.  
  
“Among other things.”  
  
Rick expelled a frustrated breath and caught Daryl’s eye in the rearview mirror. “Alright. I’ll go with you.”  
  
“Afraid I’ll make a run for it?” Jesus joked and quickly realizing his joke had fallen flat.  
  
As Michonne slid the door open for him, Rick got up and climbed out of the van, holding onto his Colt instead of returning it to its holster. He gave Michonne a nod to go ahead and shut the door and then lifted his walkie-talkie, holding it up and making sure Daryl saw him. “Keep it on channel two.”  
  
Before Michonne slid the door shut behind, Rick glimpsed Jo briefly looking at him and he kicked himself for not at least saying goodbye or even giving her a smile or a nod; something in parting in case something happened, especially after their argument outside the house. Instead, he waited and watched as Jesus got out of the truck and then began to walk half a step behind him as he led the way over the roadblocks by way of climbing over the hood of a car.  
  
“Just so you know, if you were to make a run for it, I’d shoot you in the back of the head as you went,” Rick muttered, revisiting Jesus’ attempt at humor. “I’ve got real good aim.”  
  
“Oh, I’ve no doubt,” Jesus remarked, casting Rick a quick look.  
  
“Where’s your car?”  
  
“Up ahead a bit.” Pointing forward, Jesus gestured to rear bumper of a tan-colored Buick LeSabre parked at the end of a driveway. “That one.”  
  
Rick couldn’t help by smirk at the sight of this. “I think I had that same exact car when I was in high school. 1979 Buick LeSabre, except mine was a light blue. Bought it off this old sonofabitch that went to our church and couldn’t drive anymore because of cataracts or something.”  
  
“Really? How much did you pay for it?”  
  
“Nine hundred bucks; give or take.”  
  
“And how long ago was that?”  
  
“1990,” Rick replied as they got nearer to the car. “I was seventeen, it was the summer after junior year, and there was no way I was gonna take the bus or get driven to school by my mom that fall for my senior year.”  
  
Jesus snickered and shook his head. “I dunno. I feel like nine hundred was highway robbery for a piece of shit car like this, even in 1990.”  
  
“I’ll shoot you in the head right now for that alone.” Rick spoke in jest but he wouldn’t allow his face to convey that.  
  
As he watched Jesus quicken his pace, he kept his eyes trained on their surroundings as well; wondering if there weren’t people from the Hilltop lying in wait for him to drop his guard and attack him. Walkers he could handle. The living was the bigger problem. When Jesus lurched open the passenger door, he sat down in the seat and tossed something into a backpack and then began rifling through the glove box. Rick was plenty curious; especially with how Jesus seemed to be purposely keeping his back to Rick and whatever he was putting into the backpack was a mystery Rick didn’t care much for.  
  
“What’s in the bag?”  
  
“Supplies I need.”  
  
“We established that vagueness already. I want specifics.”  
  
“Food, water, a compass, First Aid, roll of toilet paper,” Jesus rattled, stepping out of the car and tossing the backpack over his shoulder. Shutting the door behind him, he gestured in the direction they’d come from. “Okay, we can head back to the van now.”  
  
Rick shook his head. “Nah, you’re gonna set that back down and let me look through it.”  
  
“I’m not hiding any weapons. You took those off me yesterday, and my gun didn’t even have bullets, so…”  
  
Rick raised his arm and aimed his gun at Jesus’ head. “I’m sorry. Did I stutter?”  
  
With a sigh akin to that of a teenager, Jesus set the backpack down onto the ground and went one step further by pushing it closer to Rick with the toe of his boot. Hooking is own boot into one of the straps, Rick pulled the bag even closer to him before crouching down beside it. He kept his gaze intermittent between the bag and Jesus as he unzipped the bag with his left hand while maintaining his gun’s aim on Jesus with his right. When he felt comfortable enough that Jesus was just going to stand there and not try anything, Rick lowered his right hand and began to properly rifle through the bag. Something that had slid down from the top when the bag had been opened caught Rick’s eye. Reaching in, he grabbed it and pulled it out. It was a device that looked a traffic gun he’d used countless times in the past with Shane as on behalf of the King County Sheriff’s Department, but with a clear, plastic cone around it. There was a spiral cord attached to it and on the other end was a pair of large headphones.  
  
Setting it down on the ground, Rick stared up at Jesus. “A sound amplifier?”  
  
“Yeah,” Jesus nodded.  
  
“So, you’ve been listening in on my people?” Rick glared.  
  
“Obviously no. This was left in my car, for one. Also, even if I wanted to use it from the entrance to Mount Vernon where Jo and Daryl found me, I wouldn’t have been able to hear anything all the way up at the house. Too much distance in between both places,” the younger man explained. “My boyfriend gave it to me to use when I go out on supply runs, and drops with other communities. There’s a radio in there, too. It’s all in there to help me.”  
  
“Help you do what? Spy?”  
  
“No,” Jesus insisted. “Protect me.”  
  
Rick made a face. “Protect you?”  
  
“The way you’re treating me, how defensive you all are toward me and how you’re all clearly not so eager to trust me gives me enough reason to believe you’re aware of the negative faction that’s out there.”  
  
“There are a _lot_ of negative factions out there. You’ll have to be more specific,” Rick muttered, deciding he believed Jesus enough in his explanation and began to tuck the devices back into the bag. “Are we talking Sarge and those Mad Max types in DC or the guys on motorcycles working for some guy named Negan?”  
  
“You’ve dealt with the Saviors?”  
  
“Who are the Saviors?” Zipping the backpack up, Rick stood with it and handed it over to Jesus.  
  
“Negan and his people are the Saviors. Who’s Sarge?”  
  
“Sarge is this ex-military asshole who runs all of DC, apparently. They don’t like outsiders coming into the city. Long story,” Rick remarked as the memory of Milo lying dead in the street emerged. “Who exactly is Negan and these Saviors?”  
  
Jesus frowned and looked down both ends of the street. “It’s something I’d rather we waited to discuss until we got to the Hilltop. It’s not best to be out in the open this long, especially with your van filled with people, supplies and weapons. Any of the Saviors catch us on the roads with all that, it might not end pretty.”  
  
Rick snickered, holding up his left hand to show off the bandage still covering the little bit left of his left pinky. “Yeah, I’m aware of that much.”  
  
As both men began to walk away from the car and back up the road from whence they came, Jesus turned curiously toward Rick, walking somewhat sideways in the process. “Hold up, you mean you had a run-in with the Saviors and you walked away with only a missing finger?”  
  
“The cut across my face, and my brother-in-law got shot in the shoulder happened, too. But yeah, we did.”  
  
“What happened to them? The Saviors, I mean.”  
  
“They’re dead.”  
  
“H-how? And no one has come looking for you to fight you?”  
  
“We got rid of the bodies and the bikes. The blood on the road—that we didn’t bother getting rid of,” Rick replied, recounting what the others had taken care of while he and Finn had been getting mended by Nicole and Morgan. “Blood on the streets these days isn’t uncommon. We figured if anyone came back that same way looking for their fallen friends and saw blood, they would just assume the same anyone else would assume. That it was walkers.”  
  
Jesus slung his backpack over his shoulder and shook his head. “I can’t believe you killed all those Saviors. How many were there?”  
  
“Little more than half a dozen. Eight or nine, maybe.”  
  
“How many of you were there?”  
  
“Five.”  
  
“So, more or less a fair fight, then?”  
  
“No.” Rick shook his head as they turned the corner and began to climb over the hood of the same car in the roadblock they’d climbed over before. “They’d taken our guns off us, but Daryl and Michonne happened to be in the woods on either side of the road when those _Saviors_ approached. They were still carrying guns on them. Right when shit was about to go south real quick, Daryl and Michonne opened fire. The leader of that group is the one that attacked me personally. Hit me in the face with the side of our truck door, cut me. He would’ve shot me in the head, but I threw my hand up in front of the muzzle and turned away in the nick of time. Lost my finger in the process though. It was a mess.”  
  
“I bet,” Jesus remarked, sounding somewhat in awe. “Do you get that phantom limb thing with your finger? Like, when people lose a leg and they still feel like it’s there…”  
  
“Yeah, sometimes.” Rick turned and looked at Jesus; already starting to feel more comfortable with him. Perhaps it was the ease of conversation and banter that helped. Or maybe Rick was starting to see that Jesus wasn’t an actual threat as he’d initially perceived. “I just keep reminding myself that at least it was just a pinky finger and it was my left hand. I didn’t lose my ring finger and I’m right-handed, so not a major loss.”  
  
“Not a major loss?” Jesus chuckled. “You lost part of your body. Fingers don’t grow back, you know?”  
  
“But I still have my ring finger, which is important to me, and I have use of both my hands. What’s more is I’m still alive. In the grander scheme of things, no, losing a pinky finger is _not_ major.”  
  
“I suppose you’re right,” Jesus remarked as they eyed the van up ahead, still parked where they’d left it with everyone still inside and waiting.  
  
“When we get to the Hilltop, you’re gonna tell us everything about these Saviors,” Rick said. It was not a question. It was a demand.  
  
Jesus nodded. “I will.”  
  
“I want to know everything you know about them, and then some.”  
  
“I’ll do my very best.”

 

* * *

  
  
The van crested to the top of a hill where the walled community of the Hilltop was located. The wall, made up of many tree trunks stood tall and at the top, on either side of the gated entrance, two men stood guard with spears in hand. Daryl brought the van to a stop, allowing Jesus to roll down the window to the passenger door and tell the men atop the wall to open up. A few moments later, the wooden doors were pulled open and the van drove through and all inside the vehicle were greeted by the sight of the stately Georgian-style brick home ahead of them and so many people working the grounds.  
  
“This is like our place, but smaller and with more people,” Jo commented, staring out her window at what looked to be a blacksmith stall and another stall where meat was being smoked. “More productive, too.”  
  
“This place has been up and running since the beginning,” Jesus remarked. Turning to Daryl, he gestured in front of them. “You can go ahead and pull the van up to the front of the house.”  
  
When the van came to a stop again, Daryl turned off the ignition and pocketed the keys. No one wasted any time in exiting the vehicle after that. Jesus hopped out before the others, but waited patiently for each of them, while nodding politely and exchanging pleasantries with his own people who seemed curious and maybe a little nervous by these new arrivals who were armed with guns.  
  
“Jesus—who are these people?” One man among the growing group of onlookers stepping forward. In a lower voice, he asked, “Are they Saviors?”  
  
“No,” Jesus replied with an assuring smile. “They’re from a new community, near the river.”  
  
Rick stepped aside to let Michonne out but stepped forward to offer Jo his hand and help her get out. Once her feet touched the ground, she turned around and grabbed for her sheathed sword and slung the scabbard over her shoulder. Jo stepped aside then, with Rick and Michonne so the others behind them could pile out of the van next. As soon as the van was emptied of all people inside, the doors were shut to seal in the belongings they brought with them, and then they looked expectantly at Jesus and at the people gathered.  
  
“Let’s get you all inside first, where we can talk privately, shall we?” Jesus spoke, gesturing toward the front door.  
  
“So this is the Hilltop, huh?” Rick muttered.  
  
“The community as a whole is the Hilltop. The house is Barrington House,” Jesus replied, stopping at the front steps. “The family that owned this place gave it to the state in the ‘30s. The state turned it into a living history museum. Every elementary school for 50 miles used to come here for field trips. The place was running a long time before the modern world built up around it. I think people came here because they figured it’d keep running after the modern world broke down. Those windows up there let us see for miles in every direction.” He pointed up in the direction of the top of the house. “It’s perfect for security. Just like your place, except you’re not as exposed as we are. It’s hard to miss a place like this, standing at attention atop a hill.”  
  
“You had no problem finding us,” Rick remarked.  
  
Jesus smiled. “Yeah, but I’m crafty.” Once again, he gestured to the door. “Come on inside.”  
  
One by one, each person from Rick’s group followed Jesus inside to the grand foyer, which was much larger than the entrance hall at Mount Vernon by a long shot. Still yet, the house in itself wasn’t nearly as big as Mount Vernon, though. Not to mention Mount Vernon had all those extra buildings and several acres of land to boot.  
  
“Most of the rooms have been converted to living spaces. Even the ones that weren't bedrooms,” Jesus continued to speak. “You likely noticed the trailers outside. In the beginning, when the governor declared a state of emergency and requested government assistance in handling the epidemic, FEMA was brought in. They chose Barrington House as one of its safe-zones, bringing trailers here as well as defense, security, and supplies. As survivors began to arrive to here, they found this place virtually abandoned. Like every other government and military power across the country, FEMA abandoned the Hilltop, just like they did with all the other abandoned safe-zones and civilian populations, leaving the survivors like us to fend for ourselves. Due to this location, we saw promise here. The terrain’s offered fertile land and crops, while the hill’s given us an advantage of oncoming survivors and the undead. At some point, before I got here, the surrounding trees were used to build the wall around the Hilltop’s perimeter.”  
  
“So, people live here and the trailers?” Finn asked.  
  
Jesus nodded. “We’ve been planning to build for a while now. There's babies being born.”  
  
“Tell us about Negan,” Rick demanded, cutting to the chase as he tapped his fingers absentmindedly against his holstered gun.  
  
With a sigh, Jesus bowed his head and frowned. Taking a few steps to the side, he opened up a pair of double doors, revealing an ornately furnished office. “In here, if you don’t mind.”  
  
Everyone hesitated, waiting on Rick to make the first move. When he did, he walked forward with an eye on Jesus at first and then looked ahead of him to take in the interior of the office. It was nice, but it wasn’t exactly impressive to him. This was just some random, old fashioned home while he lived in Mount Vernon. He slept in the same room where George Washington slept. He walked the halls and the rooms that George Washington walked. There really was no topping that.  
  
As soon as Rick’s group had made their way inside the office, Jesus closed the doors behind them and then moved to lean against the front of the desk, facing the others. He took the skull cap off his head and scratched at his hair and then removed his gloves; setting both the cap and the gloves upon the desk behind him. “Negan’s the head of a group of people he calls the Saviors. As soon as the walls were built, the Saviors showed up. They met with our leader Gregory on behalf of their boss. They made a lot of demands, even more threats. And they killed one of us—Rory. He was sixteen years old. They beat him to death right in front of us. Said we needed to understand, right off the bat,” Jesus explained, solemnly. “Gregory was never exactly good at confrontation. He wasn’t the leader I would’ve chosen, but he helped make this place what it is, and the people liked him.”  
  
“He made a deal,” Jo deduced.  
  
Jesus nodded, looking briefly at her. “Half of everything. Our supplies, our crops, our livestock; it goes to the Saviors.”  
  
“And what do you get in return?” Tyreese questioned.  
  
“They don’t attack this place. They don’t kill us.”  
  
Daryl grunted. “Why not just kill them?”  
  
“Most of the people here don’t even know how to fight, even if we had ammo.”  
  
“Well, how many people does Negan have?” Rick asked. “Where’s his base?”  
  
Jesus licked his lips and folded his hands in front of him. “We never used to know for sure. We’d seen groups as large as twenty. And we never knew who Negan was or where he was. On occasion, each Savior would refer to himself or herself as Negan. It was like a collective thing. Usually Gregory dealt with a Savior named Simon. A real prick, but then again most of them are. Then, one day, a few months ago, some of our people went to make a drop with the Saviors at one of their outposts.”  
  
“Wait—one of?”  
  
Jesus nodded at Rick. “They have multiple outposts. They’re pretty spread out.”  
  
“Well, shit,” Merle muttered. “So, these fuckers are like herpes.”  
  
Despite the smirk upon his lips, Jesus remained serious as he continued to talk. “The Saviors had deemed the delivery of supplies to be inefficient. They killed two of our people at the drop and decided to keep another—Craig—hostage as sort of… _insurance_ policy. They said they’d keep Craig alive and return him to us, if a message was delivered for them.”  
  
“What was the message?” Jo asked, resting her hands atop her stomach.  
  
“Three returned from the drop—Ethan, Andy and Crystal. Ethan delivered the message to Gregory. That message came in the form of Ethan stabbing Gregory repeatedly in the stomach. We were able to subdue Ethan, but Gregory was too badly wounded. Our doctor couldn’t save him. There had been too much internal damage and he’d lost too much blood.”  
  
“Who’s the leader now, if Gregory is dead?” Michonne spoke up this time from where she sat upon one of the chairs in the office, holding her sheathed katana between her legs.  
  
“I am,” Jesus answered simply. “No one else wanted the position, especially after what happened to Gregory, and everyone kept turning to me, asking me what we should do. I didn’t ask for the position and I didn’t really want it, but someone had to lead us, so I just took it on.”  
  
Rick cocked his head slightly to the side; taking in what Jesus said and understanding exactly how he felt. He, himself, had never asked to become the leader of any of his people, but was always placed into that position. “What’s happened since then? You said you never _used_ to know how many there were and you never _knew_ who Negan was. That implication means past tense, so I assume you know now?”  
  
Jesus shrugged but nodded as well in response. “There was a Savior who defected. Dwight. He came here, sought me out. He said he would tell me anything I needed to know about Negan and the Sanctuary. He knew none of the communities under Negan’s thumb were at all happy with their arrangements, but not one of us had an upper hand in fighting back. We didn’t know where the Sanctuary was, what Negan looked like, how many Saviors there were as a whole…”  
  
“What’s the Sanctuary?” Daryl pressed.  
  
“The Saviors’ home base,” Jesus replied, casting a glance over at the shaggy archer. “Dwight promised to tell me anything I wanted in exchange for asylum, but he and I both knew he couldn’t stay here. As soon as Negan and the other Saviors realized he was gone, that he had defected, Dwight would be hunted down and likely killed, or at the very least, beaten within an inch of his life and imprisoned somewhere. There was only one place he could go where the Saviors couldn’t, but he couldn’t go there alone.” Jesus looked around at all the faces staring back at him, hanging on his every word it seemed. “One of the other communities is called the Kingdom. It’s a pretty amazing place. It’s based primarily out of a school, but the grounds encompass a few houses, some fields. It’s pretty idyllic, actually. They have a school system, a market place and even a choir. The Kingdom is headed by a man named Ezekiel, but everyone calls him _King_ Ezekiel and it’s all very _theatrical_ there. They’re, like, really into the whole monarchy thing, but it works for them. But, more importantly, part of their deal with the Saviors is that no Savior is allowed to step foot inside the Kingdom. They produce for them every week, just like the rest of us, except the residents of the Kingdom don’t know about any of this. They think the only threat outside their walls are the dead.”  
  
Tyreese cleared his throat. “So, this Dwight guy told you all of the Saviors’ secrets and you took him to the Kingdom? Why haven’t you done anything with the information he gave you?”  
  
Jesus shook his head. “I never got the chance to take him to the Kingdom. Dwight’s wife was back at the Sanctuary. He wanted to sneak back in and sneak her out with him. Once he did that, he’d come back here with her and I’d take them both to the Kingdom, except Dwight never came back. That was three months ago.”  
  
“So?” Merle grumbled. “He gave you the info. Who cares that he never came back?”  
  
“For all I knew, Dwight decided against defecting for good and stayed. On the off chance I tried to rally some support from the neighboring communities, how would I know that Dwight wouldn’t give us up to save his own skin? Not to mention the one thing Dwight didn’t tell me was where Negan stayed. If I had that information, maybe I could sneak in and find him. And if I did, then what? How could I expect to get the upper hand? Could I even manage to kill him, to cut the head off the beast? What if I failed and the Saviors decided to retaliate against the Hilltop? What if killing Negan didn’t stop the Saviors, and instead someone else just took his place?”  
  
“How many Saviors are there, total?” Rick asked, stepping forward.  
  
Jesus let out a sigh. He looked toward the ceiling for a moment, trying to count in his head. “A hundred, a hundred and fifty. Maybe more. _Probably_ more.” He looked over at Rick. “That was three months ago, though. I don’t know if the number has increased or decreased.”  
  
Rick held onto Jesus’ gaze for a moment and then turned his attention over toward his wife. “Did Dwight tell you how many of those Saviors were actual fighters?” he asked, returning his gaze to the younger man once more.  
  
“Half that, maybe a hundred. There’s regular people at the Sanctuary like there are here, like you have. Families with children, they have a doctor who happens to be the brother of our doctor, believe it or not. Their outposts are filled with nothing but fighters though.”  
  
“And how many outposts are there?”  
  
“At least three that I know of. One isn’t too far from here. It’s at an old satellite relay station. That’s the outpost where Craig was kept until Gregory’s body was brought there as proof that he was dead.”  
  
“Where’s the Sanctuary?” Jo asked, mirroring Rick by stepping forward, closer to Jesus. “That Savior told you where it is, right? Have you seen it?”  
  
Jesus hesitated. “He did, and I have, but not up close.” He reached behind him, to the desk, and gripped the edge with his hands. “My bag that I left in the van has a sound amplifier that I use when on the road during supply runs. It was given to me by my boyfriend to use when I made my first trip to see the Sanctuary. I got as close as I could, using binoculars to see whatever I couldn't with my own eyes, and the sound amplifier helps hear potential conversations around the place, between Saviors standing guard. Dwight gave me a handheld radio before I last saw him. I’ve used that to listen in on the Saviors and learn about where they’re gonna be at any given time as they communicate with each other as long as they’re within a reasonable distance with each other. As for where The Sanctuary is, it’s set up in a factory about fifteen miles away, give or take.”  
  
“Mount Vernon is only twenty from here,” Rick remarked, suddenly nervous as he thought about their people back home. “Does that put the Sanctuary only five from us or are they fifteen miles in an entirely different direction from here?”  
  
“Oh. No, different direction: about fifteen miles north of _here_.” Jesus clarified, holding his hands up slightly in assurance. “They’re not as close to you as they are to us.”  
  
“I got a question,” Merle commented. “These numbnuts don’t know about us at Mount Vernon yet. We start trading with you and those other communities out there you deal with, how long before the Saviors find us and try to do to us what they do to you? We got ourselves a good handful of badasses, but we ain’t exactly got the numbers.”  
  
“Collectively, we do,” Jesus spoke, broaching the subject carefully. “That’s another reason I’m hoping to bring you into this network. The benefits of trading aside, if we can gather all the best and halfway decent fighters from each community, even if we have to take the time to train those that aren’t fighting types but are willing to fight, we could very well go toe to toe with the Saviors. They are well stocked in the gun department, though. We’d need to stockpile our own arsenal. If we can keep you off the Saviors’ radar for the time being, any guns and ammunition we find, we could stockpile with you at Mount Vernon. Even if the Saviors came knocking, I’m sure you know of plenty of places where you could safely hide weapons where they wouldn’t think to look.”  
  
“You’re assuming that’s a risk we’d want to take,” Rick muttered, folding his arms across his chest. “Trading goods and supplies with other people is one thing, but going to war is an entire situation altogether. That’s a road we’ve been down and not one I think we’re ready to go down again.”  
  
Jesus gazed back at Rick while trying to read the room. “The last time you went ‘down that road’, did you win?”  
  
“Nobody won. Each side lost. We lost our home, we lost our friends and family. The other side lost numbers, too.” The memory of the carnage at the prison seven months before still felt so fresh in his mind. To Rick, sometimes it felt more like only seven days had passed instead. “Losing all that, it split us all up. We didn’t just lose people and a home, but _we_ were lost. We all got separated and ended up going from place to place, running into one terrible situation after the next. Getting to where we are now hasn’t come easy. It’s come at a big price. More of our own have suffered or died along the way. We’re finally living the closest thing to a normal, peaceful life again. I’ve got children to think about. Two babies are due soon, my own included. This ain’t exactly the best world to bring any child into, but adding fighting an uphill battle against a shit ton of assholes is—it’s reckless.”  
  
“I understand your reservations,” Jesus nodded solemnly. “I just want you to understand that without your help, without the communities coming together for the same cause, life will stay like this for all of us. There will be no getting out from underneath Negan’s thumb. Even if, after all this discussion, you decide you don’t want to be part of a trading network, I will make sure no one here speaks of your group. I won’t even tell anyone here at Hilltop where you came from. That way, the Saviors will hopefully stay clear of you.”  
  
Jo looked down at the ground, considering both sides of this conversation. She agreed with Rick’s side of not necessarily wanting to get involved, but she understood what Jesus was telling them and the threat that loomed either way her group decided. “You can’t promise the Saviors won’t find us eventually, though,” she remarked, lifting her eyes up toward the younger man. When he looked back at her with a nod and a frown, she frowned as well. “So, basically, if we walk away from here, if we turn around and go home, if we go our separate ways, there’s no guarantee that the Saviors won’t find us and do to us what’s been done to every other community. The weather is getting warmer and warmer with each passing day. These Saviors might not be based as closely to us as they are here, but you said they had outposts, spread all over; and only three that you know of. Meaning, they could have an outpost near us we don’t even know about.” Jo turned to Rick. “Those Saviors on the bikes from a month ago could’ve come from one of those outposts. Their friends might come looking for them. They might start spreading out and find our roadblocks near Mount Vernon and wonder _why_ those are there and investigate. You said it before, Rick; that we’ve been living in a bubble. Sooner or later that bubble is gonna to pop for good and we need to be prepared. We might have—what? Days, weeks, or maybe months before the Saviors find us? Or maybe a year from now. What happens then? What happens when the bubble pops and they find us? What—do we surrender and avoid putting up a fight to ensure we live and then live in fear of Negan and his Saviors the rest of our days? Do we just…make a run for it now? Maybe go back home to Georgia? What if the Saviors kill one of us either way, just to make a point—to enforce their presence? What do we do then?”  
  
“It’s not guaranteed they’ll ever find us,” Rick replied, leaning in toward her as he spoke. “We can increase our barricades, make it harder for the outside world to get to us…”  
  
“You know that’s not going to happen.” Jo shook her head. She glanced briefly at the others; noting that Merle and Michonne seemed to be the only ones—aside from Jesus, obviously—that understood and agreed with what she was getting at. “We’re living on borrowed time on a good day. With the Saviors out there, no matter how far away or how many roadblocks we attempt to set up, our days of living as we have, since arriving to Mount Vernon, are numbered. Sooner or later, the bubble won’t just pop. It’ll blow up in our faces.” She watched the way Rick shook his head slightly. She could tell in his eyes he understood what she was saying and that he was worried about what it meant for them; but, for whatever reason, a part of him hoped that by ignoring it, it might go away. “We need to be prepared for when that day comes, Rick. We need to be prepared to fight.”  
  
“It’s like everything we ever do is always leading to a fight.”  
  
“Unfortunately, that’s the world we live in now.”  
  
“I’m sorry for putting this on all of you,” Jesus muttered, looking sheepish at his desk. “I didn’t want to put you in this position. I wouldn’t have had to if I’d never found you…”  
  
“But you _did_ find us. By accident,” Michonne remarked. “And if you could find us by accident, so could anyone else.”  
  
“Exactly my point,” Jo added, still maintaining her gaze upon Rick. “We got lucky that it was only Jesus. It’s given us an opportunity to understand the exact threat we face out there; to give us time to get ready for when the threat arrives at our doorstep.”  
  
Tyreese sank down into a chair in the corner. Hunching forward, he removed his skull cap; running a hand up his face and back over his hair while a heavy-hearted sigh escaped his lips. “We came here to with the sole purpose of getting to know this community, of considering a trade agreement with them. Now suddenly we got enslavement or war on the horizon? I didn’t realize we were back in the middle of the 19 th century.”  
  
“That’s one way of putting it,” Jesus quipped, though his tone was far from amused. He was deathly aware of the seriousness of this subject and the situation Rick’s group was now in. They’d described their lives as being lived in a bubble, but it was more like a balloon and he was a pin that had gently poked it. The balloon hadn’t popped with a sudden burst but was instead slowly deflating. It was just a matter of time now before the air ran out. “The Saviors won’t accept ‘no’ as an answer if and when they come to you. When they tell you that you’re going to provide for them, you provide for them or they’ll kill one or all of you. There’s no grey area. It’s black and it’s white. You provide, you live. You refuse, you die.” Jesus was sure that if he frowned any deeper his face would stay stuck like that forever. “I can’t express enough how sorry I am to throw you into this world. I wish we could all be as lucky as you’ve been since you made Mount Vernon your home. I’d give my own life if at a moment’s notice if it meant Hilltop could be no longer beholden to Negan. I’d give my life _twice_ if Negan and the Saviors as a whole could be wiped off the face of the earth. This world was horrible enough before they showed up, what with the dead not staying dead anymore, but _they’re_ what’s wrong with this world. The dead we can manage, the living—that’s a horse of a different color.”  
  
“Yeah, we know how that goes,” Rick muttered, recalling each time a living, breathing person tried to harm him or those he cared for.  
  
“Listen, you packed supplies and told your people back home you would be gone a couple of days to flesh out a trade deal with us and the other communities. I’ll have a place for all of you to sleep during your stay here. We don’t have to discuss this all at once.” Jesus leaned off his desk and stepped forward, gesturing toward the double doors to the office. “Why don’t you take some time, look around the house, the grounds. Have something to eat, meet the people. Or don’t. Take the time you need while you’re here to talk among yourselves. Hell, if you decide you want to leave here tonight, I won’t stop you.”  
  
Rick looked down, dropping his hands to his sides and shoving them into his back pockets. “Thank you.”  
  
Jesus nodded. “No, thank _you_.”  
  
“We haven’t done anything or agreed to anything yet. Your ‘thanks’ might be a bit premature.”  
  
“All of you coming here, hearing me out and not storming away to the tune of a giant ‘fuck you’ is plenty enough right now for me to be thankful for,” the younger man rebutted. A small smile toyed at the corner of his lips. “You haven’t said yes, but you haven’t said no either. I’d say that’s enough hope to get me through another day.”  
  
Rick cocked his head slightly to the side and shrugged. “Yeah, well, don’t get those hopes up.”  
  
“When can we meet these other communities? The kingdom and…what else?” Daryl asked; his voice gruff as usual.  
  
“Alexandria,” Jesus answered. “Alexandria is set up more like the world before. They have electricity, running water, air conditioning. According to its leader, the entire community was designed in the world before as a neighborhood that was planned to be some upscale community, and it has its own solar grid, cisterns and eco-based sewage filtration. It was designed for sustainability. They'd lived in virtual seclusion, just like you are now until a few months ago. It was maybe a few weeks after I found my way to Alexandria and met its leader and residents that the Saviors followed two of Alexandria’s supply runners back from a supply trip. Negan himself made the trip after Alexandria initially retaliated. The entire community was surrounded by the Saviors. The guy manning their gate was shot dead. When Negan got inside, he made the same example of them that his men did here. He took one of them and beat him to death. After that, Alexandria bent a knee to Negan like the rest of us. It’s harder for them, though, because they weren’t farming like us or the Kingdom. They’d been relying on supply runs, which is why they rely heavily on trading with us.”  
  
“How’d you find all this out?” Finn inquired, leaning against the unlit fireplace while intermittently biting at a hangnail.  
  
“I mentioned I had a boyfriend. He used to live in Alexandria. The man who was beaten to death had been his boyfriend. He couldn’t handle living there anymore; constantly reminded of what he lost, so he came here. For peace of mind, maybe. When he arrived, he let me know what happened. That’s how I know.”  
  
“Where’s he now?” Lewis, who tended to stay silent in most discussions, spoke up.  
  
“Upstairs probably,” Jesus shrugged. “During the day, everyone is outside most of the time, keeping themselves busy with one thing or another. Aaron takes solace in the quiet the house provides then, though he’s begun to come out of his shell over the last few weeks.”  
  
“Aaron his name?” Though posed as a question, Rick meant it as mostly rhetorical.  
  
Jesus nodded. “Tomorrow, if you’d like, I can take you to the Kingdom, to meet King Ezekiel and discuss adding your community to the trade network. And, if you decide to, we can broach the subject of fighting the Saviors with him. I’m not sure what his answer will be, but it’d be worth it to try. I know Alexandria would probably agree to fight with us. Their people are a bit more restless under Negan’s thumb than the Kingdom. They have a few hotheads who would be great fighters if we could properly organize. If we go to the Kingdom tomorrow morning, we might have time to head out to Alexandria afterward. We could possibly hit up both in a day.”  
  
Rick sighed. Turning, he looked around at his friends and his wife; reading their faces to see where they stood on all this so far. “I think sleeping on this would be best,” he replied after a few moments of mulling it over. “This isn’t something we can just go head first into without a solid plan, but that’s also assuming we decide to do this at all.”  
  
“I completely understand,” Jesus asserted. “I know it’s not an easy decision. It’s not something to take lightly.”  
  
Rick nodded. “Well, I appreciate that. We won’t take off tonight. We’ll stay until morning and we’ll give you our decision then, in regard to everything we’ve just talked about here.”  
  
“Sounds good. And, like I said, please feel free to get to know Hilltop and its people and have something to eat. You can see yourself out and I’ll see to getting all of you set up with a place to stay for the night.”  
  
“Thank you,” Rick muttered. Looking from the younger man and then back to his own people again, he gave the latter a collective nod and then gestured to them with a slight tilt of the head to exit the office.  
  
Pulling open the double doors, Rick led the way out of the office and into the grand foyer. Everyone had begun to quietly filter out behind him in such a clump that he wasn’t yet aware that Jo had chosen to hang back a bit. At the sound of the front door opening and the others stepping back outside of the house, Jo turned and looked at a curious Jesus. She didn’t say anything to him initially, though. She was simply looking at him, but also away from him in thought, so he chose to be the one to break the silence.  
  
“I want to thank you for all you said before,” he remarked, folding his arms across his chest and stepping closer. “I know it’s a scary situation to be thrown into but you get it. Not many people would.”  
  
Jo bit her bottom lip and considered her next words carefully. With a steady breath, she brought her gaze back over to him. “We’re not unfamiliar with men like Negan, not in the least. We’re used to being the underdog, of being outnumbered against an opposition with more people than us. Getting to where we are now has been a long fight and fighting take its toll, both physically and mentally. But, if it weren’t for fighting, we wouldn’t have what we have. If we just sat back and let the bad guy roll over us, we’d probably all have been dead for the last year or longer. We’ve lost a lot of people, but we’ve also gained a lot of people. Each person has become part of our family, because we’ve fought for each other and alongside each other. We’re better people because of each other. There’s nothing we wouldn’t do for each other.” She began to study the way Jesus had cast his gaze downward at the floor but that he was listening intently to what she was saying, and she appreciated how he gave her his full attention and how understanding to her group’s doubts he was. “I’m going to tell you a story that I don’t much like to talk about anymore.”  
  
Bringing his gaze back upward, Jesus locked his blue eyes with Jo’s green. “You don’t have to—”  
  
“A few months into this new world, I found a girl in the woods, separated from her mother and the rest of her group. I took her into my care and tried to help her find her people. She stayed with me. I protected her, I kept her fed and found shelter for us both as we traveled along. I was even there when she got her first period. She became a daughter to me, and I a mother to her. Then we met a man on the road, a charming man, who brought us back his community; a town walled off from the outside threat that was the dead. It seemed too good to be true, and it was. The man was a megalomaniac and he…he took advantage of me in the worst possible way. As a result, I became pregnant. When I tried to leave with the girl who had become my daughter, he found me and we fought. I destroyed his eye with my thumb and he almost killed me, but he stopped when I told him I was carrying his child. He could’ve assumed I was lying to save my skin, which I technically was, but he chose to spare my life. When he was able to confirm I was pregnant, he locked me in a windowless room in a basement with only a mattress to sleep on and a literal pot to piss in. I ate off the floor like an animal and he also had me chained to the wall by my leg like one. He kept me like that for about six months, give or take. He was only keeping me alive until the baby was born and then he planned on killing me afterward.”  
  
“Shit,” Jesus muttered in dismay.  
  
“Toward the end of my stay, he began to take advantage again, but my release came in the form of Merle—that colorful redneck of a man with the missing hand that came with us here. He got me and my adopted daughter out, but he couldn’t go with us at the time. About a week later, Rick and a few others found us, including my daughter’s real mother. Rick’s group happened to be the group she was originally with, that she got separated from. They took me in, we found a prison that we secured and made a home in. The child I was pregnant with, my daughter, was born there. Rick delivered her. But then that man, that charming man who wasn’t so charming, he found us. He attacked and we lost a few good people. We knew we had to fight back but we didn’t have a lot of people. We managed, though. We had enough weapons on us, and we knew the layout of this town where the bad man was and, under the cover of night, we snuck in and we went for him.”  
  
Jo stepped over to one of the ornate sofas and sat down while Jesus remained standing as he listened to her speak with bated breath.  
  
“Where did all this happen?”  
  
“Back in Georgia, where we all came from,” she answered, staring across the room toward the opened double doors. “The mistake we made then was not killing that man without hesitation. We had the opportunity, but let it slip through our fingers and it cost us another friend in the process. We should’ve shot first and asked questions later. He got the upper hand, took me as hostage to get away free, and in that chaos, he took me outside the town and into a house where he tried attacking me again. I stabbed him, but not fatally. His friends came to his rescue and he got away. For a little over half a year after that, we got complacent with our lives at the prison. We sent out searches for him, but those searches were halfhearted. We didn’t believe, wherever he was, that he posed a threat to us anymore. And we were wrong. He came back, with new people, plenty of weapons and even a tank. He attacked, murdered Rick’s ex-wife, and we lost so many people. We lost the prison, our home. Rick was almost beaten to death by that monster. But I got my revenge. I stabbed him with my sword through the chest and then I cut off his head.”  
  
“Fuck.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo agreed. “I lost my daughter. She was separated from us. Along the way, we encountered a group of cannibals that wanted to kill and eat us. We were outnumbered again. We were literally being led to slaughter, but again Merle came to the rescue. Fired a rocket launcher, of all things, at a gas tank and blew it up. The explosion caused a distraction and it gave us the upper hand to get free, to escape. After that, we found a sign from one of our friends who had our daughter, and I say ‘our’ because Rick became her father. He was raising her with me. The sign said to come to DC. We didn’t know why he went there, but we followed. We ran into many an obstacle, we lost people, we gained people, and then we lost more people. My brother, one of our friends and I were attacked by these two men. They knocked my brother out cold and took my friend and I with them. They claimed to be part of a larger group and they were going to rape my friend. I offered myself up instead, but I never let it get to that point. I took matters into my own hands. I did what I had to do to protect myself and save my friend. We got away, we made our way back to our group and then continued on. When we got to this area, we settled temporarily outside the city, just north of Arlington. It was a place we could’ve possibly stayed in a long time, but our main goal was finding our daughter and our friend. So we spread out in three groups. One went for medical supplies at Georgetown while the other two went into the city. There we lost two more of our friends. One of those deaths was caused by a group we referred to as The Marauders, led by a man called Sarge. Real Mad Max types. The friend they killed, they had taken hostage and we were able to get him back in exchange for all our supplies and our weapons. So we did that. We offered it all up to get him back, and they took our supplies, and they took our vehicles. But they let us keep our weapons and leave. We had to promise never to come back into the city, because the city belonged to them, though they did offer to let us join them. As we left, they shot our friend in the back of the head as we walked away. When we went to make it back to where we’d been staying, we realized we were being followed by two of those Marauders and Rick took care of that, but we knew we weren’t safe. We couldn’t stay there any longer.”  
  
“So,” Jesus spoke up. “What about your daughter? Were you able to find her and your friend that had her?”  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, but Sarge had. He saw our friend after he’d buried our daughter and then killed himself in return. We found our daughter’s grave and what was left of our friend’s body. It had been eaten by walkers, so we buried what was left beside our daughter. Then we made our way to Mount Vernon because my brother’s girlfriend, who we lost at Christmas, had mentioned how it would be sustainable, and it has been.” Turning, Jo placed her hands upon her stomach; feeling a slight somersault movement from her daughter inside the womb. “I decided to tell you all of this because I want you to understand one thing.”  
  
“Alright.”  
  
“This world keeps trying to knock us down, but my people and I—we rise up. In the end, when push comes to shove, we fight back. We find a way. We _always_ find a way.” Jo looked up at Jesus with conviction in her eyes. “Nothing— _no one_ —keeps us down. We have been made to feel powerless one too many times. We have been knocked down to our knees. We’ve taken on the living and the dead. So don’t count us out for fighting the next fight. I know what my husband said; not to get your hopes up. But that’s exactly what you should do. Hold onto that hope, no matter what. Don’t give up on it.”  
  
Jesus began to smile brightly at her. “You know, I think you’re my new best friend.”  
  
Jo smirked back at him and then brought her gaze back to the double doors when she noticed someone standing in the doorway, looking back inside the room at her and Jesus.  
  
“Hey,” a man with short, curly hair and blue eyes greeted with a polite smile.  
  
Jesus immediately perked up at the other man’s presence. “Hey, uh, Aaron, this is Jo. Jo’s with a new group of people that might trade with us. Jo, this is Aaron.”  
  
“The boyfriend,” Jo smiled, knowingly.  
  
“Yeah, that’s me,” Aaron replied, blushing only slightly. “I, uh, didn’t mean to eavesdrop but I was coming down the stairs when I heard the tail end of everything you just said.” He eyed Jo specifically and stepped inside the room. “Thank you for all that. Hearing that—you have no idea how much I needed to hear something like that. Your conviction alone gives me my own hope back that the world doesn’t have to be what it is right now.” Casting a glance over at Jesus, he asked, “Do they know about the Sav—”  
  
Jesus cut Aaron off with a nod of his head. “They know everything.”  
  
“Will they help?”  
  
With a shrug, Jesus looked at Jo and smiled again. “We sure hope so.”  
  
Gripping the armrest of the sofa, Jo pulled herself up to her feet and smiled her own smile between both men and then settled her gaze upon Jesus. “Thank you for letting me talk your ear off.”  
  
“No, thank _you_. Seriously. You’ve been through a lot but your optimism helps. It can really help us move forward. We could take that optimism and your conviction to the Kingdom and convince them to fight with us, easily, I think.”  
  
Turning away from Jesus, Jo looked over to Aaron again and gave him a polite nod of her head. “It was nice meeting you, and I’m happy to have given you hope again.” Clearing her throat, she began to take a few steps toward the double doors. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I going to go catch up with my husband in case he gets worried about where I went.”  
  
Without another word, Jo head out into the grand foyer. Turning right, she walked up to the front door and opened it up to step out into the late afternoon light. Closing the door behind her, she looked to her right and saw her brother and Merle over by the blacksmith while Michonne, Tyreese and Lewis were in the midst of accepting something to eat from a food stall.  
  
The sound of a throat clearing caught her attention.  
  
Looking to her left, Jo found Rick and Daryl sitting at the base of the stairs, looking back up at her rather expectantly.  
  
“Were you taking a dump?” Daryl teased.  
  
“No,” she replied with a roll of her eyes. She descended the stone steps and then turned so that she was facing both men as she glanced down at them. “I was talking to Jesus.”  
  
Rick made a face. “In any other context one might think you were religious,” he teased. “What were you talking about?”  
  
“Everything.”  
  
Rick just stared back at her, chewing the inside of his bottom lip. After a moment, he gave a slight nod of his head. “I think we should take him up on his offer and get something to eat. My stomach is growling.”  
  
Standing up, Rick brushed his hands on the side of his pants and walked off in the direction of the food stalls, leaving Jo behind with Daryl.  
  
“I think he’s still pissed at me for coming here,” she remarked.  
  
Daryl waved her comment off and shrugged. “Nah, he’s just in a mood. He’s been in one since we got caught on the road with those Saviors last month; since he lost his finger. I think it gave him a scare he doesn’t want to admit to. Like, one of those life-flashing-before-the-eyes moments and he’s gone scared to take any unnecessary risks.”  
  
“Our entire existence is a risk these days.”  
  
“Yeah,” Daryl grunted. “You’re telling me.”  
  
“We can’t just sit idly by, though.” Jo turned and looked at Daryl until he felt her eyes on him and returned her gaze. “We’re gonna have to fight, sooner or later. I will _not_ be forced to kneel for any asshole with a God complex.”  
  
“I hear ya,” Daryl nodded. Balling his right hand into a fist, he held it out front of her. Jo caught on, knowing this to be a thing Tara usually did. Reciprocating the gesture, she bumped her fist against Daryl’s and both of them smiled. “C’mon, let’s get some grub,” he spoke again, giving her arm a nudge with his elbow.  
  
With a nod of her head, Jo began to follow after him.

 

* * *

  
  
That night, most of the group had been split up between two different trailers that were currently vacant while Rick and Jo were offered a small bedroom on the second floor that also sat empty. Before the entire Hilltop community, with the exception of the men on watch duty, had turned in for the night, Rick had approached Jesus with the decision that his group would go to the Kingdom the next morning, but just the Kingdom. He didn’t want to rush into anything and wanted to take his time getting to know each community. He believed they could, at the very least, still go forward with establishing trade routes among each other, but was still on the fence in regard to fighting the Saviors.  
  
Jesus was pleased to hear this; pleased at any bit of good news for going forward.  
  
As they lay in bed together, Jo found herself staring up at the ceiling, unable to sleep. Everything they had been told about Negan and the Saviors, and everything she had told Jesus about her group, was weighing heavily on her mind and on her heart.  
  
Turning her head to the left, she took in the sight Rick asleep on his side, with his back to her while he snored gently. She envied how easily he’d been able to fall asleep. Most nights she couldn’t anyway because that’s when the baby decided to become active and the constant motion within her didn’t exactly help. Tonight, it wasn’t just the baby that kept her awake and she knew she couldn’t get any rest until she did something about it.  
  
She had to make a decision about what was plaguing her mind and her heart.  
  
Slowly and quietly, Jo sat up. Turning to her right, she twisted at the waist and set her feet down upon the ground before pushing herself up to stand. As soon as she was upright, she tossed a look over her shoulder to see if Rick had stirred at all. Confident that he was still very much asleep, Jo padded softly across the floor of the foreign bedroom and reached the door. As slowly and as quietly as she had sat up in bed, she turned the doorknob and opened the door. Stepping out into the upstairs hall, Jo looked across toward the stairwell leading down to the grand foyer, but her gaze soon found its focus upon another door at the other end of the hallway.  
  
Silent as the grave Jo tiptoed to that other door until she stood in front of it. Lifting her fist, she tapped the knuckles from her index and middle fingers upon the door and then waited. After a few moments, she repeated the gestured and again waited.  
  
This time, she heard movement on the other side, followed by the muffled sound of a voice saying something akin to ‘hold on’ or ‘who’s there?’  
  
When the footsteps on the other side of the door got nearer, the door opened a crack and Jo found Aaron staring back at her with tired eyes.  
  
“Hey, Jo,” he whispered. “Is everything okay?”  
  
“I need to talk to Jesus. Now.”  
  
Aaron knitted his brow and then opened the door wider and stepped aside. “Alright. C’mon in.”  
  
Flashing a sheepish smile at him, Jo accepted the invitation into the bedroom and was greeted by the sight of Jesus sitting up, shirtless, in bed. “I’m sorry to bother you so late,” she remarked as Aaron shut the door behind her and then walked around her to sit down on Jesus’ side of the bed.  
  
“It’s okay,” Jesus assured as both he and Aaron looked expectantly up at her.  
  
“I didn’t interrupt anything, did I?” she asked, somewhat amused, as she gestured toward Jesus; acknowledging his state of undress and how she was unaware if that included his bottom half or not.  
  
Jesus and Aaron both gave a small chuckle.  
  
“No, you didn’t interrupt anything,” Jesus assured. Then, more seriously, he asked, “What can we do for you?”  
  
“I need you to do me an incredibly large favor, and I need you to not tell Rick or the rest of my people about it.”  
  
Both men instantly sat up a bit straighter and their curiosity was monumentally peaked.  
  
“Um, okay,” Jesus agreed.  
  
Whatever Jo was going to tell them, she seemed gravely serious about it. “I need you to promise me. Promise me you won’t say anything to anyone.”  
  
Jesus and Aaron looked between each other, frowned, but then they looked back to Jo and nodded their heads rather adamantly.  
  
“We promise,” Aaron muttered.  
  
“We won’t tell anyone about whatever you’re gonna tell us,” Jesus added.  
  
“Okay, first, I need you to get a piece of paper and then I need you to draw me a map…”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy the cliffhanger, because you have no idea how crazy the next chapter is gonna get. Bwahahaha. As always, enjoy and R&R, my pretties!
> 
> xoxo —Holly


	60. Risk

_“There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction.”_ — John F. Kennedy

* * *

  
  
Within minutes of the sun rising on the new day, the light seeped right through the window in the room where Rick and Jo were sleeping and fell upon Rick’s face. It took a few moments of wondering where the light was coming from as he began waking up. Lifting his head, he squinted and looked up toward the window with a scowl before looking over his shoulder to find Jo, still asleep, and lying on her side facing him with an extra pillow propped up under her stomach. Shifting carefully around so that he was sitting upright, he watched how Jo slept with her mouth slightly parted and how she snored very softly. She was gorgeous to him, even with the glistening of drool at the corner of her mouth.  
  
It made Rick smile, and any aggravation he’d felt yesterday about her coming to Hilltop was easily forgotten and forgiven just like that.  
  
Of course, if he told her _specifically_ that he had forgiven her, he knew she’d get mad at him, putting him in his place that there was nothing she needed to be forgiven for because she didn’t do anything wrong and he didn’t want that stress for either of them; especially her, not in her condition. Which was _another_ thing he wouldn’t he wouldn’t verbalize, because it would incite another argument. Jo hated having anyone refer to her being pregnant as a condition or treating her like she would break like some porcelain doll if she so much as lifted a finger.  
  
It’s not that they argued much. Quite rarely, actually; a big difference from when he’d been married to Lori. If he had to go out of his way to avoid an argument with her, then so be it. With the world as it was—all the things they’d been through, were going through, and anything very likely to come—Rick didn’t want anything else to cast a shadow over their lives; least of all infighting.  
  
So he sat there, enjoying how peaceful and beautiful she look while lost in whatever dreams she might be having, and he hoped they were good ones. He enjoyed the way the sun bathed over her hair and made it shine as bright as the sunlight itself. He enjoyed how puffy her bottom lip looked due to the pillow she was resting the side of her face on pushing against her cheek. He enjoyed the fullness of her stomach and of her chest from the pregnancy. Letting his eyes wander to her stomach, he studied it and then gently rested the palm of his hand upon it; wondering if their daughter was awake.  
  
While waiting for what felt like several minutes, he shifted his hand around her stomach, but lightly as not to disturb and wake Jo in the process. Eventually, toward the underside of her stomach, Rick finally felt the slight push of movement from inside her as his child’s limb attempted a stretch.  
  
It brought the biggest smile to his face and anything bad that had ever happened to him disappeared from his mind for a brief moment. That simple movement, that push from within Jo that he was able to feel, that contact from his unborn daughter, was all-consuming. His mind quickly traipsed through different thoughts about what she would look like; whose eyes would she have, would she end up with Jo’s straight blonde hair or Rick’s brown curls? Or maybe a mix of both: straight brown hair or blonde curls. Would she grow up and have a light, bubbly voice or a deep, velvety voice? Would she be feminine or a tomboy? Being raised in this world, would she grow up with harder edges; desensitized to death and violence? Would she wield a gun or blade like some natural-born warrior princess? Rick supposed there was some allure to that. Who wouldn’t want a badass for a child? As long as she grew up happy, healthy and well-rounded, also being natural warrior wouldn’t be so bad. At least he’d know she could defend and protect herself and others.  
  
“You have the weirdest look on your face now,” Jo muttered; her voice a bit groggy.  
  
Rick turned and looked upon her face to see her starting to wipe her eyes free of the crust that had formed in the corners while she’d been asleep. With a smile, he shrugged. “Just a little lost in thought.”  
  
“How long have you been up?”  
  
“A few minutes,” he replied with a small smile and still squinting from the offending sunlight from through the window. “I felt the baby moving.”  
  
“Yeah, that’s what woke me. Now I have to go to the bathroom.” Jo began to push herself up into an upright position. “She keeps pushing against my bladder.”  
  
“Lil’ Ass-Kicker like her big sister,” Rick joked, recalling Daryl’s nickname for Hope.  
  
Jo rubbed her stomach and grunted. “More like Lil’ Pain in the Ass.” Turning her body, she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and then tossed Rick a smirk over her shoulder. “Just like her daddy.”  
  
“Hey now,” he retorted with mock offense. “You’re capable of being every bit as much a pain in the ass, too, sometimes.”  
  
“Touché.”  
  
Mirroring Jo, Rick turned toward his side of the bed and draped his legs over the edge. Raising his arms he reached upward toward the high ceiling and waited a moment before the eventual crack between his shoulders blades. Tilting his head from side to side, he cracked his neck too and then flexed his shoulders backward before pushing himself up once he felt stretched and properly awoken for the day that lie ahead for them.  
  
“Did you sleep well, bladder pusher aside?” Rick asked, making his way around to her side of the bed.  
  
“Not really,” she answered honestly. “I couldn’t sleep most of the night and it didn’t really have much to do with the baby. I just had a lot on my mind. I got up and took a walk around the house for a while.”  
  
Rick walked over toward the window, pushing the curtain aside to peer out upon life already buzzing around the Hilltop. Though the view didn’t offer too much of a view. Mostly, all he could see were the tops of the trailers and what looked to be a compost heap. “I never heard you get up.”  
  
“You seemed tired. You were snoring.”  
  
Rick smirked, letting the curtain drop back in place as he looked back over at his wife. “Don’t I usually snore anyway?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Sometimes. You’re not loud, thankfully. I probably don’t notice it most of the time because I’m already dead to the world myself.”  
  
“Hey, let’s not joke about you being dead to the world, okay?”  
  
“It’s just a figure of speech.”  
  
Jo began chewing on her bottom lip; her mind beginning to wander to the night before while she’d gotten up. Out the corner of her eye she could see Rick reaching for his boots and leaning forward to slip them on before pulling his pant legs down over them, as they’d both slept in their clothes from the day before. It was uncommon for them nowadays since settling in at Mount Vernon and having actual pajamas to change into each night and clean clothes to wear every day. It had been a while since they were back on the road, staying anywhere that wasn’t home to them. Granted, this was only a temporary stay.  
  
“Where’d you go?”  
  
Jo looked directly at Rick and blinked. “Huh?”  
  
“You were daydreaming.”  
  
“Oh, just still tired, I guess.”  
  
“Why don’t you stay here at the Hilltop today while Jesus takes us to the Kingdom?”  
  
Jo nodded. “That was actually my plan. Yesterday was eventful enough getting to see this place. Despite my protests to come here, I think this is as far as I go until we go home.”  
  
Rick smiled and sauntered up to her. Cupping the side of her face with his hand, he leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “Get something to eat, see us off, and then come back up here and get some more sleep. Or get a better feel for the people here. They have a gynecologist. Pay him a visit and get a proper check-up.” Rick shrugged. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. Nicole has been great. She’s family now. But pre-natal ain’t exactly her specialty. It’d be nice to have someone who knows more about the subject take care of you for a bit.”  
  
“Maybe we could have Karen come here to give birth, or have the doctor come to us at Mount Vernon,” Jo suggested. “Jesus seems like a reasonable guy. I’m sure he’d loan his doctor to us for a little bit.”  
  
“That’s something you could talk to the doctor about while we’re gone.” Rick looked toward the door and then back down at Jo. “Let’s head outside for now, though, okay?”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Taking Jo by the hand, he helped lift her up, which wasn’t always a simple task lately; her stomach getting in the way of the simplest activities, like putting shoes on. Before they headed for the door, Rick lifted his utility belt off of a desk and pulled it around his waist. Jo opened the door up, waiting for him to get situated before heading out of the room first.  
  
“Jo, your shoes.”  
  
Jo turned around and looked back at Rick before looking down at her own feet, realizing she’d forgotten to put her own boots on. “Shit. Pregnancy brain.”  
  
Rick smirked, beckoning her over. Crouching down, he brought her boots over and let her brace herself with her hands on his shoulders as he helped her slip her feet into her boots, one at a time. They were a new pair he’d found for her a while back, knowing that as her pregnancy progressed, her feet would swell and her regular boots wouldn’t fit well anymore, and he’d been correct. These new boots were an entire size bigger than her former pair and even then they were a snug fit.  
  
“Just think,” Rick muttered, letting his hands linger on her calves, “once we get home, you can go back to being barefoot and pregnant in the house all you want.”  
  
“You could find me flip-flops.”  
  
“Didn’t you almost trip and kill yourself the last time I found flip-flops for you to wear?”  
  
“To be fair, those flip-flops you found at the prison were way too big for my feet. The right size would work fine.”  
  
Standing up, Rick let his hands drag up her sides and then rest on her hips. “I’ll get right on that.”  
  
Grinning, Jo leaned forward and brushed her nose against his when he leaned in to meet her halfway. “Love you.”  
  
“Love you more.”  
  
Once they’d left the bedroom and made their way downstairs, they were greeted by Jesus who was talking with Aaron in his office about something. The leader of Hilltop smiled pleasantly upon noticing the couple but his eyes seemed a bit nervous when he gazed primarily upon Jo. But, the moment seemed to pass as he gestured for them to head outside with him to get breakfast. Aaron and Jesus exchanged looks with each other behind Rick and Jo; the four of them exiting the house and making their way over to some picnic tables where the rest of Rick and Jo’s group was already up and having something to eat.  
  
Rick had gone and gotten something for himself as well as for Jo, and she took it, but only picked. She wasn’t feeling hungry. If anything her stomach was in anxious knots and eating anything would likely only exacerbate the situation. She knew Rick had noticed she wasn’t eating and he thankfully didn’t make a show of it. Jesus and Aaron sat across from them at the picnic table, nursing what looked to be cups of tea instead of food. Jo assumed they must’ve either eaten already or they, like her, weren’t hungry. She lifted her gaze and shared it between both men and they smiled politely back at her; knowing what was on her mind and plaguing it, because it was something they’d been privy to since the early hours of the morning when she visited their room.  
  
Turning and watching her friends—her _family_ —talk among themselves, none the wiser about what she was going to happen after they left for the Kingdom, she began to second guess herself. Her right leg bobbed out of nerves and she picked thumbnail with the nail from her opposite index finger. She had already run through all the likely scenarios of things that could go wrong, as well as those that could go right, and she truly believed it would go right. She felt it deep in her gut, but it didn’t necessarily make her feel any less guilty or worried. Then again, she supposed that was the fuel she needed. If she went ahead with what she had planned without any fear, she could get cocky and there could be serious consequences that she would bring down on, not only her own head, but others.  
  
She was going to use that fear and that worry to her favor.  
  
Jo was strong. She knew she was.  
  
All the things she’d suffered and survived; it was like practice for this next step she was going to undertake.  
  
“Earth to Jo—come in, over.”  
  
Jo blinked and looked down the table at her brother, sitting there and smiling in her direction. “Huh?”  
  
“Don’t mind her,” Rick spoke up, placing a hand on her lower back and giving it a slight rub. “She didn’t sleep much last night. She’s just overtired and zoning.”  
  
Jo smiled appreciatively up at him and nodded. “Yeah, the baby was restless last night and so was my mind,” she replied, pushing some hair behind her ear. “I’ll be staying back here while the rest of you go with Jesus to the Kingdom. Try and catch up on sleep. Maybe visit that doctor they have here.”  
  
“Carson is great,” Jesus confirmed. “We’re lucky we have him here. Doctors are like unicorns these days.”  
  
“We have an ER nurse, but having a doctor definitely earns ya some serious bragging rights,” Merle quipped, sitting sideways on the bench seat at the far end of the picnic table.  
  
“I dunno about that,” Lewis interjected with a shrug, staring down at his plate. “In my experience, nurses have done more for patients in the long run than most doctors I’ve dealt with, and Nicole is pretty damn great at what she does. We’re lucky to have _her_.”  
  
Finn grinned and nudged Lewis. “I think you’re just saying that ‘cause you’re sweet on her.”  
  
The banter continued on from that for a short while longer until Rick began to rally everyone together back to their van and armed with their weapons. As stated, Jo was staying behind and part of her was nervous to watch them all load up in the vehicle without her. The thought of this possibly being the last time she saw any of them again weighed heavily and she could only imagine how angry Rick and Finn would be with her if they knew her true motives for staying behind. They would be beyond furious, but she had accepted this was something she needed to do, regardless of how dangerous or reckless it might be viewed.  
  
She had hope, though.  
  
It was enough.  
  
Before Finn climbed into the van, Jo threw her arms around his shoulders and held him tight. “Be safe,” she murmured. “Come back alive, and in one piece.”  
  
“I’ll do my best.”  
  
“I love you.” Leaning back, she smiled up at him, something of which had always amused her; the fact that she was older but he was taller. The memory of him finally surpassing her in height still seemed fresh in her mind. She had been twenty-four and he sixteen. It felt like something that happened overnight. One minute he was a little thing, the next minute he was a giant.  
  
“Love ya, too, sis.” Finn smiled back at her and placed a kiss on her cheek before stepping away and slipping inside the van beside Michonne as the others began to follow after.  
  
Jesus and Rick still lingered outside with Jo and Aaron; the foursome looking between each other with nervous smiles, and all for different reasons.  
  
Bringing his focus primarily onto Jo, Rick closed the gap between their bodies and held her to him for a few moments; neither saying anything, just enjoying the embrace.  
  
“You should be going,” Jo finally spoke; breaking into the silence as she leaned back from Rick but remained in his arms in a sort of side hug. “You don’t want to lose daylight. You don’t want to be traveling back here at nightfall.”  
  
“If need be, I’m sure King Ezekiel could provide all of us with lodging for the night, but I doubt we’ll be gone all day,” Jesus replied, throwing a knowing look at Jo.  
  
“Well, make the most of your time, though. Don’t rush anything. See it through.”  
  
Rick looked between Jo and Jesus. It seemed like he was trying to read between the lines, and even if he was, he didn’t seem to catch on to the double meaning being spoken. “We’ll be on our best behavior,” Rick assured. “I’ll turn on that southern charm on that snared you.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “It wasn’t your charm that snared me,” she retorted with a grin. “It was that walk of yours.”  
  
Rick mirrored her with his own chuckle and then leaned down to kiss her. “Yeah, okay. Go take a nap.”  
  
“Like I told Finn: come back alive, and in one piece.”  
  
Holding up his left hand, Rick frowned. “Well, I’ll do what I can to return with everything I left with this time, but I can’t make any promises.”  
  
“Then, at least come back alive.”  
  
“I think I can definitely manage that,” Rick replied, giving her one last kiss before stepping around to the driver’s side.  
  
“Love you,” Jo called out as he opened the door.  
  
“Love you, too.” Rick winked and slid into the driver’s seat.  
  
Jo turned and watched as Jesus and Aaron exchanged a brief hug and kiss with each other and a muttering of something that went unheard by her ears. As she took a step back with Aaron, they watched as Jesus was the last to climb into the van; riding shotgun again in order to direct Rick toward the Kingdom. She watched through the windshield as Rick waved and nodded at her and then started the van up. She watched as the van lurched forward and then did a circle around the front of Barrington House in order to head for the gate, which was promptly open for them. She watched as the van slipped outside of the walls and the gate was closed, and how life within the Hilltop resumed without missing a beat.  
  
After a few moments of just staring at the closed gate, Jo turned and looked at Aaron. She exhaled a deep, steadying breath and resting her hands across the front of her protruding stomach.  
  
“You don’t have to do this now, you know,” Aaron muttered. “We should really wait for them to get back later and see what the answer from the Kingdom is.”  
  
“And if the answer is negative? If the Kingdom won’t join the good fight?” Jo shook her head. “I know this is risky, and very stupid. But it’s necessary.”  
  
“Is it really?” Aaron turned and looked back at her this time, placing his hands upon his hips.  
  
“Yes,” Jo nodded, adamantly. “It is. And you know what they say: no one ever expects the Spanish Inquisition.”  
  
Aaron shook his head with a slightly nervous laugh. “This isn’t exactly the Spanish Inquisition you’re undertaking.”  
  
“Well, no, obviously. Not technically, but you know what I’m saying. I mean, look at me.” Aaron did, giving her a once over as he watched the way she gestured to her body as a whole. She smirked and continued. “I’m a goddamn Trojan horse. Who would expect the pregnant lady?”  
  
“And that’s _why_ you should probably reconsider this. Think of the baby.”  
  
“I _am_ thinking of my child. Of my _children_. I know what I’m about and what I’m capable of. I know what I can do and get done. They’re the end game. Everything is for them. _This_ is for them,” Jo remarked. She subconsciously mimicked Aaron’s stance, standing there beside him with her hands upon her hips. “I have this one window of opportunity and I need to take it. I just hope Jesus can keep his mouth shut long enough to give me a head start.”  
  
“He will. We both agreed to help you, to keep this to ourselves.” Then, “But, you’re not doing this alone.”  
  
“What?”  
  
Aaron placed a hand upon Jo’s elbow and began to lead her up to the house. “I’m not letting you do this alone; I don’t care what you say. I don’t care how pregnant you are either. I will find a way to throw you over my shoulder if I have to.”  
  
“Aaron, no—”  
  
“Negan took the man I love from me. I watched Negan bludgeon Eric’s head in until it was nothing more than a pile of mush; pieces of bone, chunks of brain and a pool of blood. One minute he was alive and standing at my side and we had our whole lives together ahead of us. Then he was being dragged away from me, forced to kneel in front of that monster and he was gone.” Aaron ushered them both inside the house and closed the front door behind them as they stood in the grand foyer. “If anyone here has reason to see this through, it’s me.”  
  
Jo chewed the inside of her bottom lip and considered what he said. She tried putting herself in his shoes and realized she _had_ been in his shoes before, and that’s why she knew she could do this. She had the experience of killing the person who had hurt her and the ones she loved before. She couldn’t allow Aaron to do what she planned to do, though. He’d be shot on sight, whereas she knew she wouldn’t.  
  
“Fine,” Jo muttered with a huff. “But you’re not coming all the way.”  
  
Aaron looked like he was about to argue with her, but his gaze softened as he held her gaze. “Okay,” he caved. “I’ll drive you. I’ll get you there. I’ll watch from a distance to make sure you get the rest of the way safely. I need to be involved in a greater capacity than just being in the know.”  
  
Jo smiled. Raising a hand, she rested it upon Aaron’s upper arm. “I guess it’d be nice to have a little bit of company.”  
  
Aaron smiled back at her and then exhaled a shaky breath. “Alright then. Let’s get this done.”

 

* * *

  
  
One herd, one roadblock of vehicles and a little over an hour later, the van had reached its final destination as it pulled into some sort of empty lot closed in by a few trees and a couple abandoned brick buildings. The lot, itself, had plenty of weeds and overgrowth growing up from between the cracks in the pavement and there were a small handful of broken down, abandoned vehicles, too. Two of which were at the base of small paved incline; a red truck and an old school Volkswagen beetle that was so dirty that it was difficult to tell just what color it actually was. Rick was leaning toward forest green, but he could be mistaken.  
  
“This is it?” Rick questioned, hopping out of the van, but leaving the door wide open. Turning to look over the hood of the vehicle, he allowed his hand to hover over his Colt out of habit while casting a glance at Jesus, who had also climbed out of the van.  
  
“Well, not exactly. This is just as far as we can go before our escorts arrive.”  
  
As the others began to climb out of the van, the sounds of hooves clopping upon pavement alerted everyone’s senses. Rick whipped around and turned toward where the noises were originating and found two men on horseback, wearing minimal riot gear, coming down the paved incline.  
  
“Halt! Who dares to trespass on the sovereign land of the—oh, hey, Jesus,” announced the younger, leaner man.  
  
Jesus smiled and waved. “Hey, Alvaro.” He then nodded to the second man. “Richard.”  
  
“Jesus,” Richard nodded back, looking more skeptical and off-putting than his partner. “Who are these people with you?”  
  
“New friends from a small community I just found, looking to join our trade network, and maybe more, if you catch my meaning.”  
  
Richard continued his skeptical gaze as he climbed down his horse and led it forward with him as he approached Jesus, Rick and the others. “They're dealing with the same problem every community is dealing with?”  
  
“If you mean the Saviors, we’ve met some on the road already,” Rick interrupted. “They didn’t make it.”  
  
Richard’s attention immediately turned to Rick and his interest was instantly piqued. “You killed Saviors?”  
  
Rick nodded. “We walked away with a few injuries, but yeah, we did,” he replied. “We’re not under their thumb yet, though. They haven’t found our home yet. We’re hoping they won’t, but in the meantime, like Jesus said, we’re interested in opening trade with other communities not bent on murder to get what they want.”  
  
“How haven’t they found you?” Alvaro wondered from atop his horse.  
  
“We’ve kept to ourselves; we’re pretty closed off and mostly self-sustaining. We got to where we are during the fall, so we harvested as much vegetation as we could from the gardens already there, we scavenged the rest, but we gained more mouths to feed over the winter and we’re only just now starting to plant fresh. Food is getting low and it’s gonna be a while before we see anything significant,” Michonne offered up. “Until then, we’d need a buffer, and trade is the viable option for us.”  
  
“We’d like to request an audience with the King,” Jesus spoke, primarily eyeing Richard. “We have much to discuss with him.”  
  
Richard nodded. “Alright, but first you gotta hand over all your guns,” he informed. “You’ll get them back when you leave. It’s just protocol.”  
  
Rick looked over at Daryl and then to Jesus who gave him a nod that it was okay. With a sigh, Rick removed his beloved Colt from its holster and stepped forward with it held out to the man with the same name as him. “You lose this, I’ll kill ya,” he remarked with a smile.  
  
Richard smiled back. “You can try.”  
  
Rick liked him already.  
  
One by one, Richard gathered every gun from each person and placed them either in the saddle bag on his horse or in the saddle bag on Alvaro’s horse. Once all was said and done, he resumed holding onto the reins to lead his horse forward. Alvaro led all of them overall, though; Jesus, Rick and the others following the two Kingdomers up the paved incline.  
  
The group looked around them, naturally on edge as they approached unfamiliar territory with people they’d just met who had taken their guns from them. Their heightened nerves were understandable and justifiable. Jesus smiled at them all, though, and reassured them it was fine.  
  
“You don’t have to worry. You’re not cattle being led to slaughter,” he remarked. “Quite the opposite, actually.”  
  
That mental image didn’t sit well either way with Rick, as it caused him to think back to Terminus, where they literally were cattle being led to slaughter. Fortunately, they had not met they gruesome ends those bastards there had meant for them, even though they had lost Carol in the process.  
  
They all reached a large wall with a gate made of metal doors that was immediately pulled open for them. As Alvaro continued to lead the way inside, Rick’s group was immediately awestruck by the sights inside the walls. The Kingdom was much larger than the Hilltop, though clearly nowhere near as large in acreage as Mount Vernon. They had much larger buildings though, and a few proper homes it seemed. There were what seemed to be many communal gardens, life going on as if nothing was wrong with the world, and—was that the sound of a choir singing somewhere?  
  
Stopping just inside the walls, Rick’s group looked around and took it all in.  
  
“It’s a bit overwhelming at first,” Jesus smirked. “Dwarfs the Hilltop, for sure.”  
  
“Yeah, you can say that again,” Rick nodded in agreement.  
  
Richard turned around and looked between both Rick and Jesus. “You lot stay here. I’ll inform the King about your arrival and come back with his answer as to whether or not he can see you right now.”  
  
Rick watched at the other man left without another word; leading his horse away alongside Alvaro, and taking all their guns with them in the process. Rick immediately felt naked without his Colt, out in the open with all these strangers around them. Logic and reasoning won out in the end, though. There were children and the elderly all over. No one in their right mind would start trouble in a place like this with so many innocent lives in the way.  
  
“So, what do you think so far?” Jesus inquired.  
  
Placing his hands on his hips, Rick shrugged. “It looks nice, but looks can be deceiving.”  
  
Jesus nodded. “Yeah, but I’m nice to look at and you’ve already seen for yourself that I’m also a good guy, so…”  
  
Rick chuckled. “Yeah, well, I’ll give you my final decision on how I feel about this place after I meet with King Pomp and Circumstance.”

 

* * *

  
  
Trees passed by in such a blur that if Jo didn’t bother looking up to see the sky, she could easily just assume that the sky was actually just different variations of the color green. She was seated in the passenger seat of a light blue sedan that had seen better days but, then again, so had virtually every car in the last two years, give or take a month or two here and there, of the apocalypse. She wore her seatbelt, which was almost ironic, considering she was heading toward an incredibly risky and dangerous situation. Actually, Aaron had insisted on it. It was the first thing he said to her once they got into the car, which was parked outside of the Hilltop for the community’s use. Apparently they preferred keeping their vehicles outside the walls to provide them with more space inside the walls. Jo had obliged Aaron, even though it was something she would’ve done on her own anyway, merely out of decades of habit.  
  
Now, they were on the road.  
  
En route to the Sanctuary.  
  
In the backseat were two bags of supplies. The first bag was the real deal that Aaron would keep with him in the car that was filled with water bottles, food, first aid, binoculars, two flashlights, a pack of batteries and the sound amplifier for him to listen in on people from a distance that Jesus had on him. In fact it was the same bag Jesus had been using. The second bag was a prop of sorts. It held one can of lima beans, a rusty can opener, a bottle of murky water that was only filled halfway, a dirty teddy bear, and a Lady Bic razor. The last item wasn’t too strange but it would provide a perfectly good explanation as to Jo’s appearance which would soon drastically change before she got anywhere near the Sanctuary.  
  
“We can turn back now, you know,” Aaron remarked, briefly taking his eyes away from the road. “It’s not too late to change your mind.”  
  
“I’m not changing my mind,” Jo replied.  
  
Aaron sighed and nodded. “Okay. It was worth a shot.” After a few minutes further of silence, he cracked his knuckles against the steering wheel and then gripped it tightly again. “If something happens to you, I don’t think I can return to the Hilltop.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
“Your husband is a very imposing man. If I returned and told him you were killed during a suicide mission that I drove you to, he’d probably kill me. No, not probably. He _will_ kill me. And, I don’t think I’d want to return anyway. If I’m gonna die, I might as well try and take as many Saviors with me as I can. Even if it’s just one and not Negan, I could die _almost_ happy.”  
  
“How would you know if I died or not?” Jo asked, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“If you were shot before you got inside the front gates…”  
  
“I’ll get through the front gate,” Jo insisted. “I’m getting through the front _door_.”  
  
Aaron sighed again and looked at her. “I wish I shared your conviction. Really, I do. It’s admirable. A bit terrifying, but admirable.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “It’s about hope, and I have a lot of it. It gives life meaning, purpose. Without it, what’s the point? It can’t always be this bad. It has to get better. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but someday.”  
  
“I admire your optimism, too,” Aaron smiled. “I used to have that by the bucketsful.”  
  
“It’s never too late to get more buckets.”  
  
Taking his right hand from the wheel, he gestured to the opened piece of paper on her lap. “I think we’re close now. Which exit are we supposed to turn off?”  
  
“Six-twenty. Braddock Road.”  
  
“Oh shit.” Aaron all but slammed on the breaks, causing Jo to shoot her hands out, drop the map and brace her hands against the dashboard. “Sorry, sorry. I think we just passed it.”  
  
“Okay,” Jo muttered trying to reach down and grab the map up, but to no avail. “No need to slam on the breaks, though.”  
  
“Sorry.”  
  
Putting the car in park, he reached across and leaned down to pick up the map for Jo and then placed it back on her lap. Putting the car back into drive, Aaron went about attempting a three-point turn, and ended up having to add a few extra points to it do to debris in the road he was trying to avoid lest they get a flat tire and end up royally screwed. Once they were traveling back the way they’d just come from, Aaron soon slowed down at the exit coming up on their left. However, due to now driving on the wrong side of the road, turning onto the correct exit was slightly awkward, but manageable. The off-ramp took them in a circle before splitting off into two different directions, so Aaron slowed the car to a stop once again.  
  
“Left, right or straight?”  
  
“Right,” Jo replied, reading the map. “Go about two and a half miles down the road, and then turn left at Union Mill Road. After another two miles we’ll come to an intersection with a Compton Road. Yet another two-ish miles down _that_ road, stop.”  
  
“Stop?” he asked, turning right onto Braddock.  
  
“I’m gonna walk the rest of the way. If we drive any closer, the car could be loud enough for people at the Sanctuary to hear us approach. We’ll stop just before…Centreville Road. Park the car within some trees,” she remarked, gesturing to the map. “Jesus wrote a lot of little notes around the map, describing in detail certain locations. He says there are a few buildings—two, three, four stories tall—just outside the Sanctuary to the east of it. At least one of them should have a line of sight to the rear courtyard, past a fence with walkers on it. Apparently that’s the main entrance. You can get up to one of those buildings and easily keep lookout from there if you want. Safe from the elements and whatnot.”  
  
“I think that’s the least of our worries.”  
  
“I’ll make my way up that main road, but before then I’ll need to make myself…presentable.”  
  
Aaron nodded. “I can help with that. The least amount of risks we can take the better.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Okay.” When she saw he was glancing anxiously at her, she offered a reassuring smile and gestured ahead of them. “Eyes on the road. If you kill us before we get there, I’ll come back as a walker and eat you if you don’t suffer from a fatal head trauma.”

 

* * *

  
  
“It was pointless coming here,” Merle grumbled. “Sumbitch is too scared to fight the bad guy. Stuck up on his lofty throne, hiding behind his walls playing make-believe.”  
  
“It wasn’t pointless,” Rick spoke, looking insistently at the older man. “We set up a trade agreement with him. They’re sending us home with fresh vegetables and fruits as a show of good faith and we’ve gathered a lot of other household supplies, more than we can shake a stick at that we can come back with in exchange.”  
  
“I wonder what it would take to get them to rally together with the other communities,” Finn remarked. “If a place this size, with the amount of people who can fight here was motivated…we sure as shit would have a formidable ally.”  
  
“We’re not in a fight right now,” Rick reminded.  
  
“The fight is a pendulum. It’s swinging closer and closer to us and, before we know it, time’s gonna run out and we’re gonna be sliced in half. My sister was right yesterday. Joining Hilltop and the other communities, gathering to fight, to strike while the iron’s hot, while we have the element of surprise…the Saviors don’t know about us and won’t be expecting us. They won’t be expecting everyone to gather and fight back against being oppressed.” As Finn watched Rick start to shake his head and stalk off, the younger man cut in front of his brother-in-law and placed a hand on his chest for him to stop. “Fighting might not be the safest option right now, we might not all be ready, but it is the _right_ option. It’s the right thing to do. I don’t want to wait until the oppression is brought to our front door and it’s too late. I don’t want to lose one of our own from a baseball bat to the head so this Negan douchebag can show us who’s the boss. Is that _honestly_ what _you_ want, Rick?”  
  
Rick looked his brother-in-law in the eye and then beyond him to the others who seemed in agreement, more or less. “We don’t have the manpower right now.”  
  
“So, we work with what we got for now. We have us, we have Hilltop and Jesus said there’s Alexandria, too, right?” Finn glanced over at Jesus, who nodded.  
  
“Yeah, Alexandria is willing to fight. We’ve just been trying to gather the numbers, a little at a time. And, we need more ammunition.”  
  
“We have ammunition,” Michonne spoke up. “We have guns, bullets. We’ve been stockpiling and haven’t had to use any of it.”  
  
Rick frowned. “We have enough for ourselves, to get out of Mount Vernon if it got overrun.”  
  
Michonne shook her head. “No,” she insisted. “A lot of those runs we’ve taken without you, we’ve found weapons each time. After that run-in with those Saviors on the road, Daryl, José and I looted a basement of a house that was loaded to the gills. Whoever lived there was a gun enthusiast and, for whatever reason, took off or died without any of his or her guns and ammo.”  
  
“How come I haven’t seen any of these so-called guns and ammo?”  
  
“We’ve been keeping them at my place,” Merle answered.  
  
“Why wasn’t I told?”  
  
Merle shrugged. “You didn’t ask what we came back with. You were busy in the garden, and then it was just out of sight out of mind.”  
  
Rick shifted his weight and rested his hands on his hips; clearly aggravated now. “How have they been out of sight, out of mind? You just said they’re all at your place?”  
  
“It’s not like they’re out in the open for anyone to see,” Merle replied. “They’re packed in totes or in the loft upstairs.”  
  
“We loaded them up there because it was the direction we came back in. We didn’t want to keep all of it in the house and we didn’t want them anywhere unattended,” Michonne spoke. “We _were_ going to tell you. We weren't purposely keeping it from you.”  
  
“ _No one_ knew about it,” Daryl added. “Just us three.”  
  
“Well, when were you planning on saying something?” Rick questioned.  
  
“Soon. We all just kinda fell back into our regular routines around the property. It really was just out of sight, out of mind,” Michonne maintained.  
  
Before Rick could comment further in annoyance, Richard came walking out of the same building Rick and the others exited. He seemed just as frustrated as Rick’s group about King Ezekiel’s decision not to fight the Saviors—at least not at this time, anyway.  
  
“I’m sorry about in there,” Richard muttered, his gaze focused on Rick. “I was hoping that with the lot of you coming here, he would see the light. But I want you to know that I will go with you and fight alongside you if need be. I will help train anyone you need to fight. I just can’t sit idly by anymore. The time is now.”  
  
Rick sighed, but didn’t say anything right away.  
  
“What about Alexandria?” Lewis wondered. “We were pretty much in and out with Eze— _King_ Ezekiel today. I don’t think there’s really much left we can do here but gather up what he was giving us to take with us and go.”  
  
“I think Rick was right yesterday,” Jesus interjected, looking nervously at Rick. “We can go to Alexandria tomorrow if need be but we should just go back to Hilltop.”  
  
Rick was finally catching on a bit more to Jesus’ nervousness. Something was eating at him that he couldn’t seem to just come right out with and say at the moment.  
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
Jesus’ blue eyes darted right to Rick’s and he shook his head. “Nothing. I just—I think it’s best to just get back.”  
  
Rick watched him; every eye moment and line that formed in his forehead from the frowning Jesus thought he was cleverly avoiding. It began to unsettle Rick and make _him_ nervous, and when he got nervous he got worried, and when he got worried he got angry.  
  
Leaning in toward the younger man, he whispered, “You’re hiding something from me and you’re gonna tell me.”  
  
Jesus nodded and frowned more prominently. “I will,” he agreed. “When we get back.”  
  
With a deep exhale, Rick raised a hand and signaled for his group to start moving.  
  
As they began to make their way toward the main gate, Alvaro and another Kingdomer they hadn’t yet met came forward with the group’s guns to return to them, as promised. There were also a couple more Kingdomers that came forward and presented the group with a three wooden crates overflowing with vegetables and fruits. Rick nodded and muttered a sincere thank you; returning his Colt to its holster where it belonged and then taking one of the crates to carry. Daryl and Lewis took the other two.  
  
“I was serious about what I said, Rick,” Richard spoke again, having followed them all to the gate. “If you need me, I’ll go with you now, to wherever you’re from or to Hilltop, and help prepare for the fight the King’s too apprehensive to fight. Just say the word.”  
  
“I appreciate that. I do. But right now we’re just getting a feel for things. We need to meet with Alexandria first.” Rick shifted his crate onto one hip to free up an arm so that he could shake Richard’s hand. “We’ll be back within the next few days with our share of the trade. When we return, I’ll have an answer for you.”  
  
“In the meantime, maybe work on King Ezekiel. Maybe you can break him down a bit more and make him more sympathetic to the cause,” Jesus said with a smirk as he looked up at Richard.  
  
“I haven’t exactly been successful so far, but I’ll certainly try.”  
  
“That’s all any of us can do, my friend.”  
  
With a few nods and small smiles expressing goodbye in the place of the actual spoken word, Rick and his group moved closer to the gate as the metal doors were pulled open. In a loose clump, they trudged out from behind the Kingdom’s walls with Rick leading his friends and Jesus quietly at his side. The gates closed behind them with barely a sound other than a slight creak. As they made their way down the paved incline and back to their van, Finn opened up the back doors so they could set the crates inside and then, one by one, they began to climb back inside the vehicle.  
  
As Rick made his way to the driver’s door, he looked around at the immediate area; keeping an eye out for any possible threat, such as walkers, but there were none. The last inside the van, he slid into his seat and shut the door. After shoving the key into the ignition and starting it up, Rick looked to his right, at Jesus, only to find the younger man glancing back at him. They shared a knowing look; that the two of them had something serious to discuss upon their return to the Hilltop. The conversation hadn’t even been had yet and already it was leaving a bad taste in both their mouths.

 

* * *

  
  
“I’m gonna ask you again,” Aaron spoke, hunched down behind an abandoned truck up the road from the east entrance to the Sanctuary. “Are you sure you want to do this?”  
  
With a walker at their feet between them, with its abdomen completely gutted open and its rotting internal organs having spilled out, Jo was knelt beside it as she finished coating her arms and shirt with the pungent blood and bile. She looked down at how she looked; not too covered because she didn’t want to be mistaken as a walker as she approached the Sanctuary and shot on sight, but covered enough to mask as much as her own scent as possible in case she encountered more walkers than she could handle on her own on the way.  
  
“Uh, yeah, I am.” She looked Aaron in the eye as if he were an idiot child. “I’m not doing this for the thrill of it, only to turn back now.”  
  
“I know, but—”  
  
“When I start walking down the road, you need to cut through the woods and get to one of those buildings if you want to keep lookout from there,” Jo interrupted. “Or just stay here. You have a gun on you right?”  
  
Aaron huffed anxiously. “Yeah, I do. And no, I’m not staying here.”  
  
“Okay then. Hand me the backpack.” Jo held her hand out and Aaron pulled the bag from where it sat beside him on the ground and handed it over. Sliding it onto her back, Jo then pulled her hair up into a ponytail and proceeded to make it look disheveled by pulling errant strands out to hang beside her face. Wiping her hands on pants to remove the excess blood and bile off, she then rubbed them into the dirt and created a few dirty smudges on her face and clothes. “Do I look haggard enough to you? Like I’ve been on the road for a while?”  
  
“Yeah, you look disgusting,” Aaron remarked with an expressionless smirk.  
  
“You gave me the right backpack, right?”  
  
“Let me check to make sure.” Standing up, Aaron stepped behind Jo and unzipped the bag. Peering in briefly, he nodded. “Yeah, it’s the right one.”  
  
“Okay, good. Now help me up.” As Aaron stepped back around, in front of her, he took her hands in his and helped pull her up to her feet. “Thank you.”  
  
Aaron was silent for a few moments; just studying her as she seemed to be mentally gathering herself for the task she had chosen to undertake of her own volition. He looked for any signs of doubt that he could use as ammunition to convince her against this. As much as he agreed with her mindset, he didn’t feel this was something she should be doing alone, but he knew she would’ve done it with or without him here with her. He had made the decision to come and escort her to her destination and possibly fight to protect her if it came down to that, which could very well cost him his life, and he was making his peace with that. There was the thought in his mind that if he died today, he’d never see Jesus again, but at least they’d parted with a hug and a kiss and a goodbye. It was more of a farewell than he’d had with Eric.  
  
He could only imagine the thoughts going through her head and, once again, his admiration for her soared.  
  
To have everything she had—her husband, children, friends, family, a safe home untouched by Savior-oppression (for now) and, of course, her life—and she was ready to go forward with this mission she was certain she would come out of, all because of hope and optimism.  
  
“You’re staring.”  
  
Aaron blinked. “Sorry. I was just—thinking about everything. I didn’t mean to stare.” Licking his bottom lip, he sighed. “And you’re one hundred percent positive you want to do this?”  
  
Jo shrugged and tilted her head slightly. “More like ninety percent, but I’m doing it either way. I can handle this.”  
  
“Okay. If you say so.”  
  
“I _do_ say so.” Turning to face the road ahead of them, Jo squared her shoulders. Exhaling a steadying breath, she looked over back at Aaron. “On the off chance I _don’t_ make it, don’t sacrifice yourself to come in after me. If I’m not out—I dunno—before nightfall; go home. I honestly don’t believe I’d be killed. At the very least, I’d be taken captive, and that’s a road I’ve already been down and survived. I can survive it again. It could be used to rally all the communities together to fight the Saviors if the trips to the Kingdom and Alexandria don’t go as hoped.”  
  
“I _really_ wish I had your optimism,” Aaron snickered, pulling his gun out from his back pocket and adjusting the backpack he was carrying. With a deep sigh, he leaned forward and pulled Jo in for a hug. “Please be safe and don’t die.”  
  
“Right back at ya,” Jo smiled. Then, gesturing toward the tree coverage, she added, “Now go.”  
  
With slight hesitation, but then a nod of acquiescence, Aaron stalked off into the woods; allowing Jo to step out from behind the abandoned truck and begin walking down the road toward the Sanctuary’s east gate.  
  
A million and one things immediately began to fly around her mind like a swarm of angry wasps. Her heart began to pound in her chest and she could swear she could hear it in her ears. She did her utmost to deny any negative thoughts of all that could go wrong and how foolish this all was; how she wasn’t just putting herself at risk, but also the life of her unborn daughter.  
  
Looking down, she pulled the knife out of her pocket and gripped it tight. It was still coated with sticky, decayed blood she hadn’t bothered to wipe off and that was done on purpose, among other things.  
  
Sauntering forward, she walked slowly; partly to give Aaron time to reach whatever building he was going to choose for his lookout position and partly because she needed to “get into character”, so to speak. She needed to appear worn out and tired, as if she’d been traveling alone for a while. She had worked it all out in her head the night before and a few, finishing details during the car ride.  
  
Even though it took only ten minutes or less to reach the end of the road, it felt like ages.  
  
Before Jo realized it, the Sanctuary was in full view.  
  
It was a formidable structure, standing upwards of seven or eight stories tall and ashen grey in color. The fences surrounding the property were littered with walkers tied to the chain-link or to poles to keep them stationary but also as a deterrent.  
  
Jo took pause for a moment, lifting a hand to shield her eyes from the sunlight as she looked upward at the building before bringing her gaze down toward the entrance gate to the fence was.  
  
It was time to conjure some acting chops.  
  
Lowering her hand, she staggered slowly toward the gate, holding her hands to her stomach as she peered between the chain-link and looked around for signs of life.  
  
“Hello!” she called out. “Anybody?”  
  
_Please let this work, please let this work._  
  
Hitting her knife against the fence caused it to rattle a little, and then, all at once, it seemed like there was a flurry of sound and motion. Not only were the chained up walkers riled up by her presence, but a Savior she hadn’t initially seen as she approached was running down a set of rusted, metal stairs, armed with what looked to be an AK-47 and shouting at her.  
  
“Hands in the air!” the man shouted at her, and she quickly obliged; taking a step back from the fence. “Where the fuck did you come from, lady?”  
  
“Georgia,” she blurted with a heavy, sighing breath. “Please…is this place safe?”  
  
“Get back from the fence!”  
  
“I am…please…can I come in? Is it safe here?”  
  
“How did you get here?”  
  
“I’ve been walking a few days, staying in abandoned houses,” she lied. “My car died. I couldn’t find any others with any gas in the tank. I’ve been alone so long.” She conjured any terrible memories of being made to feel vulnerable that she could think of to make herself upset; to bring tears to her eyes. “Please. I’m tired…I’m tired of being scared…”  
  
The man sighed. “Drop the knife and the bag.” When she did as told, he added, “Kick them both aside, away from you.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Jo kicked the bag with her foot, hooking the strap around her boot and giving it a slight toss a few feet away and purposely stumbled backward in the process. Amping it up, she staggered to right herself and then kicked at the knife; letting it scuff along the pavement.  
  
“You pregnant?”  
  
Jo looked down at her stomach and then back up at the man. “Obviously.”  
  
“Prove it. Lift your shirt so I know you ain’t got any contraband on ya.”  
  
With a sigh, Jo lifted her shirt up just under her bosom to reveal her very engorged belly, and then dropped the shirt back down. “Can I please come in?”  
  
The Savior chewed his lips together and tossed an uncertain look over his shoulder. “Wait here,” he ordered before running off toward a set of doors at ground level, blocked slightly from view by a box truck.  
  
Jo stepped back up to the fence and watch the man disappear and leaned her forehead against the cool metal links. She had to keep the charade up because she wasn’t sure if any other Saviors were watching her. She couldn’t break character, as it were.  
  
After what felt like a few minutes, the sound of metal doors clanking open resounded from the courtyard beyond the fence and Jo lifted her gaze very tiredly as she saw the same Savior approaching, but this time with two others. One seemed to have a slight swagger to his step, as if he was the man in charge and she silently wondered if he was Negan. Donning a receding hairline and a sleazy-looking mustache and stubble, the lean man that took front and center had her full focus as he inspected her thoroughly from his side of the fence.  
  
“Hello, there, ma’am,” he greeted. “I was told a ‘tired, pregnant chick who looks disgusting is waiting outside and asking to come in.’ This dipshit’s words, not mind.” He gestured to the first Savior Jo had interacted with. “What’s your name, honey?”  
  
“Joanna.”  
  
“Joanna,” Mustache repeated with a small smile. “Nice to meet you, Joanna. How can we help you?”  
  
“I’ve been on the road, alone for a while now. I’ve been on foot for a few days. I’m down to one can of food and half a bottle of water. I’m tired, I’m scared, and I just need help. I need people.” Jo began to cry; sniffling and letting her chin quiver for added effect. “Please, will you let me in? I have no weapons. You can pat me down and check for yourself if you want. _Please_.”  
  
The man sighed. “Well, Joanna, I’m Simon, and I’m kinda second-in-command here. So, when I say I think it’d be alright to let you in, your entrance is still only conditional. I don’t have the final say-so, you understand.” With a smile, he gestured to the other Savior—a young, portly man—to open the gate for her. “Fat Joey, open the gate up, will ya?”  
  
“Sure thing,” Fat Joey replied.  
  
The first Savior still remained nameless to Jo.  
  
Taking a step back, Jo watched as the gate was unlatched and slowly slid open and now was time for her to lay it on thick.  
  
As Simon beckoned for her to step forward, she wondered if Aaron had made it up into one of the neighboring buildings or if he was still making his way. As the first Savior stepped past her to grab up her bag and her knife, Jo continued walking toward Simon. With each step, she slowed and began to breath heavier. She let her eyes droop and furrowed her brow to give the impression of a physical and internal struggle.  
  
“Have you been bitten?” Simon asked, noting her sluggishness.  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, I’m just tired and I haven’t eaten.” That really wasn’t a lie, so she used it to her benefit.  
  
“When was the last time you ate?” He seemed genuinely concerned.  
  
“Two days ago,” she replied as he moved around her and began to pat her sides and under her arms to check for weapons. “I didn’t want to eat the food in my bag until I couldn’t wait any longer. I didn’t know when my next meal would come.”  
  
“We can get you something to eat here,” Simon assured, crouching down to pat her pant legs. “Probably a shower and clean clothes, too, ‘cause—no offense, honey—you smell like ass.”  
  
“I killed a walker—a dead one—and covered myself with its blood to mask my scent. It’s how I’ve managed to get by others so I don’t have to fight them. I’m not very good at it,” she continued to lie.  
  
She was _quite_ good at it.  
  
As Simon stood back up, Jo swayed, again on purpose.  
  
“Hey, you okay?” Fat Joey asked.  
  
Jo turned to look at him, nodded slowly and then took that opportunity to fall backward into Simon; knowing he was close enough to catch her before she hit the ground. The trust fall to end all trust falls. And catch her, he did. Jo closed her eyes and kept them closed, pretending she had passed out and hoped like hell they bought it.  
  
“Hey, Joanna…wake up, honey.”  
  
Jo refused to budge from her act; listening as one of the other two Saviors slid the gate shut behind them. Judging by the distinctive shuffling and the heaviness of the footfalls, she assumed it was Fat Joey. Letting her held roll back as icing on the cake, she had to fight with herself not to smile as she listened to Simon bark at Fat Joey to help lift her legs up and help carry her. The first Savior could be heard scurrying forward as Jo felt her body being lifted up by both Simon and Fat Joey, followed by the motion of movement, all before the sound of metal doors creaking open resonated once more in the courtyard.  
  
“What do we do with her?” Fat Joey asked.  
  
“We’ll take her to see Dr. Carson. He can check her out and make sure everything’s okay,” Simon replied as Jo felt them turn slightly.  
  
Even though her eyes were closed and everything was already dark to her, wherever they were wasn’t very well lit, so Jo wouldn’t have been able to see where she was being taken even if she tried popping one eye open as subtly as possible to catch a glimpse.  
  
“I’ll get Negan and let him know about our visitor,” Simon continued and it made Jo’s nerves begin to dance. “No doubt he’ll want to greet her himself and ask her some questions before deciding if we let her stay.”  
  
“Do you really think he’d send her away?” the first Savior asked. “I saw her stomach. She really is pregnant. The only weapon she had was that knife I had her throw down, unless you count the can opener in her bag a weapon. Though, I guess the can of lima beans could be a weapon, too, if she threw it hard enough, but she don’t exactly look like someone who has the strength to even _lift_ a can of lima beans right now.”  
  
After ascending a flight of stairs and two more turns later, Simon and Fat Joey came to a stop. Jo listened as a door was pushed open.  
  
“Shit. Where’s the Doc?” Simon grunted.  
  
“Maybe’s he’s at lunch?” Fat Joey offered.  
  
Simon sighed heavily and Jo could feel his breath down upon the top of her head. “Okay, fine, just set her down on the exam table.” As she was carried and laid down on a firm yet soft surface, Simon spoke again. “Fat Joey, go find Dr. Carson. Mark, stay here with our guest and keep watch. I’ll go find Negan.”  
  
“Okay,” the first Savior — Mark — said.  
  
Maintaining the guise of being unconscious, Jo continued to listen to the men talk briefly among themselves until she was certain both Simon and Fat Joey had left. The door shut behind them and she heard the scuffing of boots on the floor and then the creak of a chair, allowing Jo to easily assume that Mark had sat down somewhere to her right. She listened to him sigh to himself, sniff at the air and clear his throat.  
  
While she let her ears adjust to every little noise, her nose picked up the scents around her. The smell in the room was an odd mix of dust, disinfectant and something distinctly medicinal. From that alone Jo could determine, without opening her eyes, that the room was poorly ventilated, but kept clean. Likely the doctor had a lot of time on his hands and cleaned the surfaces rather frequently; probably because most people brought inside the Infirmary for him to take care of came to him a wounded, bloody mess. Letting blood stain and stick wasn’t exactly hygienic. The smell reminded Jo of her pediatrician’s office from when she was little.  
  
After a while, she pretended to start waking up again.  
  
At first, she started with a slight groan, then a small cough and smacking of her lips as if she were thirsty—which, in all actuality, she was. Then, she began to open her eyes.  
  
When Jo adjusted her sight to the room around her, she began to sit up and then placed a hand to her head; giving off the impression that she’d sat up to fast and was now dizzy.  
  
“Hey, hey, take it easy. You passed out,” Mark stressed, standing up and holding his hands out to her.  
  
“Where am I?” she asked, squinting at the Savior that was at her side with his arms folded. Taking her time, she pushed at the sides of the exam table to help herself sit up.  
  
“We brought you inside. You’re in our Infirmary. Fat Joey went to get our doctor to make sure okay.”  
  
“Where’s the other one—Simon?”  
  
“Simon went to find our leader.”  
  
Jo nodded. “Who’s your leader?” She asked, playing stupid, at the same time that the Infirmary door opened up.  
  
“I am.”  
  
The voice was a little deep, a little bit gruff and a little bit velvety.  
  
Jo’s heartbeat began to race as she turned and gazed upon a tall man with dark, slicked back hair, a considerable amount of salt and pepper stubble, and black leather jacket. More importantly, she took note of the baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire tossed over his shoulder and how he held onto it like it was an extra appendage; a part of him.  
  
The man smiled charmingly at Jo, looking her over with curious attention.  
  
“Hi,” he greeted; his smile toothy and his eyes both cold and warm at the same time. “I’m Negan.”


	61. Negan

_"Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can."_ — Arthur Ashe

* * *

  
  
Jo could picture Rick’s face when he returned to the Hilltop and realized she was no longer there. Initially, he would show up, none the wiser; get out of the van and probably clump together with the rest of their group for a moment or two. Then he would go in search of Jo. If he didn’t see her immediately outside anywhere, he would assume she was inside somewhere; maybe in Jesus’ office, but likely the bedroom they’d stayed in. When he found both places to be vacant, he would take pause and consider the next option. Rick would pick up his pace as he wandered back out of the house and ask where the medical trailer was, because he knew that was one of the places he had suggested she go to, to get examined by Hilltop’s Dr. Harlan Carson. Jo could assume Rick wouldn’t even get that far before Jesus told him the truth, if he hadn’t done so before they got back.  
  
At first, Rick would probably be confused; trying to process what Jesus was telling him. Then the anger would set in, followed shortly thereafter by fear and worry and more anger. He would immediately run through all the worst case scenarios in his head, he would start pacing and maybe get in Jesus’ face. Maybe he would even take a swing. Daryl would come to Rick like an obedient lapdog and make Rick’s fight his fight as well. Finn would get scared and a little angry. Jesus might try to calm them down, but to no avail. Rick would need to go immediately to the Sanctuary, prepared to fight after all; knowing he would be going headfirst into this and likely not survive, and he wouldn’t want to if he discovered Jo had been killed.  
  
Jo could picture his face. She could picture the way his eyes would be bright and blue as the sky when he first returned, and then change like the sea; growing dark and stormy.  
  
This was one of the upsides of doing all this alone.  
  
She didn’t have to see that look in his eyes. She didn’t have to see his heart break or hear his voice crack as he shouted in anger and fear while trying to figure out what to do next.  
  
And she couldn’t think about the looks she knew he’d give or the sounds he’d make.  
  
She had more pressing matters to deal with.  
  
“Hi. I’m Negan,” the man before her had spoken as he greeted her; Simon appearing just behind him.  
  
She didn’t know why, but he looked exactly like how she had imagined, without actually having thought about it.  
  
Tall, dark and handsome, with a charming smile, menacing gaze, intimidating stance and a very crafty melee weapon she’d already heard stories about? Yeah, she could see how easily he could get people to serve him, grow his numbers and then oppress the outside, surviving population.  
  
“And you are?” He asked when she didn’t react right away.  
  
“Joanna,” she mumbled. “I’m Joanna.”  
  
“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Joanna.” Negan smirked, giving her a languid onceover and finding some amusement in how pregnant she was as his gaze seemed to linger the longest over her stomach. “Simon tells me you’ve been on your own a while; been traveling on foot and haven’t eaten in a couple days. That just _doesn’t_ sit well with me. I can’t have some _pregnant_ chick going without _food_. You got that baby to think about, and children _are_ our future after all.”  
  
“I have a can of lima beans in my bag. I had a knife, but I’m not good at hunting,” Jo remarked; suddenly recalling the Irish woman, Clara, in the woods outside the prison and choosing to borrow bits of her story. “My husband used to do all the hunting for us. He took care of me, kept me safe.”  
  
At that moment, Fat Joey blustered into the room and came to a very abrupt stop when he realized Negan was there. Stepping around Fat Joey was an older man wearing a blue dress shirt, khaki dress pants and a white lab coat. The fact that he was the doctor was unmistakable.  
  
“Fat Joey says I have a new patient?” the doctor asked.  
  
Negan gestured to Jo with his free hand. “Well, she’s not sitting on the exam table for the fun of it. Take a sonogram. Check and make sure mother and child are both doing fine.”  
  
Jo looked from Negan to the doctor, who she had heard earlier being referred to as Dr. Carson. Was he the same Dr. Carson that worked at Hilltop, was the same last name mere coincidence, or were both doctors related? Either way, this Dr. Carson seemed unimpressed by her condition.  
  
“If I’m to examine her, she’ll need to have some privacy,” Dr. Carson spoke, eyeing Negan’s henchmen.  
  
Negan looked between Simon, Fat Joey and Mark. “You heard the doc. Get out.” As the trio retreated from the room without hesitation, Negan turned back toward Jo. “Dr. Carson here is gonna take care of you, and then I’ll have someone bring you some food and get you cleaned up. After that, you and I can talk about your… _situation_.”  
  
With a wink, Negan lowered his bat and brought it close to Dr. Carson’s leg, causing the doctor to nervously take step back. The reaction brought a chuckle to Negan’s lips before bringing the bat against his own leg and nodding to Jo.  
  
“See ya later, alligator,” he called out, still chuckling under his breath as he grabbed the door and shut it behind him.  
  
Dr. Carson let his gaze hover at the door for a few moments. He looked as if he was terrified that Negan would burst right back inside without warning. The sound of muffled voices, followed by heavy footsteps fading away gave the doctor a reason to finally find ease. His shoulders noticeably drooped with the release of the tension he’d been feeling in Negan’s presence. Turning his attention to Jo, he offered a small, polite smile.  
  
“What’s your name?”  
  
“Joanna Moore,” she replied, giving her full, former married name.  
  
“Joanna would’ve sufficed.” When she made to remark, Dr. Carson continued; pulling a stethoscope from his coat pocket. “Do you know how far along you are, Joanna?”  
  
Jo nodded, watching as he placed the earpieces in his ears and breathed onto the diaphragm. “About eight months, give or take.”  
  
“So, about to pop, it seems.” As he brought the diaphragm closer to Jo’s chest, he hesitated and gestured to the collar of her shirt; silently asking if it was okay that he pulled it down a bit so he could place the diaphragm upon her chest to listen to her heart and lungs. With an equally silent nod of consent from her, Dr. Carson went about his job while Jo just sat there awkwardly. “What happened to the father, if you don’t mind me asking?”  
  
Leaning her head back to give herself some extra personal space between him and her, Jo sighed sadly for show. “My husband died. It happened a couple months ago.”  
  
She said nothing else.  
  
He wasn’t the one her fabricated sob story was for.  
  
Noticing she had fallen silent, he didn’t bother to ask any further personal questions. He didn’t really seem to care about those details anyway and was just there to do a job. So, instead, he busied himself with moving around the room and pulled an ultrasound machine over toward the bed and turned it on. Jo was familiar with the routine from her exams with Nicole. She obliged him by lifting her shirt up over her stomach so he could squeeze the gel onto her skin, press the wand into the gel and then slowly begin to move it around her stomach until he could glimpse an image on the screen. Then, there she was, Jo and Rick’s little bun in the oven.  
  
Jo rested her head back against the headrest and smiled and tears stung her eyes; not because she was playing it up for this doctor, Negan or any other Saviors at this compound, but because the sight always created happy tears, no matter if she was happy or sad.  
  
“Do you want to know what it is?” Dr. Carson asked, unaware that Jo already knew.  
  
“Yes, please.”  
  
After a moment or two of moving the wand around to another spot, the doctor held the wand in place with one hand and, with the other hand, pointed to a spot on the screen. “No penis to be found. You’re having a girl.”  
  
Jo smiled more noticeably. This time it was for show. “I wish my husband was here to see this. He lost a son in the beginning. He never had a daughter of his own. Until now, anyway.”  
  
“Better late than never, perhaps?”  
  
“Yeah,” Jo nodded. “I’ll just have to tell her every day what an amazing man her father was. I just wish I had a photo of him so she can grow up knowing what he looked like.”  
  
“Well, I can’t help you there, but I can print out a sonogram picture for you, if you’d like.”  
  
Jo nodded again as he handed her a towel to wipe the gel off her stomach. “Yes, please. That would be wonderful.” Turning away, Jo cleaned her stomach and pulled her shirt back down while Dr. Carson pressed a few buttons on the machine. A moment later, he was handing her a long stream of multiple pictures from different angles of her baby. “Thank you.”  
  
Dr. Carson merely nodded his own head in response and then pushed the machine aside. “Well, the baby seems to be moving around just fine and positioned well. Have you noticed any spotting at all or had any pains?”  
  
“No pain. And there was some spotting here and there over the last couple months, but I rested then. I didn’t overexert myself unless absolutely necessary.”  
  
“That’s good.” Moving over to a cabinet filled with prescription medicine, he perused the contents once he opened the cabinet doors and then pulled a bottle out. Twisting off the cap, he tipped the bottle until one capsule tumbled into his palm. “Here. Take this with something to drink when you can. It’s a prenatal vitamin. I’m pretty well stocked up with bottles of these. There aren’t many pregnant women these days that require such things, so we lucked out here. You can come back here every day for one. Have you had access to any before now?”  
  
Jo shook her head. “No,” she lied.  
  
She did, back at Mount Vernon, also thanks to Nicole.  
  
“Well, you will now. Also better late than never,” Dr. Carson muttered, returning the bottle to the cabinet. “We’ll make the most of your last month so long as Negan allows you to stay.”  
  
“And what if he doesn’t let me stay?”  
  
Dr. Carson paused and a shadow fell over his face as he grew serious. “I don’t think any of us are in a position to turn you away.”  
  
He had chosen his words carefully. Had Jo not been privy to the things Negan and his Saviors had done to the other communities, she wouldn’t have read into the doctor’s reply. However, she _had_ been made privy. She knew what the Saviors were capable of. She had just met Negan and had just seen for herself the kind of presence he had. His personality and the way he clearly carried himself dwarfed that of the men who served him; all of them falling in line like good little ducks. She could tell simply from those few minutes that whatever respect he must have among his people was demanded of and not earned.  
  
“Well, I hope I can stay,” Jo remarked, plastering a sweet smile upon her face. “This place seems really safe, like it can be protected really well, and that’s important.”  
  
“There are a lot of people here to do that.”  
  
“How many people are here? I mean, how many keep this place safe? I used to live somewhere with my husband that we thought was secure, and it was a group effort to keep it that way.”  
  
“I’m not positive on the exact number. No less than fifty.”  
  
“There’s only fifty people here?”  
  
“No, fifty people who keep this place secure,” Dr. Carson replied. “There’s more than that who are just everyday people like us. Families, with children.”  
  
“How many children are here?” When Jo felt she came off as sounding too eager, she added, “I used to be a teacher before all this. Second grade, and then I taught in another community, briefly, at the beginning. I could help here. I could teach the kids here, if there isn’t a teacher already.”  
  
Dr. Carson shrugged and nodded. “I don’t think there’s a teacher. I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to ask when Negan talks to you.” Looking around at his office, he released a small sigh. “There’s not much else I can do for you right now. You’re clearly not dehydrated, you seem perfectly healthy. There are no visible wounds. You clearly haven’t been bitten because otherwise you’d already be showing signs. You don’t have a fever. You just need to clean up, have something to eat and rest.”  
  
Jo smirked. “Is that your professional opinion?”  
  
“Well, I’m not an OB-GYN and it’s been twenty years since my maternity rotation during my obstetrics residency.”  
  
“What kind of doctor were you?”  
  
He sighed again. “Cardiovascular surgeon.”  
  
“That’s impressive. That’s a heart doctor, right?” Off his nod, Jo smiled. It was easier to catch flies with honey than with vinegar. “I think that if you can perform something as intricate as repairing a living heart, than taking care of any other ailments is a piece of cake by comparison.”  
  
“It’s more like comparing apples and oranges.”  
  
Jo sat up completely and turned so that her legs to dangle over the edge of the exam table. “Well, it’s all fruit in the end.”  
  
A knock at the door drew their attention away. Before Dr. Carson could even verbally invite whoever it was in, the door opened up to reveal Simon.  
  
“How’s the patient, doc?” Simon inquired, his gaze lingering on Jo a moment longer than necessary.  
  
Jo couldn’t tell if he was staring because he was suspicious of her or if he just thought she was good looking, even covered in walker blood and dirt as well as sporting a very pregnant stomach. Either way, she allowed her expression to soften more, to give the impression of innocence and naïveté.  
  
“She’s good. Her baby’s doing well—”  
  
“I’m having a girl,” Jo interrupted with a smile.  
  
Simon smiled right back, stepping a bit further into the room. “Well, ain’t that something. Congratulations.”  
  
“Thank you.”  
  
“Other than that, she seems to be a picture of health. Just needs a good meal and some rest, is my suggestion,” Dr. Caron finished saying.  
  
“Well, that’s something I’m sure we can manage.” Raising a hand, he beckoned to Jo. “Can you walk okay or do I need to get help in carrying you again?”  
  
“I’m okay. I think the heat and lack of food and exhaustion just caught up with me before.”  
  
With the doctor’s assistance, she hopped down from the exam table. Placing a hand to her stomach she began to walk over toward Simon who still held his hand out toward her. Casting a look to the doctor, she nodded politely to him and then let Simon lead her quietly from the room. As soon as the door was shut behind them, Jo found they were in a grey and poorly lit hallway, but it was lit regardless. Not that she expected to be walking around in the dark. If Dr. Carson had medical equipment running normally on electricity then she shouldn’t be surprised that there would be electricity elsewhere. The Hilltop had electricity, too, and it made Jo realize how much she’d gotten used to not having it, and being around it again was almost a tease; knowing she would go back to Mount Vernon, where the only electricity they had was used to operate the ultrasound machine via the small generator they had.  
  
“We don’t have maternity clothes just lying around the place, despite having had a pregnant chick in the past. We do have a few overweight folks, like Fat Joey, so we’ll be able to find you something clean to wear,” Simon commented, leading her down the hall. And, again, if she hadn’t known any differently about the Saviors, Jo almost felt like this could be a decent place to be. But she couldn’t let their initial hospitality deter her from her goal. “Not gonna throw you in with Gen Pop either. We got plenty of spare rooms around here that go unused most of the time. Most have sinks with running water. This used to be a steam plant, abandoned some twenty or so years ago I think. Turned coal into steam. That’s what they used to do here. So you gotta expect the men working here would wanna shower before going home to their wives and kids. So, there is a shower room. Negan and his soldiers, like me, can use it whenever we want, but everyone else, who works on a point system, has to rely on sponge bathing until they can rack up enough points for the luxury of an actual shower. Only problem is it’s cold water so and the water pressure is shit, but it’s better than nothing.”  
  
“I’m used to sponge bathing,” Jo replied, crossing one arm across her chest and holding onto her opposite elbow and following him still as they turned right down another hall.  
  
Simon looked down at her and smirked slightly. “I’ll find Laura. She’s one of the female soldiers less likely to bitch about babysitting you while you clean up. She’ll stand guard outside the shower room so no one goes in while you’re in there. I’ll get clothes first. Don’t want you to catch your death, standing around naked, soaked to the bone from cold water while waiting on something to wear.”  
  
“Thank you. I really can’t thank ya’ll enough for this. Kindness is not something I’m used to.”  
  
“Well, I won’t lie. We got some assholes within our ranks that’ll shoot first and ask questions later if they’re left unchecked by Negan or myself.”  
  
“Are you like, the vice president to his president? Second in command?”  
  
Simon let out a chuckle as they reached a metal door. Pushing it open, a stairwell was revealed and he allowed her to cross the threshold first. “I might be his right hand man, but when it comes to hierarchy around here, Negan is President, Vice President, Speaker of the House, and all three branches of the fucking government. In comparison, I’m sort of like the Chief of Staff.”  
  
“But if Negan’s not here, are you in charge or is someone else?” Jo asked as demurely as possible as they walked down the stairs, side by side. She gripped the railing tight on her descent; somewhat of a scapegoat for how anxious she was trying not to feel.  
  
“Yeah, I guess in that instance, I am.”  
  
“So, then you’d be next in line to the throne, so to speak? If something ever happened to him, you’d rule the roost?” To deflect any suspicion from him for her line of questioning, she continued on. “My husband, when he was alive and back when we used to have a safe place to live with a bunch of people, he was our leader. If something ever happened to him, or me, his best friend would take up the reins and lead everyone where my husband left off. In the end, it turns out my husband and I were the only ones left of our original group so there was no need to worry about how our people would handle following someone else.”  
  
At the next landing, Simon pulled open the metal door and ushered Jo through. “I try not to think about those things. Better to live in the moment, especially these days.”  
  
Jo nodded, following one step behind as he led her down a new hallway; an exact replica of the one a floor above. They were ground level now; that much was certain, considering there had been no more stairs to walk down. Neither of them spoke after that until they came to stop at a door and he held a finger up to her, signaling her to wait in the hall. Stepping inside, Jo watched as he disappeared from view but could hear what sound like squeaky drawers being yanked open and rifled through. Taking the opportunity with being alone for the moment, no matter how briefly it was, Jo looked around and tried to take in every detail of her surroundings. The direction they’d come from was virtually silent, but there was noise coming from her right, from the direction they’d been walking toward. The noise was muffled and inaudible, but she could tell it was a cacophony of voices.  
  
Simon caught her looking that way as he stepped back out of the room, holding an oversized, grey Led Zeppelin T-shirt with the Icarus logo on it. “Here. Fat Joey won’t miss it. He only ever seems to wear the same fucking shirt anyway,” he remarked tossing the shirt to her. When she caught it, he nodded toward the noises. “That’s the factory floor. You don’t need to worry about that place just yet. All in good time.”  
  
“Thanks for the shirt.”  
  
Simon shrugged and closed the door to Fat Joey’s room and then removed a walkie-talkie from his belt. Lifting it up to his face, he spoke into it. “This is Simon, someone tell me where Laura is.”  
  
After a moment, a voice replied. _“She’s outside.”_  
  
Simon sighed. “Well, go outside and bring her your walkie. I got something I need her to do.”  
  
_“Uh…alright.”_  
  
Lowering the walkie-talkie, Simon rolled his eyes and smirked at Jo. “So hard to find good help these days.” With a curl of his finger, he gestured for Jo to follow him as they headed back the way they came, but turned down a new corridor. “Might as well take you to the shower room while we wait.”  
  
They reached the room before Laura made contact via the walkie-talkie. By that point, the two of them were simply standing in awkward silence outside the door; trying to find anything interesting to stare at. For Jo, she used the time to go over her plan in her head once more.  
  
_“What’s up, Simon?”_  
  
Simon raised the walkie-talkie again. “Hey, come inside and go get a clean pair of underwear and pants from your room. We got a new guest in need of something to wear. Something with a low waistline where the pants are concerned. Clean socks, too,” he replied. “Meet us at the shower room. I need you to do something once you get here.”  
  
_“You better not be trying to get me into a threesome.”_  
  
Simon turned his back to Jo and lowered his voice in an attempt for her not to hear. “That was one time, and I was more or less joking.” Then, “Bring some shampoo and soap, too.”  
  
_“Whatever. I’ll be there in five.”_  
  
“Thank you.” Clipping his walkie-talkie back to his belt, he gestured to the door. “I guess I can at least show you where you can shower in there and how it all works. The one knob is a pain in the ass sometimes.”  
  
Those five minutes ticked by and felt like forever. She was shown into the room where there were several bays of metal lockers with a wooden bench within each bay, making her think of locker rooms from her school days. Around the corner were a few bathroom stalls and urinals and across the way was one, large open room. The walls and the floor were all tiled, with about ten shower stalls, separated from each other with privacy walls made up of glass blocks. Jo was actually rather impressed. She couldn’t even remember actual gyms she’d belonged to in the past having privacy walls. It was always just one room with multiple shower heads, which is why she always went home to shower. She was not a fan of being willingly naked in front of strangers. At the prison, the showering was like those gyms, but at least they had rigged up curtains for privacy and no one ever really showered at the same time, with the exception of the couples, like Rick and Jo, of course.  
  
Approximately five minutes later, give or take, a knock came to the door and, before Simon could say it was okay to come in, the door opened right up and a young blonde woman with a nose ring sauntered in, clenching underwear, socks and pants in her left hand and a caddy with shampoo and soap in her right.  
  
“Is this the pregnant chick I’m hearing about?” Laura asked, gesturing to Jo with the clothes in her hand.  
  
“This is Joanna. Joanna, this is Laura.”  
  
“Hi,” Jo greeted, shyly.  
  
Laura clicked her tongue against the inside of her bottom lip and gave Jo a onceover. “How pregnant are ya?”  
  
“About eight months.”  
  
“Dr. Carson did a sonogram on her. She’s having a girl,” Simon informed.  
  
Laura nodded; clearly not interested. “Cool. Congrats.”  
  
“Thanks,” Jo replied, continuing with her shy act.  
  
“So, I want you to stand guard, outside the shower room while Joanna here cleans up. As you can see, she’s fucking disgusting.” He turned and looked at Jo. “No offense.”  
  
“None taken.”  
  
“Make sure no one comes in so she can shower in privacy. When she’s done, take her up to the Boudoir to hang out with the wives until Negan’s ready to see her.”  
  
Laura nodded obediently; the pecking order made clear to Jo that Laura was merely an underling compared to Simon. This was more useful information Jo chose to store away. Simon left with a simple “see ya later” and Laura didn’t say anything as she handed off the clothing for Jo to wear and the caddy of shampoo and soap. She didn’t even stay long enough to really here the thank you Jo muttered before walking out of the shower room to keep guard.  
  
Jo simply turned around and looked to shower stalls and chose the one furthest away and to her right. Giving the area one last look just to be on the safe side, in case there were any possible lurkers of either the living or dead variety, she stepped into the stall; draping the clean clothes over the privacy wall and setting the caddy onto the metal tray sticking out of the wall underneath the shower head but above the hot and cold knobs. It took a few moments, but she managed to get her boots off, and then peel off her socks, which she tossed away aside. She removed her soiled shirt next, followed by her bra; the latter she draped over the privacy wall with the clean clothes since she didn’t have another one to change into. Next she shimmied out of her pregnancy jeans, which we she was sorry to cast off, since they were really comfortable, but she was making the sacrifice in order for her plan to go smoothly. Lastly, she removed her underwear and tossed them into the pile with her shirt, socks and jeans, just outside the stall with her boots.  
  
Reaching forward, she turned both knobs to the right; forgetting that Simon had told her there was only cold water. The knob didn’t seem to give her a problem and figured Simon probably only ever used whatever stall he’d shown her before. When she was met with the cold stream of water, Jo let out an unintentional yelp and immediately tensed. She stepped back slightly as the water rolled down her body and caused her to shiver.  
  
“Fuck,” she muttered; mentally steeling herself to continue onward with this shower.  
  
It had been a long time since she’d bathed with cold water like this; having gotten so used to boiled and lukewarm water that was dumped into the copper tub back home at Mount Vernon. She grabbed the shampoo first and squeezed a decent dollop into the palm of her hand before replacing the bottle to the metal tray. Slapping her palms together, she then lathered up her hair real good. The entire time she closed her eyes and clenched her jaw as she concentrated on not letting the coldness bother her. Piling her sudsy hair atop her head, Jo reached for the soap, which was contained in its own little rectangular container. Taking it out, she held it under the water and rubbed it between her hands to work up some suds before beginning to scrub her arms clean first. Once her body was lathered up as best as she could reach, not thanks to her stomach getting in the way, she dipped back underneath the shower head again and let the icy water rinse it all away. She focused lastly on her hair, rinsing it all out and when she was done, cursed aloud; realizing she wasn’t given a towel to dry off with.  
  
The only thing Jo could do was squeeze her hair in her hands a few times, as best as she could, to get as much water out as possible and then literally brush the water off her body with her hand. She crouched back down and picked up her soiled shirt, turned it inside out and used it to mop up a few damps spots on her body before tossing it back down to the ground.  
  
She was thankful that the pants Laura had brought fit well. They were baggy, olive-colored cargo pants that had a button and drawstring for keep the pants closed at the top. Jo didn’t bother with the button because that would be pushing her luck. She slipped into the clean underwear first, then her own bra again. Next, came the pants, which were a snug fit and did in fact sit low on her hips because her stomach wasn’t about to allow the pants to go any higher. She tied the drawstring loosely and ignored the button altogether before pulling the T-shirt over her head. Jo stepped out of the stall with the socks and shoved them into her boots. She reached back into the stall only to place the soap back into its container and then place both the container and shampoo bottle back into the caddy. She grabbed the caddy and reached down for her boots; leaving her old clothes to remain on the floor as she made her way out of the shower area and toward one of the locker bays to take advantage of one of those benches.  
  
Sitting down, she set the caddy to her left and her boots to her right. Slowly and one by one, Jo put the socks on and then went forth with the laborious task of getting her boots on; thankful they zipped up and she didn’t have to bother with the time-consuming task of lacing them up. When she was finished, she sat up straight and sighed deeply; already tired from all that exertion. Normally she had Rick to help her with these things lately but, again, she was making a sacrifice for her plans to go forward smoothly.  
  
Rick wasn’t here and she had to do this alone.  
  
She needed to be in that mindset and commit to the story she had created.  
  
After a few moments, and a few extra deep breaths, Jo stood up and grabbed the caddy. Her blonde hair hung damply against the back of her neck and between her shoulder blades; no doubt creating a wet spots on the back of the T-shirt, but she knew it wouldn’t take long to dry.  
  
Walking toward the door, she opened it up and walked out into the hall, startling Laura a little; who tried to play it cool. “I left my dirty clothes outside the shower stall. It was getting too tiring try lean down and I didn’t have enough hands.”  
  
“Don’t worry about it. We got janitors that’ll get it later. We can get that shit cleaned up, too. That way I can get my clothes back soon.”  
  
“Sorry for the inconvenience,” Jo replied; trying to sound genuine and not sarcastic.  
  
Laura shrugged. “No rush.” Giving Jo another onceover, now that she was clean, she smirked. “You clean up well, at least.”  
  
Jo smirked and shrugged as well. “Thanks, I guess.”  
  
“I’ll take the caddy.” Laura took it from Jo and then began to walk forward with a nod of her head. “C’mon. We got a few flights of stairs to go.”  
  
“To the Boudoir?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“What’s the Boudoir?”  
  
“It’s this fancy-ass room where Negan’s wives stay most of the day unless they’re occupying their time with their, uh, _wifely duties._ ”  
  
“How does he have multiple wives?”  
  
“It was a choice they were offered. Become a wife and they don’t have to worry about working for points. They get the best of everything and they earn it by simply being his wife.”  
  
“There’s gotta be a catch,” Jo remarked, as they reached a stairwell. “There’s always a catch.”  
  
“They gotta be loyal only to Negan. If they had a boyfriend or a husband before, that husband or boyfriend gets to become a solider and not work for points either, but neither can ever be together again. If his wives cheat with their former lover, there are two options. Either she goes back to her boyfriend or husband and has to work for points again, or she stays with Negan and her boyfriend or husband gets the iron.”  
  
Jo knitted her brow in curiosity as they ascended the stairs and reached the first landing. “What the iron?”  
  
“It’s literally just an iron,” Laura answered blandly. “It gets heated up and then Negan presses it to the poor disphit’s face so half his face is permanently scarred. After that, all is forgiven.”  
  
Jo couldn’t react as she normally would’ve—in disgust. She needed to play along, for no one to doubt her intentions and trust her. So, she nodded thoughtfully. “Sounds fair. I mean, if they know what the punishment is for cheating, and risk it anyway, that’s their own fault.”  
  
Laura smiled. “Exactly.”  
  
A few more flights of stairs later and Jo was already out of breath. She tried not to draw attention to herself by breathing in and out, deeply and quietly, once they had come out onto the floor in question. At the end of the hall, they reached a pair of double door and Laura opened them up.  
  
Suddenly, several women seemed to practically jump out of their skins; either sitting or standing tensely where they were in anticipation to greet whoever it was they thought it was going to be on the other side of the threshold. When they were met with the sight of Laura and this new, pregnant female, their shoulders slumped and their features softened. They no longer looked anxious but instead curious and maybe even relieved.  
  
“This is Joanna,” Laura introduced. “Keep her company for a little while.”  
  
Like in the shower room before, the blonde Savior left without a word. She took her caddy back and shut the doors behind Jo; leaving her alone in the opulent room with several beautiful women dressed in short black dresses and black heels.  
  
“Hi,” Jo greeted with a small wave.  
  
A young woman with brown hair and bangs resting softly upon her forehead stood up from one of the lush sofas, peppered with glittery and fuzzy pillows, and properly greeted Jo first. “Hi, I’m Tanya.” Then, she added rather sarcastically, “Welcome to the Harem.”  
  
Jo cast her eyes around at all the women. The smallest of them all, a blonde who looked to be in her very early twenties, seemed just as equally meek as Jo was pretending to be.  
  
Tanya began to point out the others for introduction. “That’s Amber,” she started with the meek blonde, “Frankie, Yolanda and Alicia.” The last three were a ginger, black girl and Latina; respectively.  
  
Each girl gave Jo their full attention and muttered a quiet hello and she did the same.  
  
“Come sit down over here,” Tanya remarked, ushering Jo over to one of the sofas. “Wow, so you’re gonna have a baby?”  
  
Jo nodded. “In about a month,” she replied. “The doctor here performed a sonogram on me a little while ago and showed me I’m expecting a girl.”  
  
“Oh, wow, that’s awesome. Congrats.”  
  
“Is there a father in the picture?” Frankie, the ginger, asked.  
  
“ _Frankie_.”  
  
“What? It’s a reasonable question.”  
  
Jo shook her head. “My husband’s dead. A couple months ago. It’s just been me for a while.”  
  
“Damn.”  
  
“How did you end up here?” Yolanda inquired, setting down a notebook she’d been writing in.  
  
“I was just walking, no destination in sight, and I found this place. Saw the dead chained to the fences and figured they were put there on purpose by the living. It was worth a shot to see if there was anyone here and I lucked out. I passed out, though, and had to be carried inside to the doctor’s office. I woke up there. I haven’t eaten in a couple days, and had only half a bottle of water left.”  
  
Tanya knitted her brow together in concern. “Have you been given anything to eat or drink yet?”  
  
Jo shook her head. “No, I was just examined by the doctor and then taken to the showers to clean up. I’m supposed to meet with Negan soon, to talk with him. I suppose he’s interested in how I ended up here and to figure out if he’ll let me stay and, if so, where.”  
  
“Well, he definitely wouldn’t turn you out,” Alicia finally spoke up. “He has a soft spot for the damsel in distress type and you’re clearly that.”  
  
“Especially since you aren’t spoken for,” Frankie added. “If you’re able to spring back to a decent body weight after you have your baby, he might offer you a place among us, if you’re willing.”  
  
“He won’t force that option on you, but it’s a possible option you might be given to consider,” Tanya remarked. Turning toward Alicia, she gestured to the bar where there were trays of finger foods; little sandwiches and pieces of fresh fruits and vegetables. “Make her a plate. Let’s get her fed.”  
  
Jo smiled. She really was starting to feel hungry now. She had definitely worked up and appetite already. When Alicia brought her a plate of food, she also came with a glass of water.  
  
“Thank you,” Jo muttered, taking a few sips of water and setting the glass on the table beside her.  
  
While most of the girls went back to whatever they’d been occupying themselves with before Jo arrived, Tanya sank down beside Jo and kept her engaged in conversation as she began to eat.  
  
“So, do you have any skills? Anything that you can do here to contribute? I mean, you have a baby on the way and don’t seem like much of the soldier type, so that doesn’t seem like the job opportunity for you here. Even if you ‘bounce back’ body-wise, don’t let becoming one of us be your first option. If you have a marketable skill, so to speak, there’s a chance you won’t have to work for points like so many of the others,” Tanya spoke, sounding genuinely concerned. “Like, Dr. Carson, for example. He doesn’t work for points. He earns his keep because of his skill as a doctor and can take what he wants in available food and supplies whenever he wants, as long as he writes down what was taken for, like, inventory purposes.”  
  
“I was a teacher in the old world,” Jo spoke, mid bite of an orange slice; the juice dribbling down a bit from the corner her mouth. Wiping it away with a finger, she set the rest of the slice down on the plate and looked at Tanya. “I taught second grade, and I’ve been given the impression there are at least a few kids here. If there’s no one doing it already, I could teach them. I assume there’s the extra space somewhere in this building to set up a schoolroom somewhere. I mean, just because the world we knew ended, doesn’t mean basic education has to. Reading, writing, math, science…those subjects will always be important and useful as kids transition into adults.”  
  
“I don’t think there’s a teacher. Not in the formal sense anyway. There might be someone looking after the kids, more like a babysitter, to simply keep them occupied while their parents are working, but yeah.” Tanya smiled and nodded as she thought about that. “You should definitely offer that skill up. I think that’s a good idea.”  
  
Jo just smiled back, politely. She didn’t want to be making small talk with Negan’s wives. She wanted a one on one with Negan, getting to the, shall we say, heart of the matter. It wasn’t all worthwhile or a waste of her time though. She fell back on her usual brand of optimism and looked at this as reconnaissance.  
  
“What’s it like, being a wife? I mean, I know what it’s like being a wife in general, but…as one of many wives to one man. Is he a good husband?”  
  
Tanya took a moment before nodding. She even smiled but the smile didn’t reach her eyes; something which wasn’t lost on Jo. “He’s decent. He never forces himself on any of us. Nothing like that. In fact, one of the rules here is no rape. It might even be his number one rule. When he’s in the mood, one of usually volunteers; unless he has a preference that night. The only time we really say no is if it’s our time of the month. He’s not rough or hurtful.”  
  
“He ain’t exactly Don Juan, though,” Frankie muttered, a bit more bitterly.  
  
“What are the downsides?” Jo wondered, trying to come off as naively curious.  
  
“Aside from having sex with him?” Frankie almost laughed. “I’m not saying he’s terrible in bed, but he’s not who I would’ve chosen to marry and spend the rest of my life with if I didn’t have better options. I was a massage therapist in the old world. I’m not cut out for the work floor, so I opted for this life instead. We’re stuck here most hours of the day, with little to do.”  
  
“At least the rest of the assholes here can’t lay a finger on us,” Yolanda remarked and then frowned as she noticed the way Amber began to pout and sulk. “Sorry, Amber. Obviously Mark is exempt from the ‘asshole’ umbrella.”  
  
“Mark,” Jo repeated. “Young guy, blondish-brown hair, blue eyes and could’ve been a model?”  
  
Amber perked up and finally gave Jo her attention for the first time since Jo arrived to the Boudoir. “Yeah. He was my boyfriend before I married Negan,” she spoke in a small voice. “I only married Negan to guarantee my mother medication because she isn’t able to work for it herself. Now she gets it all for free. _That’s_ the only upside for me; that my mother is taken care of.”  
  
“I lived in two different communities before, each with a lot of people, and we all had equal rights to whatever medication and supplies we had. We all worked together; not one person more important than the other. We were happy, or as happy as you can be in this kind of world,” Jo commented; referencing both Woodbury and the prison in regard to the amount of people that had access to medication and supplies.  
  
“What happened to those places?”  
  
“The first place was this small town in Georgia, where I’m from. The streets were blocked off and everything ran smoothly there, like life was before, but the leader turned out to be this real monster. Attacked me, and I was lucky enough to have had a friend who helped me get away. The group I ended up with next is the one that found me and we found this prison to stay in. We made it safe, until it wasn’t.”  
  
“What happened to make it _not_ safe?” Yolanda asked, seeming rather intrigued.  
  
“The leader from the first community attacked us. He lost his town. The people there found how the monster he was. Eventually he found a large group of new people, rallied them together and came for us at the prison. They had a tank and everything. Blew holes into the buildings, ran down our fences with the tank and their trucks. Murdered my friends. My husband and I got away. We lost everything we had there and we’d been on the road ever since. Decided to put it all behind us and come north, with a hope of something better out there for us. But then I lost my husband, so it’s been just me.”  
  
Each of the wives seemed to be on the edge of their seats.  
  
“Oh my god, that’s so horrible,” Tanya remarked. “You lost _everyone_ , like, all at once like that?”  
  
“Pretty much,” Jo nodded.  
  
“I don’t know how I would’ve gone on after that,” Alicia muttered quietly.  
  
“I had to. I was pregnant,” Jo replied. “Everything was for my baby. My husband and I were determined find safety; someplace to call home so we could raise our children and where we didn’t have to worry about when our next meal would be.”  
  
“Well,” Tanya smiled sadly, placing a hand to Jo’s knee, “You’re here now. You have friends in us. Maybe when your baby’s born and when you start to work, we can babysit for you. It would give us something more to do anyway.”  
  
“I’ll keep that in mind.”  
  
Yolanda nodded rather adamantly. “Yeah. We women gotta stick together.”  
  
Jo smiled; liking the sound of that.  
  
That was music to her ears.  
  
While Jo slowly turned her attention back to the finger foods on her plate, a succession of five knocks, followed by two more, came to the door. A moment later, the double doors were opened up and there Negan stood with a smile on his face.  
  
Each of the wives turned and almost immediately tensed at his presence and it didn’t fade away like it had when they’d seen it was only Jo and Laura. They seemed nervous and didn’t look him in the eye; like little children scared to so much as breathe the wrong way in the presence of an abusive parent. It gave Jo a little more insight into how the wives truly felt about their “husband.”  
  
If they _truly_ cared or even _loved_ him, they would’ve looked up at him and smiled. They would’ve even stood up and gone to him. Instead, they just remained where they were; waiting for him to make the first move to see what it was he wanted—or rather _who_ he wanted.  
  
Slowly, he looked around the room, and he did so on purpose. Negan eyed each of wives, giving them his full attention one at a time. Though he smiled and seemed to find amusement in how they evaded his gaze, there was a slight glimmer of annoyance that was unmistakable.  
  
“Well, don’t all of you greet your loving husband at once. Jesus- _fucking_ -Christ on a _motherfucking_ cracker. You look like someone died and I _do_ not recall killing anyone today.” He grinned. “Yet.” When the wives slowly looked up at him, he just rolled his eyes. “I’m kidding. For fuck’s sake.”  
  
“Sorry, Negan,” Frankie muttered, standing up and walking over to him with her hands clasped in front of her. She flashed the briefest of glances toward Jo. “We were just, uh…shaken by what Joanna told us about the things that happened to her, about how she lost her friends and her husband.”  
  
Negan turned and cast his gaze upon Jo; knitting his brow together in what seemed to be actual concern. “You don’t say,” he remarked. “Well, all’s forgiven, my loves. Go back to braiding each other’s hair or whatever it is you do while I’m gone. I came here for Miss Joanna anyway.” When she looked up at him, giving him her full attention, he smiled at her and held out a hand. “Bring that food with you and come with me. Let’s go somewhere private where we can talk.”  
  
Licking at her bottom lip, Jo extended her hand to him; allowing him to take it and help her up to her feet. Her other hand held onto her plate. “It was nice meeting ya’ll,” Jo remarked, looking back at the wives as she began to exit with Negan.  
  
Shutting the doors behind them, Negan let out a chuckle. “Ya’ll,” he mimicked with the same southern accent she spoke with. “How far south are you from?”  
  
“Georgia. Decatur, specifically,” she answered.  
  
“How close is that to Atlanta?”  
  
“Maybe, like, two miles. It’s a suburb of Atlanta.”  
  
“Nice.”  
  
Jo didn’t have to go far with Negan. They stayed in the same hallway and everything as they came to another set of double doors with a desk outside it. Simon was sitting there, in a chair, with his legs up on the desk and a pocket knife in his hand, cleaning out the dirt from underneath his fingernails.  
  
“Simon,” Negan greeted. “Don’t let anyone inside while I’m having my meeting with Miss Joanna here, okay?”  
  
Simon’s legs shot down and came to rest normally upon the ground; sitting up straight and nodding obediently. “Sure thing, Negan.”  
  
Flashing Jo a smile that screamed “look how important I am”, Negan pushed open one of the two double doors and let her walk in first.  
  
The room was decently lit, not by electricity, but by the wall of windows with thick, dark curtains to her immediate right, where there was a leather couch and two comfortable looking chairs across from the couch, and a coffee table in between. To the right was also a fancy vase atop a small table, a large potted palm plant that may or may not be fake, a couple of high-end lamps, a sideboard behind the two chairs, and an industrial-style shelving unit behind the couch containing several random items that seemed to be mostly for show and not actual use. In the center of the ceiling there was a rather gorgeous chandelier; something Jo would’ve actually love to have had in her home before the apocalypse. To her immediate left was a large, four-poster bed with two small bedside tables next to it with a lamp on each, which matched the other lamps in the room. Beyond that, was a couple small dressers, a black and white cow-print chair in the corner, a few more potted plants and each wall seemed to be adorned small, framed prints or mounted animal heads.  
  
What struck Jo wasn’t the opulence of the room, but how dark it was, and not because of the lighting. Everything seemed to be either black or dark grey. What little color seemed to only come from the rug on the floor between the couch and the chairs or the green plants.  
  
It was rather depressing, and made her long for Mount Vernon with its brightly colored walls and flowery patterns all over the place.  
  
The darkness of the room’s décor said a lot about the man who lived in it.  
  
“This room is beautiful,” she muttered upon entering and taking in its overall appearance.  
  
“Thank you,” he replied, stepping up from behind her. He moved around to instead stand before her and gestured to the chair closest to her. “Have a seat.”  
  
It wasn’t a request.  
  
Jo obliged him and sat down, letting the plate of food rest upon her lap as she waited expectantly to see what he was going to do next. She watched as he lingered for just a moment, before stepping over to his bed and lifting up his barbed wire-covered bat she had seen him with earlier in the infirmary.  
  
“This is Lucille,” he spoke, holding the bat up and admiring it like it was some shapely vixen that had stolen his heart. “You two weren’t properly introduced earlier.” The smile he wore continued as he shifted his gaze from the bat to Jo. “She’s been a good friend. I can always count on her.”  
  
Jo didn’t reply. She wasn’t exactly sure how to comment anyway. Instead, she just smiled politely.  
  
Negan emitted a small smile and stepped over to the couch after giving Lucille a gingerly swing toward the ground; at a safe distance away from Jo’s legs. Turning in his step, he sank down with the fullness of his weight upon the leather cushion and sat back comfortably as he stared across with Jo. With Lucille coming to rest between his legs, he held it up at the knob with one hand over the other. Neither he nor Jo spoke for a few minutes; both seemingly trying to size each other up and read the air in the room for possible threats.  
  
After a moment, Negan smiled again. “So…Joanna…let’s not beat around the bush. Tell me what brought you to my literal door. I’m in the mood for a good story.”  
  
“Stories should have happy endings.”  
  
“You found your way here. I’d call that a happy ending considering you’ve apparently been through enough shit to have my wives enthralled.”  
  
“Where do you want me to begin?” she asked, as meekly as possible.  
  
“The beginning is typically a good place to start,” he replied. “You said you’re from Decatur.”  
  
Jo sighed deeply, partly for show. She was also trying to drum up enough emotion to start crying when she needed to by focusing on the pain, fear and sorrow she’d felt. It wouldn’t be very hard to do considering thinking about all those instances in her life since the world fell apart still made her heart ache something fierce. Right now, she was also have to focus on weaving a tale to tell him that mixed fact and fiction to assist with her end goal.  
  
“In the beginning, I was married to a man named Oscar. He was one of those that got sick and died right away when the entire world was trying to figure out what the hell was going on. I tried nursing him back to health but he got worse and worse and there was nothing I could do. When he died and came back, I got scared. When the television networks stopped airing but the radio still went, I heard the reports about how to kill the reanimated with a fatal blow to the head; that their bite was contagious and fatal, but I couldn’t do that to Oscar. I couldn’t kill my husband,” she began. She caught Negan’s eye and noticed he had immediately seemed intrigued and somewhat sympathetic. He looked like her words had already struck a chord with him. “I left. I locked him in our room and took off to find my brother, but couldn’t get to where he lived. It was already overrun, so I went to my father’s house next but he was already dead. He’d been bitten and taken his own life. Didn’t leave a note, probably because he didn’t think neither my brother or I would ever reach him.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Negan muttered, and seeming genuinely so.  
  
“That was just the first few days,” Jo muttered ruefully. “I went on the road after that. Mostly just driving around the greater Atlanta area but eventually I knew it had to get away from the densely populated areas. After a couple months I found a community, a small town called Woodbury where the main route was blocked off and heavily guarded to keep the undead out and the living safely inside. It was ruled over by a man named the Governor. He was charming, initially. He was polite, a gentleman. But there was something about him that was off and I couldn’t put my finger on it. Coming there had been a mistake. I got to know that real quick when after he’d invited me to dinner one night I wound up with my wine drugged. When I woke up the next morning, I realized he’d raped me.”  
  
Jo let that information sit for a moment before she bothered to move on. She wanted to gauge Negan’s reaction first to see how she would continue. To her surprise, he seemed almost immediately angered by what she’d said; angered on her behalf. And then she remembered Tanya mentioning how raping was against the rules at the Sanctuary.  
  
She’d definitely struck a chord there and was on her way to having herself endeared to him.  
  
_Good_ , she thought to herself.  
  
“I’m am _really_ fucking sorry that happened to you,” Negan muttered; his face entrenched with a glower. “That shit is uncalled for and unacceptable.”  
  
Jo bowed her head and fidgeted with her plate, pretending to compose herself so she could continue. “I truly appreciate the sympathy. It’s very rare to find in anyone these days.”  
  
“Ain’t that the fucking truth.” His response was paired with silence that followed; signaling for her to speak next.  
  
“When I realized I was pregnant, I tried to leave. I couldn’t stay there any longer. I didn’t want to bring my child into a world, or even a protected town, where it’s father reigned as a monster and where no one knew what a monster he was,” she spoke on. “Unfortunately, the Governor caught me and we fought. I did whatever I could and ended up taking out his right eye with my thumb. He got the upper hand real quick after that and was going to kill me but I stopped him by revealing my pregnancy to him. It was the only thing that saved me. He knocked me out and while I was unconscious he locked me in a windowless room in the basement of one of the buildings. My left leg was chained to the wall, I had a mattress to sleep on and only a literal pot to piss in.” Jo looked up then, finding Negan leaning forward and drinking in her every word. Looking away from his gaze, she bit her bottom lip and pretended to become overcome with emotion for a moment. “Sorry.”  
  
“It’s okay. Take your time.”  
  
After a couple of steadying breaths, Jo continued. “He told me I would only be there until the baby was born and then he would kill me and raise the baby. I had no idea what to do or how to get free. At first I loathed the idea of becoming pregnant by this man when I couldn’t even get pregnant by my own husband. But then I fell in love with my child, the first time I felt her move.” Instinctively, Jo placed her hand to her stomach, recalling those moments with Hope in that dark cell. “The days ticked away, slowly, and then all at once. The only way I knew what time of day it was was simply by when I was brought food. In the morning. Always in the morning. The further along in my pregnancy the more frequently the Governor’s scientist friend came to perform exams on me to make sure the baby was okay, and he wasn’t even an actual doctor. Then I caught the attention of a man guarding the door to my cell. I tried explaining what had happened to me, in detail, and initially I didn’t think he cared or if he would decide to help me. In the last couple of weeks I was there, the Governor began to rape me again and I had almost given up. But then, one night, the man at my door made the choice to help me escape. He was going to come with me, but had me go ahead without him to buy me some time to properly get free.”  
  
Jo was choosing to leave Sophia out of the story. She needed to make this about her, as pathetic as that may have sounded.  
  
“I found an abandoned house. There were a few walkers—the undead—and I had no means to protect myself. I was tired, I was hungry and dehydrated. I made my way upstairs to a bedroom and shut myself in. Eventually I passed out and I’m not sure if it had been hours or days, but soon a group passing by found me. They gave me water to drink and food to eat and promised to take care of me; that I could be with them, no strings attached. Of course, I was skeptical, but I was too tired to question it. That same day the leader of the group and his friend found a prison. It was secure with two layers of chain-link fencing outside the yard and the courtyard was fenced off as well. Inside was overrun, but somehow over the course of that day, all the walkers in the yard were killed and cleared out. The next day, and the days that followed, the rest of the prison was slowly cleared out as well and we all made a home in C Block. The cells there were ideal, because the doors could be closed and we could be locked in for our safety. The place was cleaned up and made to feel like home, little by little, every day, and it _did_ become home. Most of my happiest memories since the world fell apart happened there.” Jo smiled as she reminisced. “One day, after about a month or so, I went into labor, and I was early. It could’ve been stress that induced it. I don’t know. The leader, he was the one who delivered my child; my daughter. After that, he and I grew closer, and we fell in love. He became the father my daughter deserved and over time, my husband.”  
  
Negan still wasn’t speaking; too interested in seeing where her story went.  
  
“I don’t want to talk your ear off,” Jo muttered, trying to seem apologetic.  
  
“No, no…it’s alright. Talk away.”  
  
Jo focused on her plate. Scooting closer to the edge of her seat, she set the plate down on the coffee table and licked her lips. “The Governor found out I was at the prison and attacked us. Killed three of our people, including our only doctor; a lovely old man who had given up his only weapon, a gun, so I could protect myself. After that the Governor demanded I be given back to him, like I was his property, and no one else would have to die. My husband wouldn’t allow it, so a plan was formed to go to Woodbury; to sneak in and attack the Governor on his own soil. My friends succeeded,” she remarked, leaving herself out of the equation where the attack against Woodbury was concerned, “but only in ousting the Governor as the leader of Woodbury. He ran off like a dog with its tail between its legs and Woodbury resumed under new, less sociopathic management, so to speak.”  
  
“Well, that’s good.”  
  
“It was, for a time,” Jo replied. “For several months we lived in peace. Our numbers grew when we accepted residents from Woodbury to live and thrive with us. Then a sickness came, and we lost a lot of those numbers. A different sickness from the one plaguing the world, I mean. It was like an extreme flu. Everyone who contracted it was basically marked for death, though there were a small few who managed to survive. We found medication in time and borrowed a doctor from Woodbury to save as many as we could. And just as the sickness was passing, when we thought we had a moment to breathe, the Governor attacked again; this time with a new group of followers he’d fed lies to and rallied for his cause. They came in trucks and even a tank. I had been outside the fences with a friend, helping to burn the bodies of the sick because it just wasn’t sanitary to bury them inside the fences like the others that had died. My friend and I were unlucky because the Governor found us and took us hostage. He forced us to our knees and threatened to kill everyone unless my husband agreed to give up the prison. But we still had sick people, we had children with us. They wouldn’t have survived being removed from the prison like that. The Governor wouldn’t hear it. He wouldn’t take no for an answer and then made my husband choose which person would die first: my friend or me.”  
  
“No shit.”  
  
Jo nodded, letting the first of many tears she was conjuring up to fall. “My friend offered herself up. She made the choice for all of us and the Governor cut off her head without blinking an eye.”  
  
Negan let out a slight chuckle. “Sorry. I don’t mean to laugh. I understand how horrible that was for you to witness, but you said he didn’t blink an eye and I just find that hilarious because he only had the one left, right?”  
  
Jo couldn’t deny. It was kind of funny. “Yeah. And I wanted to take his other one so badly.”  
  
“No doubt. I would, too.”  
  
“That’s when the fighting began. Things got insane, gun fire was everywhere. The Governor got distracted and I was able to get away from him. My friends were being killed; left, right and center. I found a young woman, sympathetic to my plight, who removed the binding from my hands and then I tried to make my way back to my husband. When I did, the Governor was hovering over him, beating him within an inch of his life, so I did what any good wife would do.”  
  
“Which was?” Negan inquired, literally and figuratively on the edge of seat.  
  
“I found a large blade,” she began, not bothering with the detail of it being her sword, “I came up behind the Governor and I ran him through the chest. When he fell off my husband, I let out all my anger. I unleashed all the fear and sorrow he’d given me and I cut off his head.”  
  
“Well, _fuck_ ,” Negan muttered; thoroughly impressed. “That’s hardcore as absolute fucking _fuck_.”  
  
Jo shrugged, trying to play it cool. “I think it was all adrenaline. He was a very tall and imposing man who could’ve easily taken me down had he seen me coming. The only reason I was able to stab him was because he was so involved with my husband and because his back was turned.”  
  
“Hey. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do.”  
  
Jo became much more serious then. “My daughter died that day; collateral damage in the firefight,” she lied. She summoned all her grief over losing hope and found it rather easy to be swept up in it. Without any hesitation at all, the tears began to fall down Jo’s face as she hugged her stomach and hunched forward in the chair. Unexpectedly, though, she felt Negan’s hand as he reached across the coffee table and covered one of her hands.  
  
“I'm definitely so fucking sorry now,” he commented.  
  
Jo wasn’t looking at him but she could tell by the sound in his voice that his face was probably lined with concern and further sympathy.  
  
“To lose a child like that, and at so young an age; I can’t even begin to imagine.”  
  
Removing her free hand, she brought it up to her face to wipe away a few of the tears, but she made no move to stop herself from crying. Negan was showing himself to be a sucker for a woman crying. It was definitely the exact in Jo had been looking for.  
  
Sucking in a few sobs under the guise of composing herself to soldier on through her story, Jo looked at Negan and attempted to smile appreciatively at him for this kindness she was showing him. “It’s still very hard to come to terms with.”  
  
“I bet.”  
  
A few short, steadying breaths later, Jo continued on again. “My husband and I got away from the prison. There was nothing left for us there. Our friends were dead, our daughter was dead, and our home was destroyed. We went on the road after that, trying to find safety anywhere. We ended caught by a group of cannibals who wanted to kill and eat us when we wouldn’t join them and somehow we managed to escape by the skin of our teeth.” The altering of that tale was done so specifically so that Negan would think it was just her and Rick after the prison fell, and no one else. “Once we were back on the road, we tried for Atlanta, but that fell through. There was a herd that was hard to avoid. We found a car, but it broke down almost as soon as we reached South Carolina. Our goal was to come north. We thought that if any place, anywhere, had a failsafe in check to protect people, that it would be DC. I found out I was pregnant then, with my husband’s child this time and, for the first time, we felt hope again. We were determined, more than ever, to find someplace to start over; someplace safe where we could raise this child and wouldn’t have to worry about going hungry. We bounced from place to place until it was no longer safe anymore, trying desperately to make it to DC.”  
  
“Did you?”  
  
“ _I_ did,” Jo specified. She lifted her gaze and held eye contact with Negan. “My husband died while he was going on a supply run for food,” she continued to lie. “He said he’d only be a few hours, at most. When he didn’t come back, I went looking for him and that’s when I found him, in between two houses. His face was gone, an arm had been pulled out of its socket and his entire middle had been devoured.” Jo brought on the waterworks again with the added bonus of a quivering bottom lip and chin. “I had a gun with me, the one my husband had left me with for protection. There were only a few bullets and I’ve never been a good shot, but I managed to kill the two walkers that were still eating him. I found a blanket and covered him, because I couldn’t bury him, not without straining myself in my condition. And then, I left.” Jo shrugged, casting a forlorn gaze toward Lucille, though not on purpose. It was just where her eyes had wandered. She wasn’t even focusing on the bat. Her mind’s eye was focusing on the new story she was inventing for the simple act of sympathy and to cast her in a light of being some damsel in distress who needed to be protected by a strong man. “I don’t know how to syphon gas from cars or how to hotwire them. I was left with trying to luck out and find vehicles with enough gas already in them, that ran, and had keys stuck in the ignition. And, believe me, it’s not easy to do.”  
  
“Without those skills? No, it sure as shit ain’t,” Negan agreed, finally removing his hand from hers and sitting back. Once more both of his hands encompassed the knob of Lucille; as if he found comfort in holding any part of the bat at all times. It came across as if it were like an extra limb to him.  
  
“I tried to find food, and often enough I’ve been going hungry. Plenty of times I thought I would die and even more times I thought about just killing myself,” she remarked with a dejected shrug. “I barely had any means to protect myself and barely any food to eat or water to drink, let alone any idea how I would bring my child into this world and keep it healthy and safe. But something in me told me to carry on, that something would turn up. And one day, I found a knife, the knife that was taken off me today and again I contemplated using it to kill myself, but instead I used it to defend myself. I tried hunting animals with it, but they’re took quick, and I’ve gotten less so. The stomach kind of gets in the way.” Jo lifted a hand again to wipe away a few extra tears. “Very early this morning I found a walker and killed it. I gutted it and covered myself with its blood and bile so that I could mask my scent. I figured if I did that, and if I came across more walkers than I could handle, they wouldn’t realize I was alive and that they wouldn’t attack me. I didn’t have the chance to test that theory when I came down the road and found this factory.” All at once, Jo began to sob. She tried to make it appear as if it were a sob of relief, full of happy tears at her good fortune of finding safety after all this time. “My husband would be so happy to know I made it to someplace like this; a safe place led by a good man who protects his own, just like my husband did.”  
  
The last part was meant as a very subtle dig; in that Negan had no problem murdering outsiders. At that moment, it was no or never to bring it home; to do what she needed to do.  
  
Gripping the armrests to the chair, Jo slowly pushed herself. Once she was standing, she took a couple steps forward, turning her back to Negan and brought her hands up to her face. She hunched her shoulders forward and cried some more. She stood like that for what felt like forever, wondering when and if he would follow through with what she’d hoped would come next. And, sure as shit, he did.  
  
Negan stood up and came to stand behind Jo; placing his hands on her shoulders as he leaned in and whispered in her ear. “Hey, now. You don’t need to cry anymore. You got a place here if you want it.”  
  
“Really?” Jo lifted her head and dropped her hands down to her chest.  
  
“Really.”  
  
“I’ll earn my keep. I don’t expect a free ride.”  
  
“Well, now, you’re not exactly in a position to earn much of a keep right now. At least not for a couple months,” he remarked, slowly slinking along to stand in front of her, just where Jo was hoping he’d move to. “You got about a month left till pop goes the weasel and then that baby is gonna need you full time for the first couple of months. Let’s shoot for three months from now, we’ll revisit how you earn that keep and until then anything you need, just ask for it.”  
  
“I don’t believe in a free ride, though. I can work, I can do something,” she insisted. “I used to be a first grade teacher and I used to teach the children at both Woodbury and the prison. I can do that here, if there are kids of school age and if you don’t already have a teacher.”  
  
“Okay, then,” Negan agreed with a nod. “We’ll set something up for now. I don’t believe we got any teachers here and if the kids are getting educated at all, it’s probably just by their parents when they’re not working. Work until you pop, then take that time off to take care of the bun in your oven. Go back to teaching when you’re ready. How’s that sound?”  
  
Jo smiled up at him, and not because of what he had just proposed and how she was supposed to feel about it. Sure, if the story she’d just given him was one hundred percent accurate and she had come to the Sanctuary unschooled with the evil deeds Negan and his Saviors had carried out, Jo would’ve genuinely jumped at the offer.  
  
However, she was not a fool to the type of man he was and she was _schooled_ to those evil deeds he had done and would very likely still carry on doing.  
  
“That sounds perfect.” Jo bit her bottom lip and wiped the tears away from both her eyes at the same time with both of her hands. “Can I ask a bold favor?”  
  
“I _love_ bold. _Especially_ in beautiful women.”  
  
Jo pretended to find pleasure with his compliment. “It’s been a long while for me, but I was just wondering if I could hug you?” she inquired; making her voice seem small and nervous. She knitted her brow together and looked at him with doe eyes. “The last person I ever hugged was my husband and it’s just been so long since I’ve felt any ounce closeness and physical safety with another living being. I mean, you can obviously say no…I was just—”  
  
Negan tutted at her and smirked. Bending slightly at the knees so that his face was level with hers, he stared at her and held her shying gaze. “We can hug,” he confirmed. “I’ll consider it a handshake for our deal at you becoming the Sanctuary’s teacher.”  
  
Jo smiled again, expressing relief.  
  
Slowly, she approached him and was welcomed into his arms, which slid easily around her back and held her in place, despite the awkwardness her large stomach presented between their bodies. Casually, she rested her forehead against his chest and smiled to herself.  
  
“Thank you,” she whispered, turning her face upward toward his neck and the underside of his chin.  
  
“It’s nothing,” he assured.  
  
“No, _thank you_ ,” she repeated, maintaining herself in that position so he wouldn’t pull away.  
  
“What for? Letting you stay? Well, you’re welcome.”  
  
When she felt his arms starting to loosen at her back, it became imperative for her to act quickly.  
  
“No,” she said again, keeping her voice low as her heartbeat began to race with each passing second. “Thank you for dying quickly and quietly.”  
  
Before Negan could pull away and look at her with a questioning gaze to make sure he had heard her correctly, Jo stood up on tip toe within his embrace, raised her hands swiftly to either side of his face and yanked it closer to her as she sank her teeth into the front of his throat.  
  
Jo bypassed the initial taste of blood that quickly filled her mouth, steeling herself against it, and keeping her teeth clamped down as he began to stagger backward. Negan removed his hands from her back in an attempt to swat at her, and she used those few seconds of him pulling away to reach a hand under his chin and grab at the gaping hole she’d created in his neck. With her fingers she tore past the tendons and gripped onto the bone of his trachea and gave a hard tug. His fists, which he had planned to hit her with, felt at his sides as the light began to slowly fade from his eyes. The gurgling sound from his neck was his last attempts to draw breath as he dropped to his knees before her.  
  
Not wanting him to make a sound as he fell, Jo cradled the back of his head and crouched as she helped him lay down upon the ground and drown from all the blood pooling in his throat that wasn’t already seeping from the considerable gash in his neck.  
  
“You’re not a good man,” she muttered quietly; still very aware that Simon was just outside the door, but that was another bridge she would cross soon enough. Right now, Negan was her sole focus. “This was for Hilltop, and for the Kingdom, and for Alexandria, and any other community you’ve been oppressing and the countless innocent lives you’ve taken to keep this place running with no regard to what it did to anyone outside your fences.” Somehow he was still alive, though his body was started to twitch as the last vestiges of his life began to flee. Taking a step back, Jo turned and reached for his beloved Lucille; grabbing it by the handle and lifting it up as if to admire it. She looked down, watching as he stared lamely back up at her. The last traces of light in his eyes starting to glaze over as death quickly came for him. “This is also for my husband, who is still very much alive, as well as my friends, who had the sorry misfortune of crossing paths with a few of your men on the road a month ago and nearly killed my husband and my brother. And this also so you won’t ever do anything like that to anyone else. Ever. Again.”  
  
Standing over Negan, Jo raised the bat and swung down against Negan’s forehead with as much strength as she could muster in her physical state. It wasn’t as easy as it would’ve been for her several months ago. Fortunately, because of how far gone Negan was, she only needed the one strike.  
  
He laid there now, a subtle gash against his had to match the one in his neck. Blood was still spilling from the latter, as well as the former, and also from his nostrils and his mouth. His eyes stared blankly, his body was no longer twitching and the gurgling quiet gurgling ceased.  
  
Taking a step back and lowering the bat—Lucille—Jo inspected what she had done.  
  
A part of her didn’t feel as vindicated as she had when she’d done the same thing to that Wolf at the gas station months ago, but, then again, this time it hadn’t been done in extreme fear and rage. It had been done as a necessary evil.  
  
She looked at it as sacrificing a piece of her soul to do evil in order to prevent further evil from plaguing this forsaken world.  
  
As she told Negan as he lay dying, she did it for everyone else who had suffered because of him so they wouldn’t have to suffer anymore.  
  
She did it so that her people—her _family_ —would never suffer the same.  
  
Jo kept her grip on Lucille as she stepped further back from Negan’s corpse and sat down upon the armrest of the couch. After a few moments, she considered that Simon might notice the lack of any talking and come in to check. Her mind began to race with what she should do next.  
  
Setting Lucille down against the couch, she stood back up and walked soundlessly over to the bed and grabbed at the duvet. With a generous yank, she pulled it free and dragged it down to the ground to drape over Negan’s body. But she wasn’t content with just leaving him there like that. Actually, she kind of liked his leather jacket and began to think how it would serve a greater purpose. So, getting down to her knees, she moved as quickly as she could to pull Negan’s arms free from the jacket’s sleeves, occasionally taking brief pause to wipe her hands clean of blood on the dark grey material of the duvet. Leaning over his body, she cradled the back of his head again and pulled him up so she could remove the jacket from underneath him. Once it was free and clear, she set laid him back down and pulled the duvet over him so she didn’t have to look at what she had done.  
  
Even though he had been kind to her, he wasn’t a kind man. He was a manipulative, narcissistic man who was very dangerous.  
  
She felt in her heart she had done the right thing.  
  
Gripping onto the bedpost closest to her, she pulled herself up and sauntered over to one of the dressers. Pulling open the middle drawer, she struck gold in the form of a plethora of white T-shirts. Yanking the blood soaked Led Zeppelin shirt up over her head, she spit onto it and attempted to wipe away most of the blood from around her mouth and down her neck and from her hands. She didn’t bother cleaning her arms because she was going to cover them up anyway. Tossing the soiled shirt to the ground, she pulled the clean, white T-shirt on and found it to be quite snug around the middle but it still fit decently enough; just more like a woman’s fitted tee rather than a regular T-shirt meant for a man of Negan’s build.  
  
Stepping back over toward his covered corpse, she crouched down again for his jacket and slipped it on. It actually fit rather well on her, but she blamed that on the pregnancy weight she had gained. Months ago she might’ve been swimming a bit in the jacket.  
  
Stepping away from the body again, Jo sank down onto the leather couch and picked up Lucille again. Breathing in slowly and steadily as her mind continued to race, she laid back down against the cushions and stared up at the ceiling and draped Lucille across her lap; the knob pressed against the back cushion and the bloodied, barbed wire-covered barrel pointed at the coffee table.  
  
Now, the only thing Jo had to do was to figure out the details regarding how in the fuck she was going to get out of there.  
  
  



	62. Coup

_“I might only have one match,_  
_But I can make an explosion”_  
— Rachel Platten

* * *

  
  
It was surprisingly easy to find peace in the silence of the room as Jo continued to lie upon the couch, staring up at the ceiling. Although her heartbeat was still beating faster than normal due to the anxiety she’d given herself over her current situation, closing her eyes and just focusing on her heartbeat actually began to calm her and help her find her center. She steadied her breathing, she thought of the things that made her happy, and her heartbeat slowly steadied itself as well. She almost wished she could turn on some music. For whatever reason, David Bowie’s “Rebel Rebel” sounded like a good choice. Negan came off as a guy who might’ve had a Bowie collection tucked away somewhere. However, now wasn’t exactly the best time to play music, even if she found it, and draw attention to the room. Then again, perhaps Simon, on the other side of those double doors, wouldn’t think anything out of the ordinary about hearing who he thought to be Negan playing music inside the room for himself and a guest. Either way, Jo wasn’t about to actually do it, even though it was a tempting idea.  
  
Now, though, because she’d been thinking about that song, it was soon stuck in her head and was humming it quietly to herself while she gripped Lucille’s handle a bit tighter.  
  
_“Hey, boss?”_  
  
Jo’s eyes shot open faster than lightning and she had also pulled herself up faster than she had been able to in the last few months without assistance. Fear was a great motivator.  
  
_“Ya need anything in there?”_ Simon asked further. No doubt he’d finally picked up on the lack of voices inside the room.  
  
Using the bat like a cane, Jo pushed herself up to her feet with a bit of a puff of breath from exertion. She stepped quietly over to Negan’s duvet-covered corpse and kicked at where his legs were; giving them a shove with the toe of her boots to push them off to the side so it wasn’t so obvious he was lying there dead.  
  
_“Negan…is everything alright in there?”_  
  
So much for a slower heartbeat.  
  
Even though Jo was frowning at how her heart was once again feeling as if it might jump right out of her chest, she found a way to rein it in and harness that anxiety. She was determined to use it as fuel for the fire within her than was screaming to get this show on the road.  
  
She moved along the side of the bed, beside the double doors. She stood there, waiting, and lifted Lucille up to prepare herself for what she knew was coming.  
  
After a few moments of just staring at the door knobs, she watched as the one closest to her began to turn.  
  
_“Negan, I’m coming in. I hope you and Joanna are dressed,”_ Simon announced; a slight chuckle in his voice.  
  
Lifting her gaze up from the knob as the door began to open, Jo settled upon the space that would be occupied with Simon’s face in mere seconds. Taking half a step back and twisting slightly to the left at the hips, she took a batter’s stance.  
  
“Uh, hello?”  
  
As Simon stepped into the room, he looked straight ahead toward the couch and two chairs first before it even registered that anyone was standing beside the bed. Before he had the chance to fully realize Jo was right there, she swung the bat as hard and fast as she could into his face.  
  
Simon stumbled back without hesitation and the pain was instant for him. Seeing stars before his eyes as blood began to gush from his nose, Jo kicked the door closed with her boot once he’d stumbled clear of it. One of his hands reached for his nose, touching the warm red liquid that seeped freely while the other hand shot out defensively to block any other unwanted blows.  
  
“Whatthefuck,” he muttered, turning to look up at her in shock. His eyes were watering; the stinging pain in what was very likely a broken nose getting the better of him. He wasn’t even bothering to reach for any of the weapons he had on him. He was too stunned, both physically and mentally. As he turned his gaze and seemed to notice there was a body covered up on the floor, Jo swung again; cracking him over the top of his head. “ _Ungh_ ,” he grunted as he collapsed forward onto the ground. “Bit…sssch.”  
  
Jo could safely assume he was trying to call her a ‘bitch’ and she didn’t care. “I’d say it was nothing personal, but that would be a lie,” she remarked, swinging a third time against the left side of his head. Watching the way his arms shot out at his side and how he made an agonized garble of noise from his mouth, Jo opted for one last swing in the same spot; crouching to do so to get more force in the swing.  
  
Standing back up straight, Jo took a step back to inspect what she’d done again. She watched the way Simon’s hands twitched and how the deep gashes in his head were unavoidable to notice. Despite the mess of blood leaking from those open wounds, his mouth, ears, nose and eyes, it was the sight of cracked skull bone and damaged brain which was hard to miss. Apparently Jo had more strength in her than she knew. Even though she was breathing heavily from the energy spent, it didn’t really feel like she was overexerting herself all that much.  
  
Jo gave the end of Lucille a shake and lowered her arm to give it a rest for now. She ignored the fresh blood dripping off the bat to the floor and instead focused next on giving Simon’s legs a kick to make sure he was dead. She kept her gaze mostly upon his head, but looked at his hands and noticed the way the twitching was beginning to slow. When it stopped, she knew then that all brain activity had ceased and any last messages the brain had been sending through the central nervous system had been cut off for good.  
  
Jo inhaled a deep breath and looked at the double doors. “Two down,” she spoke quietly.  
  
Cracking her head from side to side, she turned the knob to the same door Simon had come through and pulled it open slowly and without a sound. Poking her head out into the hallway with Lucille hidden behind the door in case anyone saw her, Jo looked to her right and then to her left and was pleased to find the hallway was empty.  
  
Getting out of the room wasn’t really going to be a problem, but getting out of Sanctuary wasn’t going to be easy at all. She knew she would have to make several, if not many, surgical strikes against the Saviors that would cross her path. She wasn’t sure all of who were high ranking Saviors that could swoop in and take charge of the entire place in Negan’s and Simon’s places. Laura would have to go, maybe that guy Mark, but she doubted the latter. He seemed like a lowly guard dog by comparison. What would help was having allies inside the Sanctuary, and Jo realized she had probably already had that.  
  
Looking down the hallway toward where the Boudoir was, Jo smirked. However, she didn’t make a break for it just yet.  
  
Shutting the door and closing herself up in the room again, Jo set Lucille upon the bed and then crouched down beside Simon’s body. She rolled him over and began to undo his utility belt, slipping it off from underneath him. Kneeling on the ground, Jo pulled the belt on around her hips and tightened to a comfortable notch and then removed the magazine to check that there were enough rounds. Pleasantly surprised to see that it was completely full, Jo secured it back in place and returned the gun to the holster now hanging against her right hip. There was a machete secured against her left hip, but she remembered seeing Simon toying with a pocket knife but hadn’t noticed him entering the room with it in hand, so she began to dig into his pockets. She found success on the second pat down; removing the pocket knife and tucking it into her own pocket instead.  
  
Slowly pushing herself up to her feet, Jo grabbed for Lucille again and quietly let herself out of the room. Moving like a cat, she headed on tip toe for the Boudoir and knocked on the door the same way she remembered Negan had with the “Shave and a Haircut” couplet of seven knocks. She needed the wives to be prepared for her to enter, though she didn’t want to scare them.  
  
Without added fanfare, Jo turned the knob and stepped inside the lavish room; finding the women were visibly tense, which diminished only slightly while some confusion took up residence on their faces.  
  
“Joanna, are you okay?” Tanya asked, standing up and approaching rather gingerly. She must’ve noticed some blood splatter from when Jo had just killed Simon.  
  
So much for the clean, white T-shirt.  
  
What was even the point in having so many clean, white shirts? Had Negan a warehouse filled with them somewhere that he could easily throw one away after it got dirty or had he rarely ever gotten his own hands dirty; leaving it up to his minions.  
  
“I’m fine,” she assured, looking around the room and assessing each face.  
  
“Is that Negan’s jacket?” Alicia inquired, tilting her head slightly.  
  
Jo nodded. “Yep.”  
  
“Why are you wearing Negan’s jacket?”  
  
Then they all finally realized what she was holding.  
  
“Why do you have Lucille?” Frankie blurted; half nervous and half impressed.  
  
Jo sighed, shutting the door behind her for a moment so no one’s voices traveled. “Because he’s not using either anymore.”  
  
The wives quickly began looking between each other and slowly smiles began to spread to their faces.  
  
“Is he dead?” came the small voice belonging to the petite blonde that was Amber.  
  
“Very much so,” Jo answered. “Is that okay with you ladies? I mean, a blind man could see how much you detested him when he entered the room and when you thought I was him coming in. So, I don’t think I’m going out on a limb by assuming there’s no love lost.”  
  
Tanya shook her head. “No. No, we’re cool.”  
  
“Good,” Jo nodded. “Consider yourselves widows now instead of wives.” Off their increasing smiles, Jo added, “By the way, the sob story I gave you earlier was pretty much horseshit and you can call me Jo.”  
  
Yolanda stood up and walked up to Jo and gave her a hug, which caught Jo off guard. “Thank you,” she muttered with a slight laugh. “I don’t know how you did it or where you came from, but you are heaven sent, girl.”  
  
When Yolanda pulled back, Jo simply smiled and looked back at the others. “I need to know something upfront. I need to know who else hated Negan. Who else, here at the Sanctuary, would’ve loved to see him dead?”  
  
“My boyfriend Mark,” Amber offered up. “Sherry’s husband, Dwight.”  
  
“I’ve heard that name—Dwight,” Jo remarked. “A friend from another community met Dwight before. Dwight was supposed to help pass along the Sanctuary’s secrets and help the other communities gather together to overthrow Negan and his regime.”  
  
“Dwight and Sherry tried making a run for it a couple of months ago with Sherry’s sister Tina,” Frankie explained. “I guess Tina died at some point during their escape and when Dwight and Sherry got caught, Sherry got shot. We assume the shot was fatal because Dwight was brought back here a blubbering mess and thrown into a cell. He’s been there ever since.”  
  
“Are you sure he isn’t dead?” Jo questioned.  
  
“If he were, he’d be one of the living dead hooked to any one of those posts or the fences outside this place,” Tanya informed. “Everyone serves the Sanctuary, in one aspect or another, even after we die. But I don’t think Dwight’s dead. We’d have gotten wind of it, or seen his chained up corpse outside.”  
  
“So, if I could get Dwight out, he’d be an ally?”  
  
Tanya nodded. “Definitely.”  
  
“Any of you ladies know how to use weapons—guns, knives, machetes, crossbows?”  
  
“Not really,” Amber admitted; finally seeming talkative and bubblier now that the threat of Negan’s existence was over. “We were kept here like porcelain dolls. We were never given lessons. Negan said we didn’t need to learn because we were his wives and he would keep us safe.”  
  
She seemed disgusted at some memory she was recalling and Jo sympathized with it; thinking back on her initial doubts with The Governor when she was merely one of his citizens and not yet his prisoner. No one needed weapons or to learn to protect themselves in Woodbury because The Governor had his guards on watch duty, twenty-four seven.  
  
That gave Jo a thought.  
  
“Weapons,” she muttered. “Is there an arsenal here, and if so do you know where it is? Who has access to it? And more importantly, who carries weapons around here—just the soldiers or everyone?”  
  
“We can definitely tell you where the arsenal is and we can tell you the name of the big players around here and describe what they look like, but you’re gonna need more allies on your side to get you where you need to go.” Frankie stood up, folded her arms and looked around to her fellow wives before settling her gaze back upon Jo. “Is your goal to take this place?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Something like that.”  
  
“Do you have outside help? Are there any people waiting to charge this place the second you give them a signal.”  
  
“It’s pretty much just me, and I know it sounds crazy…”  
  
Frankie held up a hand. “Crazy is the dead walking around instead of staying dead. This is just…” she gestured to Jo and smirked. “This is inspiring.”  
  
“You can say that again,” Alicia smiled, standing up as well.  
  
“We’ll help you take this place from the Saviors; that is, the soldier-types. There are families here, with children, and they cannot be harmed,” Frankie added.  
  
“My intention is taking out as many soldiers as I can without getting myself killed,” Jo assured. “I have a husband and daughters I want to get back to. I’m doing this for them. I’m doing this for all the communities.” Jo looked around at each face staring back at her. She adjusted and tightened her grip on Lucille’s handle as she held it up. “There may be some battles in the near future, but I’m preventing an all-out war before it starts. ”

 

* * *

  
  
To say Rick was seething would’ve been an understatement.  
  
He’d gone beyond seeing red to seeing new colors he couldn’t put a name to.  
  
Upon returning to the Hilltop, and in record time, because he knew something was amiss and wanted answers as soon as possible, he initially sought out Jo, to tell her about how meeting King Ezekiel and seeing the Kingdom had gone. When she didn’t appear right away, he wasn’t too worried. He assumed she might be inside Barrington House or in the doctor’s trailer or in some other way unable to step away just then. What he knew was that Jesus had something serious to discuss with him that had had Rick’s gut twisted with anxiety the entire drive back from the Kingdom. The younger man had been ominous and looked incredibly guilt-stricken about something and it wasn’t sitting right with Rick; not in the least.  
  
Rick went into Barrington House while his group remained with the van. He walked right into grand foyer, looking toward the office and then upward toward the stairs, as if expecting Jo to just be there. When he called out to her again, Jesus appeared behind him, shutting the front door behind.  
  
The subtle show of privacy was not lost on Rick as he turned around and eyed the younger man.  
  
“Jo isn’t here,” Jesus had admitted in a low, quiet voice; finding it hard to look Rick directly in the eye.  
  
“What do you mean? Where else can she be? Did she go back to Mount Vernon? Who took her?” Rick demanded, not assuming the worst just yet.  
  
Jesus sighed and bit his bottom lip. “Maybe we should go into the office, sit down and—”  
  
“No,” Rick cut him off. “Nothing good ever comes from being told to sit down first before being told something. Just tell me what’s going on. Where the fuck is my wife?” The worry and fear was creeping in fast and strong by this point. He was glowering at Jesus as the worst case scenarios began to pop into his mind. “If something happened to her, you better make good with your maker, because so help me…I will fucking _end_ you.”  
  
Folding his arms across his chest, Jesus kept his gaze averted and focused on anything but Rick’s face. “Late last night Jo came to talk to me and Aaron,” he began.  
  
“About what?”  
  
“About the Sanctuary, the Saviors, and any other information I had gathered about Negan.”  
  
Rick processed this little bit, steadied his breath and looked down at the floor while resting his hands upon his hips. Surprisingly, he didn’t do the usual gesture of tapping the handle of his Colt which typically came as a subconscious comfort. “And?” he pushed. He looked up and found the fact that Jesus couldn’t or didn’t want to make eye contact more than a little disconcerting.  
  
“She asked for directions on how to get there and a promise I would not say anything about anything until after she’d been given a couple-hour head start to get there.”  
  
Rick blanched. “And you _agreed_ to it?” He was absolutely dumbstruck. He began to take steps backward, turning away from Jesus and placing his hands to his face as the seriousness of what was going on hit him like an anvil. Pulling his hands away, he barely noticed that they were shaking as stress, fear, worry and anger took hold of him. “You let her go off by herself to do what? What was her plan? What was _your_ plan?” Rick spun around and got right in Jesus’ face. “You secretly working for the Saviors, maybe? I mean, I can’t think of another reason why you’d think it okay to let a pregnant woman—my _wife_ —just go off alone to the headquarters of these assholes you’re so keen for everyone to fight.”  
  
“I’m not the only one who wants to fight them—”  
  
“Well, the Kingdom didn’t seem to give a sh—”  
  
“They will once they hear what Jo has done. What she was willing to do, despite her physical limitations. Because if _she_ can do what needs to be done, and at great personal risk, then they have no excuse to hide behind their walls anymore.”  
  
Rick was silenced. His worst fear was being laid before him. “What was she willing to do?” he asked; not entirely sure he was prepared for the answer.  
  
“Kill Negan.” Watching the way Rick was trying to process that, Jesus offered up more to say. “It was her idea, and I still believe it is a great idea. She wanted to be a Trojan horse, because she said no one would harm a pregnant woman, especially if she was unarmed. She was going to paint a picture of herself for the Saviors, to give them the impression she was no threat at all and do whatever she could to get a private meeting with Negan. She said that if killing him was not going to be an option, then her last resort would be to talk to him. But that was her _last_ resort. Her goal was to see him dead.”  
  
“How the hell did she plan on getting out of there if he was dead? Didn’t she think people would retaliate?” Rick was pacing; frantic and racked with a million worrying thoughts.  
  
“She was going to pick off any threats one by one,” Jesus replied. “I don’t know how, but that’s what she said. I believed her capable. She told me the brunt of what had been done to her and your group in the past and the things you’ve had to do to get through it all. The levels you’ve had to stoop down to in order to survive. She said she was done letting men like The Governor think they ruled the world and could get whatever they want at the cost of innocent lives.”  
  
The mention of The Governor brought some focus back to Rick as he glared at Jesus. “How long ago would she have left?”  
  
“Shortly after we did; minutes, half an hour.”  
  
Rick just stood there; his fists clenching at his sides. When Jesus finally lifted his gaze and made eye contact with Rick, Rick took half a step forward and then pulled an arm back. Before Jesus could react, Rick had hauled off and punched him square in the jaw; knocking him flat on his ass.  
  
“If she’s dead, you’re dead,” Rick barked. Watching as Jesus tried to shake it off and wiped a little bit of blood from the corner of his mouth, Rick then extended his hand to the younger man. “You’re gonna take me to the Sanctuary to get my wife back. You’re gonna gather as many fighters as you got to come with us.”  
  
“Rick, I—” Jesus began as he stood back up with Rick’s assistance.  
  
“You don’t get a fucking say in the matter,” Rick interrupted. “You wanted us to fight the Saviors with you. Well, now I’ve got all the cause I need. Send someone back to the Kingdom, and to Alexandria if need be, to get their fighters to join us. If something happens or has already happened to Jo and those Saviors find out that she came from this way, they’re gonna retaliate and retaliate hard. I’ve dealt with that type more than once.” The Governor as well as the Marauders in DC immediately came to mind. “I don’t know what the hell Jo was thinking but it’s too late to worry on that now. We’re gonna have the fallout of it to deal with and soon. They may not come here or to any of the other communities today, maybe not even tomorrow but the Saviors _will_ be here. It’s not a matter of if, but of when, and I’m sorry but I can’t let them find their way to Mount Vernon.”  
  
Rick’s heart was beating so wildly and so hard. He was feeling almost as if he would just keel over dead with a heart attack right there. At the very least, it was possible he was quite successfully suppressing a major anxiety attack instead; mostly because there wasn’t time to focus on the fear eating at him or the anger festering within like wildfire.  
  
“If we’re fighting—if you’re fighting with us now—we’re going to need weapons. All those guns Michonne said you guys have stored away at Mount Vernon; we’re going to need the entire arsenal.”  
  
“I’ll send Michonne back with Merle and Tyreese. They can take the van back, load it up, and come back with whoever we left behind to come here that we can spare to fight. If they will.”  
  
“You don’t think any of the rest of your people would fight?”  
  
Dragging his fingertips along the round table at the center of the grand foyer, Rick moved over toward the window to the left of the door and pushed the thin, lace curtain aside. He peered out, noting how the late afternoon sun had begun casting shadows. Because of the porch overhead, he couldn’t look up to see the exact position the sun sat in the sky to determine how late it was and he no longer trusted his wristwatch anymore. The battery was slowing it down more and more and soon enough, like everything else in the world, it would die; unless, of course, he could find another. It really made no sense to even wear it anymore, but it had become a part of him like his utility belt, his Colt and his wedding ring. Without it, he felt bare.  
  
Dropping his hand from the curtain, Rick cast his gaze down at his hand and began to play with said wedding ring; twisting it around and around as he thought about Jo and prayed she was alive.  
  
He was angry at her for hiding her intentions to go it alone to the Sanctuary and do what she felt she needed to do. He knew her feelings about all this was probably rooted in everything that had been done to her and those they loved because of the Governor. Even though she had been able to kill the Governor, he doubted she ever felt better about doing it because of having lost so many in the process, that horrible day at the prison. His one death didn’t rectify the pain and the multitude of deaths he’d caused. There had been so many other things since then, in the space of really nothing more than a simple month, that had happened that Jo, nor anyone else, could’ve truly prevented. So, maybe now, Jo was probably thinking this was something she could do; something she could prevent. Cut off the head of the snake and it could no longer bite.  
  
“Rick,” Jesus spoke, cutting into Rick’s thoughts.  
  
Trying to remember what they’d been talking about, he threw a slight look over his shoulder. “One of my toughest men—Tyreese—he’s gonna be a dad any day now. I can’t ask something like this of him. He should stay behind at Mount Vernon once he gets back with Michonne and Merle. Nicole, we need her safe since she’d there to deliver Karen’s baby, and mine if Jo somehow comes home to me. Barb is older and arthritic. Mike is capable but I doubt he’d want to go off to fight and leave his son alone; not considering he’s only ten and just lost both his mother and older brother in the same day a few months ago. I think I can spare Morgan, José and Tara. Tara, especially; she’s a good shot,” Rick rattled. Turning fully toward Jesus, he looked the younger man square in the eye. “How many of your people do you think can be ready at a moment’s notice to take up arms?”  
  
Jesus sighed, considering his numbers. “Twenty, maybe twenty-five. I’d be pushing it at thirty and that would leave this Hilltop with a skeleton crew if we take the fight to the Saviors.”  
  
“Well, it’ll have to do.” Rick walked up to Jesus, hands on his hips. “Pick two people you trust, that know the way to the Kingdom and to Alexandria; send each with the message that not fighting is no longer an option because it’s coming whether they like it or not.”  
  
“I agree.”  
  
“People like Negan, like the Saviors—they won’t stop with just one community. If they’re not sure where Jo came from, where the threat came from, they’ll come after _every_ community. They will strike fast and hard. If they have these outposts you’ve mentioned, then they are beyond organized. It’ll probably only take one call over the radio and those troops will rally together at the drop of a hat.”  
  
“You have experience with something of this magnitude?” Jesus inquired; quite intrigued.  
  
“Not really,” Rick shrugged. “It’s just what I would do.” Taking one step closer, he glanced down between both of them and then narrowed his gaze. “I’m not sorry for punching you, just so you know, and if I deem it necessary, or if I just feel like it, I’ll do it again.”  
  
“Well, now I know it might be coming, so I’ll be ever vigilant in keeping a safe distance.” There was a slight smirk appearing at the corners of Jesus’ mouth.  
  
“Trust me,” Rick muttered; a knowing spark in his eye. “You won’t see it coming.”

 

* * *

  
  
“How are you gonna do this by yourself? You’re only one person.”  
  
Jo was back in Negan’s suite, sitting on the edge of the bed with Tanya standing a couple of feet in front of her. Holding the walkie-talkie that Simon had left upon the desk outside the room, Jo kept her finger hovering over the button as she stared at the younger woman. “Kinda like dominoes.”  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“One falls, then the next, until the threat is knocked down. Kinda like that.”  
  
Tanya knitted her brow together; unconvinced. She was also trying her best to avoid looking at Simon’s corpse which she had helped Jo move around to the other side of the bed so that if anyone happened to walked right in, they wouldn’t immediately see anything. Except for maybe the blood, that is, but a couple of shirts from Negan’s dresser had sopped up most of it.  
  
“But with dominoes, one domino takes out the next one. They’re not getting knocked down individually by an outside source, with the exception of the first domino.”  
  
Jo sighed. “Don’t overthink it.”  
  
“Okay, then what do you need me to do right now? I mean, someone is gonna come up here looking for Negan soon enough to ask him some asinine question, no doubt. My bet is on Fat Joey.”  
  
Jo raised an eyebrow. “Why is he called that? Why not just Joey?”  
  
“’Cause there’s another Joey who isn’t fat. It helps avoid confusion when Negan needed to call for one of them over the radio.”  
  
“I would’ve just gone with their last names.”  
  
“Well, Negan isn’t— _wasn’t_ big on being politically correct.”  
  
“You said Arat is next in line as top dog around here?” Off Tanya’s nod, Jo turned the walkie-talkie around so that it faced Tanya. “She won’t know my voice and will be suspicious if I call her. You need to do it for me.”  
  
“What do I say?”  
  
“Just tell her who you are and that Negan requires her presence here, and alone. I doubt she’d question one of his wives being here.”  
  
“And if she wants to know why I’m calling her and he isn’t?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “You’ve lived here, pretending to be okay with being Negan’s glorified love slave. I think you can manage this.” She jostled the walkie-talkie as if to make her point. “You want to help, this is how you help.”  
  
Exhaling a deep breath to gather her strength, Tanya took the walkie-talkie from Jo and held it up to her lips. She paused for a moment, locking eyes with Jo as if it would help calm her nerves, and then pressed the button. “Hey, Arat. You there?” Tanya asked, wincing at how lame she felt that was.  
  
Without hesitation, a response came. _“Yeah, who’s this?”_  
  
“It’s Tanya.”  
  
_“Oh.”_ Then, _“What do you want?”_  
  
“It’s not what _I_ want. Negan asked me to ask _you_ to come up here to his room. He has something important or whatever to talk to you about.” Tanya removed her thumb from the button and grimaced at Jo.  
  
“Tell her…tell her it’s got to do with…the next supply pickup to Alexandria,” Jo whispered. She felt like that was something that would entice the woman on the other end; something that Tanya likely wouldn’t know much if anything about but Negan obviously would.  
  
“He mentioned something about the next supply pickup at Alexandria? He didn’t seem to be in the best of moods about it,” Tanya rattled into the walkie-talkie.  
  
_“Why isn’t he asking me himself?”_  
  
Tanya pressed the button in again, but didn’t speak right away. “I dunno. I think he finds it funny, having me do this.” She then lowered her voice and really got into the part she was playing. “He just stepped into his bathroom, and like I said, he doesn’t seem to be in the best of moods right now so I wouldn’t keep him waiting.”  
  
An audible sigh came across the radio. _“Yeah,”_ Arat muttered, clearly in agreement. _“Alright. I’ll be there in two shakes.”_  
  
“Okay.” Tanya removed her thumb from the button for the last time and then handed the walkie-talkie back over to Jo. “You think she bought it?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Doesn’t matter,” she replied. “I just needed to get her here.” Setting the device down beside her, she stood up and grabbed for the machete and walked over to the double doors. After locking the right door, she stepped aside of the left door which she kept unlocked. “I’m giving you two choices right now; either head back to the Boudoir or stay. If you stay, then get up on the bed and sit casually. Try not to think about what’s gonna happen.”  
  
“I’d ask what was gonna happen, but I know,” the young brunette muttered, sidling up to the bed; her decision to stay, obvious. She didn’t appear too unnerved by the prospect of watching someone die, but rather like a woman resigned to some terrible fate she had not motivation to avoid.  
  
“You can look away when she comes in,” Jo remarked, sympathetically. “You don’t have to watch it happen.  
  
“Why did you lock one of the doors?” Tanya asked as she pulled her legs up, cross-legged style, but mindful that she was wearing a short black dress and taking the necessary precaution in pushing down the front so she wasn’t exposing her underwear to Jo.  
  
“It’ll force Arat to come in the left door. When she comes in, and the door opens, she won’t be able to see me behind it. Her initial focus will be on seeing you there on the bed. I’ll use that distraction to my benefit,” Jo explained, lifting the machete and making a cutting motion to get her meaning across. “I’m not exactly in optimum fighting condition,” she added, gesturing to her stomach, “so I need to use every little thing to my advantage to get the upper hand. Cunning and slights of hand, so to speak.”  
  
Tanya nodded, and began to pick idly with the hem of her dress. “Okay.”  
  
“That’s good. Keep doing that,” Jo remarked.  
  
“Doing what?”  
  
“Looking like you’d rather not be here and trying to find something to distract yourself with.”  
  
Both women smiled at each other and then fell into silence. While Tanya looked down at the black sheets underneath her bent and folded legs, waiting with bated breath for the imminent death of Negan’s henchwoman, Jo leaned the small of her back against the sideboard against the wall, beside the doors. She did what she could to clear her mind and not let what was about to happen bother her. This Arat was another cog in the machine, and she wasn’t some helpless victim forced into the lifestyle of a Savior. She clearly chose it and if left to live, after finding out what happened to Negan, she would pose as much of a threat as Simon would’ve with Negan gone. Anyone that would rally the rest of the Sanctuary together to fight back or continue with the Saviors’ way of life of oppressing others and thoughtlessly murdering those under their thumb had to go.  
  
Jo refused to consider any other option. It was not up for debate.  
  
As she glanced down at her stomach, running her left hand briefly over it, the sound of footsteps drew near and Jo lifted her gaze toward the closed left door. When the footsteps stopped, a knock came, and then the left door knob turned. Tanya immediately sat up straight and Jo leaned away from the sideboard and gripped the machete.  
  
“Hey Negan, what’s up?” a woman’s voice inquired as the door opened.  
  
Jo lifted the machete and watched as Arat appeared; her back to Jo as she noticed and was distracted by Tanya’s presence at first, as expected.  
  
“Is he still in the bathroom?” Arat asked.  
  
Tanya unconsciously glanced over Arat’s shoulder to Jo and that simple look drew Arat’s attention away. As she began to turn and see who or what was behind her, Jo could not afford to hesitate as she brought the machete down upon the side of Arat’s head. The other woman was quite obviously caught off guard and stumbled back a little as blood began to spurt out from the wound Jo had created. Yanking the machete back with all her might, because it had become somewhat lodged into Arat’s skull, she struck another blow at the woman’s head to play it safe.  
  
Tanya gasped, having not bothered to look away, as Arat dropped to the ground; spluttering blood from her lips. She tried to speak but it became clear that Jo had done enough damage to render the woman incapable to forming and semblance of words. She teetered to the side and then dropped fully upon the floor, right into the tackiness of leftover blood from where Simon had fallen and died a while before.  
  
“Close the door and look away.”  
  
“Why?” Tanya questioned, quickly moving to unfold her legs and climb down from the bed.  
  
“Because what I’m going to do next, you won’t want to see.” Moving to stand astride Arat’s waist, Jo crouched down slightly with a huff and waited to hear the left door click shut. “Are you looking away?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
Taking Tanya’s word for it, Jo swung the blade down across Arat’s neck. Despite her determined resolve, Jo grimaced as she shoved the tip of the blade into the woman’s eye socket to speed up the dying process since both blows of the machete to her head hadn’t done the trick. Jo could only assume the blade hadn’t been as sharp as she had hoped.  
  
Jo sighed and brought her gaze away from Arat’s face. “No hard feelings,” she muttered.  
  
“Huh?”  
  
Jo pushed herself back up to stand straight and shook it off. “Nothing,” she replied. “Help me drag her over with the other two.”  
  
As Tanya turned around, she frowned at the sight of Arat’s body on the floor. “What about all the blood?”  
  
“Who else would take up arms to stop me?” Jo asked, ignoring Tanya’s question.  
  
“Um…Jared, probably. From what little I’ve seen of him, he’s a major asshole. Trigger-happy type. And, uh, probably Gary. Maybe Laura. There’s Gavin…I think he’s in charge of a group that collects supplies. Jared is part of that group. Gavin seems kinda nice, though.”  
  
A new knock came at the door and it cause Tanya to nearly jump out of her skin as she took a step back. The knock, however, was short and soft; delicate, even.  
  
“It’s Yolanda,” the voice called from the other side; barely above a whisper.  
  
Stepping around Tanya, Jo walked over to the door and pulled it open a hair. “What’s the word on Dwight? Were you able to figure out where he was being kept?”  
  
Yolanda grinned and pushed the door open, causing Jo to step back a little. “I did you one better.” As she stepped aside, she beckoned at something to her left as a lanky man with stringy blonde hair stepped forward into view. “Jo, this is Dwight. Dwight, meet our _real_ Savior.”  
  
Jo snickered and assessed Dwight’s appearance. He looked pale and was dressed in a dirty pair of what was probably white sweatpants, at one time anyway, with a large letter C upon the chest with orange spray paint. He didn’t smell that great either. Likely, he had been kept in a dark place for a long while, with little opportunity to bathe. “You’re the one who met with Jesus and tried to help get him information about this place, to help the communities band together to fight back?”  
  
Dwight nodded. “I am.”  
  
“Are you prepared to put your money where your mouth is or were you all just talk before?”  
  
Shifting his weight from one leg to the other, Dwight planted his hands firmly upon his narrow hips. “You the one who killed Negan and Simon and…” he peered inside the room and noticed Arat still lying there, dead on the floor, “Arat?”  
  
Jo took pause, eyeing Dwight, and then nodded. “I am.”  
  
“Then, yes,” Dwight replied, adamantly. “I am here to help you.” Then, he added, almost sadly, “You did what I never could. I lost my wife and my sister-in-law just trying to get away from that asshole. I don’t even know if my wife is alive, somewhere out there. I was caught and we got separated, but if she died, at least she died free of this place. The not knowing hasn’t been easy, but at least she was free and didn’t end up back here, locked up like an animal and living off only fucking dog food.”  
  
“Well, a new day has dawned,” Jo smirked. “No more dog food for you.”  
  
“That alone has me in your debt.” Dwight smirked back.  
  
“Well, you can pay that debt back now by getting me to the arsenal and taking care of anyone who gets in my way to take this place.” Jo pulled the handgun from behind her and handed it over to him; already trusting him completely. There was nothing about him that made her feel uneasy.  
  
Dwight stared at the gun being offered to him and almost looked as if he wanted to cry. It had quite obviously been a long while since he’d been shown kindness and faith. “Thank you.”  
  
“Frankie’s already made her way down to the arsenal,” Yolanda informed. “I saw her chatting up David who was guarding the arsenal. He seemed in her thrall and it’s what helped me slip by and get to Dwight.”  
  
“And they didn’t see you slip back out?” Tanya wondered.  
  
“The arsenal door was open, but they weren’t outside the room. I figured they were inside.”  
  
“Good enough,” Jo announced, stepping over to the bed and picking up the walkie-talkie and then clipping it to what was now her utility belt. “Alright, Dwight, I want you at my side. Tanya, head downstairs and start spreading word of a communal meeting of sorts wherever most people would gather to listen to Negan preach or whatever he did.”  
  
“Nah, preach is basically it,” Dwight remarked with a slight chuckle as he checked the gun in his hand to see how fully loaded it was, if at all. “He loved the sound of his own voice.”  
  
“Oh god—did he _ever_ ,” Yolanda agreed with a chuckle of her own. “Even after sex, he was surprisingly chatty for a guy. It was, like, yeah…okay, dude, whatever. Shut up, already.”  
  
Tanya grinned. “Seriously, though,” she muttered in agreement.  
  
“Okay, ladies, let’s save the war stories for later,” Jo spoke, gesturing for Tanya to head out of the room ahead of her.  
  
“So, you’re doing all this nine months pregnant?” Dwight questioned as Jo shut the door behind them.  
  
Carrying only Simon’s machete, which was leaving a trail of blood dripping in its wake, and Simon’s pocket knife, Jo looked down at her stomach and then up at the blonde man. “I’m only about eight months, but yes.”  
  
“That’s badass.”  
  
“Yeah, I know,” Jo replied, trying to sound aloof about it all. Pointing forward with the machete, she gave a nod toward the end of the hallway. “One of you lead the way.”  
  
Yolanda took point, walking ahead of the other three as they made their way out of the hall and turned in the direction of the stairwell. For the most part, they remained silent, so as not to draw any possible attention from the sounds of their voices. They even made sure the door to the stairwell closed soundlessly and tried to walk as quietly down the stairs as possible; but that was somewhat easier said than done for Tanya and Yolanda who had to walk each flight in high heels.  
  
“Is that Negan’s jacket?” Dwight asked quietly; a mere step behind Jo on the stairs.  
  
“Yeah. It’s not like he was using it anymore. Plus, it’ll serve a purpose.”  
  
“Damn.”  
  
He sounded impressed and that helped fuel Jo’s confidence, which she need as much of as possible right now.  
  
At the ground floor, they turned down the same hallway where Simon had led Jo to Fat Joey’s room. Once again the sound of many voices increased, signifying that they were close to factory floor. They continued past the door to Fat Joey’s room, which was closed, and neared even closer to the factory floor, which was likely around the corner at the very end of the hallway up ahead. Jo turned and looked at Dwight and stopped walking.  
  
“Were you the only one Negan had locked up?”  
  
“I think so. I haven’t heard anyone else around me in a while,” he replied, keeping his voice low. “Either they were let go or they’re dead and on the fence now.” He pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “The way we just came from, but if we’d turned immediately left, that led to where I was kept. If we’d gone right, we’d have—”  
  
“The shower room,” Jo cut him off. “Yeah, I was there already.”  
  
Dwight nodded as Yolanda came to a stop and pointed to the room at the end of the hall, but just before the bend toward the factory floor. She turned and nodded at the opened door. Dwight nodded back and then glanced at the machete in Jo’s hand. “Can I use this?” he tapped her hand with the back of his. “It won’t draw attention like the gun will.”  
  
Since the blade was the closest thing to her sword, Jo felt a little apprehensive giving it up, even if only momentarily. But she acquiesced; handing it to him as he traded the gun back. “Time to prove your worth,” she whispered.  
  
Dwight merely snickered and then took a deep breath. Finding a grip around the machete’s handle that felt most comfortable to him, he poked his head into the room first and then coyly stepped inside with his hands behind his back to hide the wide blade. “Hey, Dave,” Dwight greeted.  
  
_“Wh-what are you doing out?”_  
  
David sounded surprised at both the appearance of Dwight and also being found alone in the room with one of Negan’s wives. At the same time, Tanya gave Jo a knowing look and continued on toward the direction of the factory floor, to spread the “news” of a meeting that “Negan” was going to hold soon and everyone needed to be present.  
  
_“Oh, you didn’t hear? I was released on account of good behavior,”_ Dwight lied.  
  
_“You mean you got tired of eating shit and sitting in your own, and then you begged like a little bitch for Negan to let you out? I bet you cried genuine tears, too.”_  
  
_“Nah, it was nothing like that. Trust me. I’m still on probation, I guess you could say, but I sure as hell know of a way to put me back into Negan’s good graces, like, yesterday.”_  
  
_“Oh?”_  
  
_“Well, yeah, I mean…here you are with one of his wives and you look pretty cozy with her. I’m sure Frankie, here, wouldn’t mind corroborating to the fact that you lured her in here. After all, it wouldn’t be hard. You’re much larger than her. You could’ve easily been forcing yourself on her. I remember how rough you got with Laura that one time and you were lucky she let it slide and didn’t take it to Negan. You know how he feels about rape.”_  
  
_“I wasn’t—I didn’t…that’s not what was happening here, D._ She _was coming onto_ me _.”_  
  
_“Yeah, sure. And pigs can fly.”_  
  
_“I swear, man. You can’t say a thing to Negan. He’ll have my balls in a vice and give me the iron for so much as looking at her.”_ David very audibly huffed; stressing, no doubt. _“Tell him I wasn’t luring you in here.”_  
  
Before Frankie could speak up, Dwight did instead. _“Listen, I won’t say a thing and this can be swept under the carpet, but you gotta do me a solid, alright?”_  
  
_“Sure, yeah, name it.”_  
  
_“Get me that inventory list over there on the wall. I wanna see how much of what we’ve got. I’m not allowed to leave the Sanctuary just yet, on account of my probation and all, but maybe I could earn my keep working in here in the meantime, and I’d like to be up to speed if that should happen for me.”_  
  
_“Shit, okay.”_  
  
There was a moment of silence from within the room, mixed with the heavily shuffling of a pair of feet, then another pair shuffling a bit lighter. Another moment later there was a noise that sounded quite similar to a watermelon getting smacked into a wall, followed by a feminine gasp which obviously belonged to Frankie who, seconds later, came rushing out of the arsenal with minor blood splatter on her arms and a shocked look on her face. She clearly hadn’t been expecting what had clearly happened inside the room.  
  
After a second smacking noise, mixed with pain grunts and then what sounded like a bag of potatoes dropping to the ground, footsteps neared the doorway and Dwight poked his head out.  
  
“Okay,” he beckoned; casting a careful look in the direction of the factory floor to make sure no one was coming.  
  
Jo stepped forward first and her eyes immediately went down to the dead man on the ground on the other side of the room but then her eyes were easily distracted by the immense volume of weaponry. The arsenal of weapons her people had kept back at the prison, and even what Michonne and Daryl had brought back from a run a few weeks ago, which they hadn’t been aware that she knew about, had nothing on this arsenal. Not even combined.  
  
“Holy shit,” she murmured.  
  
“I know, right?”  
  
“Alright, ladies. Grab whatever you feel comfortable using, and only if you know how to use it. I don’t have time to show you.”  
  
Dwight gave Jo the machete back to her before he grabbed a handgun, attached a silencer to the muzzle and loaded it with a new clip into the magazine. He then grabbed an AK from the hook on the wall, loaded it as well and pulled it around him so that it hung across his shoulder and chest by the strap. Both Yolanda and Frankie took large knives, but only Yolanda took a handgun and loaded it properly. When she noticed the others looking at her, she shrugged it off.  
  
“I know enough,” was all she offered up; keeping it vague.  
  
Jo merely nodded and then gestured to the keys on David’s belt. “One of those would lock this place up, right?”  
  
“Yeah,” Dwight confirmed.  
  
“Who else would have a key?”  
  
“Simon and Negan, but they’re no problem now, are they?”  
  
With a shared smirk, Dwight didn’t need to be asked to grab the keys off of David and lock up the arsenal behind them to prevent anyone other than them from getting in. As they made their way back the way they came, a door halfway up the hallway opened up and they all froze.  
  
When no one came out right away, they breathed a little easier, but that was until the walkie-talkie clipped to Jo’s utility belt came alive with minor chatter.  
  
_“Hey, Arat—you still in with Negan? I gotta talk about switching runs with you tomorrow. You take tomorrow to Hilltop with me and I’ll cover Alexandria for you on Thursday,”_ the voice, a male, was saying. _“I think I fucking sprained my fucking ankle. Shit hurts like a motherfucker, let me tell you.”_  
  
_“Pussy,”_ a second, also male, voice crackled over the radio.  
  
_“Eat my ass, Jared.”_  
  
_“Buy me dinner first, Chris.”_  
  
Looking from the walkie-talkie, back over to the room with the now-opened door, the quartet watched a shadow of someone moving around inside the room drew nearer to the door and then, suddenly, there was Fat Joey poking his head out into the hallway. Instead of the suspicion the group had expected, the poor schlub was all smiles.  
  
“Hey, Joanna,” he greeted Jo first as he fully stepped out into the hallway. “How’d your sit-down with Negan go? Ya staying?”  
  
“No, I don’t think I will,” she replied, which seemed to bring confusion to his face.  
  
“Oh,” he muttered before bringing his attention to Dwight. “I thought you were still locked up?”  
  
“I was,” Dwight answered with a nod.  
  
“Negan decided to let you out?”  
  
Dwight shook his head. “Nah.” He gestured to Jo before raising his gun and pointing it at Fat Joey’s head. “There’s been a change in management.”  
  
Fat Joey’s hands immediately went up, obviously surrendering for one of two reasons; either he was unarmed or he was scared. Likely, it was both.  
  
“Heh…okay, that’s cool. Um…anything I can do for you?”  
  
Dwight frowned. “Don’t ask me. I’m not in charge.”  
  
Jo raised an eyebrow and stepped forward; lifting the machete and aiming it for Fat Joey’s jugular. With her free hand, she removed the walkie-talkie from her utility belt and handed it to him. “You’re gonna ask the following people to meet up in Negan’s room in ten minutes for an important preliminary meeting.”  
  
“Um, okay.” Taking the walkie-talkie with shaky hands, Fat Joey held it up to his face and waited for his next order.  
  
Jo recalled the names Tanya had told her that seemed to be top dogs or those who would definitely put up a fight. “Gavin, Jared, Laura, and Gary,” she named.  
  
“Wade and Paula, too. Especially Paula,” Dwight remarked. “If she’s here, that is. She’s as loyal to Negan as they come.”  
  
“She’s here,” Fat Joey assured. “I saw her earlier.”  
  
“Then call them and tell them what I told you to say, or you die. Those are your only choices,” Jo demanded.  
  
Nodding obediently, Fat Joy pushed the button in with his thumb. “Hey, Fat Joey here. Uh, I’ve been tasked with asking the following to meet with Negan upstairs in his room for some important, uh, preliminary meeting in ten minutes. Gavin, Jared…uh, Paula, Wade, Gary…oh, and Laura.” Removing his thumb from the button, he looked between Jo and Dwight as if seeking approval; like a dog looking for a belly rub and to be told what a good boy he was.  
  
_“Is Arat there still?”_ came that first male voice from before.  
  
Jo nodded. “Say yes.”  
  
“Yes,” Fat Joey confirmed into the walkie-talkie.  
  
_“Tell her to meet me afterward, okay? She clearly doesn’t have a two-way on her right now.”_  
  
“Who is this again?”  
  
_“Chris, ya damn lardass.”_  
  
“Oh, okay. I’ll pass the message along.”  
  
Handing the walkie-talkie back to Jo as if it were laced with some sort of disease, Fat Joey grimaced. “You’re not gonna kill me now, are you? I did what you asked.”  
  
“Yes, you did,” Jo agreed. “Now you’re coming with us.” Pushing the top of the machete’s blade against his arm, she didn’t draw any blood but the slight prick was enough to cause a teeny bit of pain and show him she meant business. “Move.”

 

* * *

  
  
Rick sat shotgun in a pickup truck that belonged to the Hilltop while Jesus drove; since he was the only one who knew the way to the Sanctuary, although he had left behind directions for those that might show up from either the Kingdom or Alexandria to fight. In the meantime, it was only Rick and Jesus in the front cab of the old truck while Daryl and Finn held on tight in the back bed and armed appropriately. Behind the truck, they were followed by the van from Mount Vernon, driven by Tyreese, who had refused to stay behind and felt obligated to fight. Lewis sat shotgun with him and the rest of the occupants of the van were made up of other residents of Hilltop who were sick of serving the Saviors and prepared to lay their lives down to fight. Behind the van, was a car, filled with a few more Hilltoppers.  
  
“I can’t believe Aaron went with her,” Jesus muttered. “I mean, I can. It’s the kind of person he is. He couldn’t let her go it alone, but I guess now I get how you feel.” He cast a brief look at Rick but, for the most part, kept his eyes on the road. “Him and I are pretty new with our relationship, but I know he’s my one and I’m pretty damn terrified that he might be dead right now. So, I get it, and if I was in your shoes, I would’ve punched me, too.”  
  
Rick remained silent; simply staring straight ahead. His mind was both a turbulent storm of horrible worst case scenarios involving Jo while also, somehow, completely void of any real thought. It was that deep, painful feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach that was the worst.  
  
Now he could understand those times Jo feared him going off when it was necessary for him to do so.  
  
Anything could happen to her or could’ve already happened and he’d never know until it was too late; until it was over and he was left with the consequences of her actions.  
  
The image of finding her as a walker, stumbling toward him, was haunting and one he couldn’t shake.  
  
“I’m sorry I ever involved you in any of this,” Jesus apologized; still trying to talk to Rick. “A few days ago you were just going about your lives, almost blissfully unaware of all this and I wish I could give that back to you.”  
  
“I don’t,” Rick finally remarked. “Even if Jo hadn’t gone off today with Aaron, you were both right. This was gonna happen sooner or later. We couldn’t hide away at Mount Vernon forever. The outside world was already closing in on us, and we didn’t truly know how much. _I_ didn’t know how much…until now.” Rick sighed and ran a hand down over his face. “I don’t care what happens to me when we get there. If Jo gets out alive and unharmed, and our baby alive and unharmed, then that’s all that matters. She needs to survive. Jo needs to live.”


	63. Sedition

_"In the unrest of the masses I augur great good. It is by their realizing that their condition of life is not what it ought to be that vast improvements may be accomplished."_ — Leland Stanford

* * *

  
  
Fat Joey sat at the leather couch, hunched forward slightly with his hands clasped together between his knees while he avoided looking toward the other side of the room where he could just barely make out a pair of legs belonging to someone’s dead body sticking out from the other side of Negan’s bed. Dwight was standing at one of the dressers, not caring who was looking as he changed out of the soiled sweatpants and sweatshirt he’d been forced to wear for who knows how long and changed into an extra pair of Negan’s pants, which he had to wear with a belt to keep them from falling off his waist, and a white T-shirt like Jo was wearing. There was a bottle of some sort of cologne atop the dresser or the stick of deodorant he could’ve utilized until he had time for a proper shower, but chose to forgo those luxuries for the time being.  
  
Frankie and Yolanda sat together on the bed, holding hands for strength, with their chosen weapons on either side of them. Jo, meanwhile picked up Negan’s bat, which she had left in the room earlier and used it to lean on like a cane while she stared at the double doors with anticipation.  
  
Tanya hadn’t made her way back, but Jo hadn’t given explicit directions to do such, so she could only assume the brunette would make that choice on her own or possibly head back to the Boudoir to be with Alicia and Amber until this all blew over. _If_ it blew over.  
  
“What do you need me to do?” Dwight asked, strapping the AK back around him and then began to tuck the handgun with silencer into the back of his pants.  
  
“Keep that out,” she gestured to the handgun. When he did as much, she added, “I’m giving them two choices when they arrive: change their ways and work together with all the communities, for the betterment of _everyone_ and not just the Sanctuary, or die. I think the choice is simple, don’t you?”  
  
“Sure as shit is.”  
  
“If they agree to change, but seem like they’re actually just full of shit, shoot ‘em. I know the things they’ve been party to; terrorizing other survivors for profit, senseless murder to assert power. Even if they weren’t the ones who pulled the trigger, they still stood idly by and let it all happen. But,” Jo sighed, dragging her gaze back to the doors. “I’m giving them a second chance at life. Let’s hope they choose smart. No more blood needs to be shed.”  
  
“Would you like me to do anything?” Fat Joey asked meekly from the couch.  
  
Jo turned slightly and looked over her shoulder at him. “Sure,” she nodded. “For starters, stop answering to Fat Joey. It’s shitty. What do you want to be referred as?”  
  
He shrugged. “Just Joey, I guess, or Joseph.”  
  
Jo looked over at the girls on the bed and smirked. “Now that would make more sense to differentiate him from the other Joey that's here, huh?” Turning back to look at Fat Joey, she smiled at him. “Joseph, it is.”  
  
He smiled back at her and seemed genuinely happy, if not at ease, given the situation they were all in. “Thank you.”  
  
Jo furrowed her brow. “For what?”  
  
“Not being a dick. For actually giving a shit.”  
  
“That’s what people _should_ be doing. Giving a shit.” Exhaling a calming breath, she considered something for a moment. “You really want to do something for me?”  
  
“Sure. Yeah,” Fat Joey—no— _Joseph_ answered with an adamant nod.  
  
“Stand outside the doors and greet everyone that shows up. If they have weapons on them, make them leave whatever they have on the desk outside. Make them wait off to the side of the desk, so that when the door opens, the others can’t see inside until it’s their turn to come in. Also, make sure to let them in one by one, and don’t give them any reason to think Negan or Simon or Arat isn’t alive and well in here, okay?”  
  
Pushing himself up, Joseph stood and nodded once again. “Okay. I can definitely do that.”  
  
“When you tell them that, and if they seem pissy about it, tell them it’s on Negan’s strict orders.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Stepping forward, Joseph made his way to the double doors and let himself out, and not a minute too soon. Moments later, several footsteps began to echo out in the hallway, along with the muffled voices of those that had arrived for the so-called preliminary meeting.  
  
Yolanda and Frankie grabbed tighter onto each other’s hands as well as their weapons, should the need them at a moment’s notice to defend themselves. Dwight stood off to the side, twisting the AK around so that it hung behind him against his back while holding the handgun with silencer down at his side; more than ready to use it. Then there was Jo, who just stood there; a freshly wiped clean machete sheathed on her left, a handgun holstered at her right, a pocket knife in her pocket, and Lucille still being used like a cane with her hand gripping the knob with her right hand while the end of the barrel was pressed against the floor.  
  
The muffled voices seemed slightly more gruff when Joseph was probably telling them about leaving their weapons on the desk. Further talking carried on for a few more moments, and then a knock came, followed by the opening of the door.  
  
“Shut the door behind you,” Jo spoke.  
  
The person that entered was a man in his early to mid-forties with a little bit of grey in his well-trimmed beard and thin, but wavy light brown hair. He seemed understandably confused as he obliged and closed the door with the heel of his shoe.  
  
“Um…where’s Negan?”  
  
“Which one are you? Jared, Gavin, Gary or Wade?”  
  
“Me? I’m Gavin. Who are you?” He then glanced at Dwight with confusion. “Weren’t you—?”  
  
“Obviously not anymore,” Dwight cut him off, already knowing what he was gonna ask.  
  
“Gavin,” Jo repeated. “I was told earlier that you head up a group that collects supplies from one of the communities. Which community is that?”  
  
“I’m sorry, but who are you and where is Negan? We were told to come here for a meeting with him. And then there’s another meeting with everyone on the factory floor later? What’s the deal here?”  
  
“Which community do you collect from?”  
  
Without needing to be asked, Dwight raised his arm and pointed his gun at Gavin’s head. “She asked you a question.”  
  
Gavin sighed. “The Kingdom.”  
  
“How would you describe your interaction with The Kingdom and its residents?”  
  
“Well, I don’t interact with the residents unless you mean King Ezekiel and a few of his soldiers. We don’t meet at the Kingdom, either. We have a prearranged drop point. It’s part of the deal Negan has with them. They provide the most food for us, so we’re more lenient with them.”  
  
“How do you treat them?”  
  
“Well, I like King Ezekiel. He’s a good guy, a bit weird with the whole king thing going on, but I respect him.”  
  
Jo narrowed her eyes. “Respect. That’s a good word,” she muttered as she noticed the way Gavin’s eyes kept shifting between Lucille and her stomach. “Have you ever caused harm because the Kingdom couldn’t make their quota for the week? Have you ever _killed_ any of King Ezekiel’s men or any other member of the other communities for any reason _other_ than because they tried to cause you or someone you care about with unprovoked physical harm?”  
  
Gavin considered his words carefully; trying to suss out the situation at hand. “I have.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because I had to.”  
  
“Why did you _have_ to?”  
  
Gavin glowered at her. “Because I was _expected_ to. It wasn’t any of King Ezekiel’s men, if that matters any.”  
  
“On a whole, do you think it’s right, forcing people to hand over half of everything they’ve worked so hard for? Would you want to be in that position?”  
  
His face softened then, and slowly he shook his head. “No, I don’t think it’s right, but it’s how I’m surviving.”  
  
“That’s a good thing; you seeing that what you’re doing isn't right. It means you can change, that there’s hope for you yet.”  
  
“What’s that mean? Seriously, who are you?”  
  
“I’m Jo Grimes, and I’m in charge here at the moment. There is no Negan to answer to. There’s only me, so stop asking,” she bit out while lifting Lucille up and held it out toward Gavin’s face. She smirked as he instantly tensed. It was possible he was just well aware of all the awful things he knew Negan had done with it to people and feared the same fate or perhaps he noticed the dried blood upon it and that it was fresh blood and feared the same fate even more with the bat being wielded by a stranger now. “Things here are going to change from here on out. There will be no more supply runs to the other communities to take half their shit. If you want something, you will work for it the same as everyone else. Everyone contributes, everyone gets an even share. If someone is hungry and there is food, you feed them. If someone is cold and there are blankets available, you wrap them up. If someone is sick and needs medication, you give them the medication or the medical attention they need. The point system is over. As for the other communities, you’re gonna learn to work with them. Maybe you don’t have fertile land around here at the Sanctuary of your own and that’s why you take, take, take. If that’s the case, find some land, secure it and learn to harvest it. It’s early enough in the season. You start now, and you can be plentiful by the end of summer. So, my question to you is this: do you choose to change for the better and accept this new way of life or do you choose death?”  
  
Gavin shot a look over at Dwight, who still aimed his gun. “I…” he began with a shrug and a frown. “I choose to change.”  
  
Jo smiled. “I’m glad to hear that. I hope your friends out there follow your example.”  
  
“Am I…am I free to go? Was that it?”  
  
“Oh, hell no. I still don’t trust you as far as I can throw you. And I am in no condition to throw anyone, as you can plainly see,” Jo gestured to her stomach. “You get to stay here until I’m done with the others. More importantly, you get to live.”  
  
“Uh, thanks?”  
  
Jo used Lucille to point at one of the two chairs across from the couch. “Sit.”  
  
Gavin sat down in the chair closest to him without hesitation. Jo watched as he leaned forward and folded his hands between his knees, much like Joseph had before on the couch, and watched the way his face expressed how lost in thought he was about what had just happened and what was happening.  
  
Feeling more confident now, Jo shouted out, “Next!”  
  
A moment later, the door opened and a man, younger than Gavin and with long brown hair, a beard and eyebrows so fair that it looked like he didn’t even have any. What bothered Jo most about how he looked was his beady eyes.  
  
“Close the door behind you, please.”  
  
The man glanced to his right and noted Gavin sitting down and then smirked over at Jo and how she was dressed in Negan’s leather jacket and holding Lucille. Closing the door after minor hesitation, he looked around the room and smiled at Yolanda and Frankie before practically sneering at Dwight.  
  
“The fuck is all this about?” he demanded.  
  
“Who are you?”  
  
“I’m Negan,” he replied with a cocky grin while throwing his arms out wide at his sides.  
  
Gavin sighed audibly and turned around to look up at the younger man; shaking his head. “Obviously there is no more Negan, dumbass. Just answer her.”  
  
The younger man held Gavin’s gaze for a moment and then looked back at Jo; more thoroughly studying her. He walked closer to her and licked his lips. “This a game? A test Negan’s got going on?”  
  
“Negan’s dead, fuckwit,” Dwight remarked. “His body is on the floor over there. His blood is still on the floor. And he’s not the only one who’s dead, so watch it.”  
  
Jo looked over at Dwight and was quite grateful with how he so easily stepped up to the plate to be her right hand man in all of this. Negan’s widows were helpful, but only to an extent. Dwight, although lean, was the muscle she required. And now with Gavin, who seemed very willing to break with the old ways Negan had instilled at the Sanctuary, she had him in her corner, whether he realized it or not.  
  
“Yeah, right,” the younger man muttered; not believing Negan was dead.  
  
“I promise you, Negan is very dead and not coming back,” Jo insisted rather calmly. “Now, answer my question: who are you? What is your name?”  
  
The younger man smacked his lips. “Jared.”  
  
“Ah,” Jo muttered. “I was told about you, too. The exact words that were used to describe you, I believe, were ‘asshole’ and ‘trigger-happy’. Would you say that’s a fair assessment of yourself?”  
  
“Bitch, fuck you. I ain’t staying here for whatever bullshit this is. Negan’s dead? A world of shit is gonna rain down on you if that’s true,” Jared taunted.  
  
With a heavy sigh, Jo looked to Dwight who met her gaze when he felt hers on him. “Go on.”  
  
Understanding her meaning, Dwight steadied his aim and fired a single shot into Jared’s head. His blood painted the doors behind him and his body fell backwards to the floor; limply like a deflated, lead balloon.  
  
The girls jumped from the suddenness of the deed but seemed to plenty capable of keeping themselves composed. Gavin was considerably more composed. While the death had come suddenly indeed, he didn’t really seemed bothered. If Jo was properly reading his reaction, she’d assume he was actually relieved.  
  
“I take it you weren’t best of friends with him?”  
  
“Not even close,” Gavin admitted. “I was forced to tolerate him because he was part of my group that went to the Kingdom, but he was always trying to start shit. He was simply a bully who took pleasure in his job. He was brutal, antagonizing and whoever told you he was an asshole and trigger-happy was right on the nose. So, no, I wasn’t friends with him.”  
  
“Good,” Jo smirked. “Then you won’t mind being a dear and moving his body out of the way of the door for me, will ya?”  
  
Having no opinion one way or the other, Gavin nodded and stood up. As he stepped up beside Jared’s corpse, he crouched down and grabbed his former associate by the ankle and dragged him behind between the backs of the chairs and in front of the sideboard. Once Jared was successfully out of the way, Gavin resumed his seat in the same chair.  
  
“Thank you,” Jo nodded. Turning back toward the door, she ignored the blood splatter and called out again for the next Savior. “Next!”  
  
As the knob turned, in walked Laura, who was immediately confused and maybe even _amused_. “Yo, what’s the deal with the jacket and Lucille?” she asked before she noticed the small pool of blood she’d just stepped in. “Aww, what the fuck?” Looking down and then over where Jared’s body was, she quickly whipped her head back and then glared between Jo and Dwight. “What’s going on? Who killed Jared and where’s Negan? Why are you wearing that jacket?”  
  
“Dwight killed Jared because I let him. Negan’s not here anymore and I’m wearing his jacket because _I_ killed _him_ ,” Jo cut to the chase. “You know, Native Americans used to scalp their victims and keep the scalps as trophies, as disgusting as that is. It was also believed Celtic tribes used to do the same thing, but it was less common. Then there’s the whole matter of fallen soldiers having their shoes removed after death and because good shoes weren’t that easy to come by. And why let good shoes go to waste, right?” Jo gestured to the jacket. “Same thing, I guess. Perhaps it’s a trophy or perhaps I just liked it and didn’t see the point in letting some dead asshole take it to his grave.”  
  
Laura practically sneered at Jo. “Why?”  
  
“Because he was a horrible human being. Can you honestly say what he built here is good…for _everyone_?” Jo shook her head, answering her own question. “No, it’s an unfair situation for too many people. There shouldn't be anyone higher on the food chain, so to speak. Everyone should be equal and treated equally. They _deserve_ to be equal. The communities this place takes from every week deserves to be equal. There will be no more taking from anyone if you haven’t earned it. Everyone is going to work together for the betterment of each community as a network. If you work together, _trade_ with each other, then life can be better. There will be no more oppressing anyone or senseless murder to get supplies this place can’t be bothered to find for itself or grow for itself. I don’t want to hear an excuse that there’s no good soil around here, because soil can be found. It can be transported from one place and a hothouse can be built. There is more than one way to grow your own food instead of taking from others or killing for it.”  
  
“So, what do you want from me?” Laura questioned, folding her arms across her chest like a moody teenager.  
  
“To change. To be better than this,” Jo answered. “Everyone has the ability to change, to grow and to learn from the mistakes they’ve made. I’m giving you the chance to start over. To do good in this world instead of perpetuating harm and fear. I mean…is that the kind of person you want to be? Is that the kind of person who saw yourself becoming? A villain? ‘Cause that’s what the Saviors are, I don’t care what excuses you try to tell yourself to help you sleep at night. The Saviors are villains. So, will you change? Will you help turn things around here and work _with_ the other communities instead of forcing them to work _for_ you? Or…”  
  
“Or what?”  
  
“Do you choose death?”  
  
“Those are my only options? Submit or die?”  
  
“It’s not submission. You’re not going to be under anyone’s thumb. You’re a finger on a hand and that hand is part of a larger body. That body is every community working together as one.”  
  
Laura chewed the inside of her bottom lip and shrugged. “I guess,” she huffed. “I’m not good at farming and shit, though.”  
  
“Okay, well I’m sure you have other skills that you can offer and that’s a bridge to cross when we get to it. I just want to know that you understand, and I want to know if you can agree to change your ways.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah. As long as I don’t have to end up like Jared, I’ll fucking learn how to churn butter if I have to.”  
  
Jo smirked. “Cool,” she muttered. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Off Laura’s silence, she gestured to the chair beside Gavin. “Take a seat.”  
  
After a brief moment of hesitation, Laura crossed in front of Gavin and dropped down into the seat. “What did you do with Negan anyway?”  
  
Jo nodded toward the other side of the bed. “He’s over there on the floor, covered with the duvet from the bed.”  
  
“No, I mean, how’d you do him in?”  
  
“What does it matter?”  
  
Laura shrugged. “I’ve always wondered how anyone could possibly off him, and here you waltz in and do it. Maybe I’m just a little impressed.”  
  
“I pretended to get emotional and cry and when I got him to hug me, I bit his throat out.”  
  
“Holy shit.”  
  
Gavin and the widows perked at that, too. While the widows had seen the state of her when she first came into the Boudoir after killing Negan and Simon, she hadn’t explained how she’d done it and neither had they seen his body since it had been covered. Only Dwight had bothered to pulled the duvet back and sneak a peek.  
  
“Then I hit him on the head with this bat, twice,” Jo continued, holding Lucille up. “Then Simon came in, so I had to kill him. Then Arat. They’re over there on the floor, too.”  
  
“You said no senseless murder.”  
  
“They posed a serious threat. With Negan dead, either Simon or Arat would’ve easily stepped in and filled his shoes and this way of life that was created here would’ve continued, unchanged. But you lot, you have the ability to change and make sure things change for the better.”  
  
Laura slumped back into her chair and, like Gavin before her, seemed lost in thought about what was happening.  
  
Confident that the interaction with the younger woman was over, Jo brought her attention to the doors once again. “Next!”  
  
As the knob turned and the door opened, Jo watched as a man who seemed somewhat older than Gavin stepped inside. He was bald on top, with black hair going around the sides and back of his head in a way that reminded Jo of Homer Simpson.  
  
“Hello,” she greeted.  
  
“Hi,” he replied, looking around at everyone present and then, like Laura, noticed Jared’s body. But, unlike Laura, he didn’t seem to give a shit. Turning to look at Dwight, he nodded rather politely. “I see you’ve been freed. How’d that happen?”  
  
“Jo happened,” Dwight replied, gesturing to Jo with a cock of his head.  
  
The balding man brought his gaze back to Jo and nodded while assessing her appearance. “So, Negan’s dead, too, I take it? He’d never let that jacket, and especially not Lucille, out of his possession unless they were pried from his cold, dead hands.”  
  
Jo chuckled, almost admiring how this man got straight to the point. He seemed like someone who would be rather easy to work with and to convince, and she would be correct. He turned out to be Wade, the Savior who had actually been in charge of going after Dwight, Dwight’s wife Sherry and Sherry’s sister Tina, and only came back with Dwight, who was then locked up for the last couple of months. Wade expressed no hard feelings to Dwight; he was just doing his job. When given more or less the same spiel that was given to Gavin and Laura, he wasted no time in surrendering, so to speak. He waved that figurative white flag and threw his hands up as he explained he didn’t care what regime or whatever was in charge so long as he had a place to call home, clean clothes and food in his stomach. The only reason he took so easily to his work as one of Negan’s lieutenants was because of his military background and an unashamed, lifelong need of approval from his “superior officer” and Negan had filled that role with ease. Willing and able to change and accept a different way of life that benefited every community, the Sanctuary included, Wade took a seat on the couch across from Gavin and Laura.  
  
Next in the room was a much younger man, somewhere in age between Jared and Gavin, with a darker skintone and an interesting tattoo around the back of his bald head. He looked mean with the scowl he walked into the room and had the posture of a soldier, making Jo wonder if maybe he had served in one of the armed forces before the world fell apart and that’s while falling into his place as a soldier for Negan had seemed like a good choice for him.  
  
“As you’re the last male here, I can assume you’re Gary,” Jo commented.  
  
“Yeah,” he confirmed with a nod.  
  
Watching him cast a subtle glance down at his right as he took notice of Jared’s body lying there, Jo waited for how he might react. When he looked upon the faces of the other three seated sullen and quiet, he seemed more intrigued than confused or angry.  
  
“This is a coup.” It was a statement and not a question, as he brought his attention back to Jo. He didn’t even bother to give Dwight the courtesy of acknowledgement and had probably been so conditioned by Negan that it seemed like he didn’t even dare to spare a brief glance at either Yolanda or Frankie.  
  
Jo shrugged. “Pretty much, yeah.”  
  
“How’d you do it?”  
  
“By being pregnant and playing the damsel in distress,” Jo admitted. “Most men can’t handle seeing women cry. They feel the need to console and protect. For Negan, that was his fatal mistake. He shouldn’t have agreed to hug me.”  
  
“D’you stab him or something?”  
  
“She bit his neck out,” Laura offered up, momentarily pinching the bridge of her nose with her thumb and index finger as if she suddenly had a migraine.  
  
“No shit.” Again, Gary seemed intrigued. “Alright. So, what do you want with us?”  
  
“Change,” Jo replied simply, and then went into the same spiel all over again; but tried to condense it because the least amount of time spent on convincing these top dogs to play nice and change their spots, the sooner she could take the same spiel to the entirety of the Sanctuary and then, after that, head home.  
  
When all was said and done, more or less, Gary nodded as he took in everything Jo had expressed to him. “Something like this ain’t gonna change overnight.”  
  
“I don’t expect it to. I still expect there to be some dissention, but for the good of all the people, change has to happen. Change _will_ happen.”  
  
“Those who resist? What happens to them?” Gavin asked.  
  
“Imprisonment until they see the error of their ways, banishment or death.”  
  
“Jared didn’t get banishment or imprisonment,” Laura pointed out.  
  
“Because he was hostile,” Jo replied plainly. “You were brought here because each of you apparently has sway in this place. I’m sure there are others, too, especially at the outposts. But, if the others can see you’ve accepted to change things here and to do away with the ways you’ve gotten by at the expense of others, there stands a very good chance others will follow. After all, once the first domino falls, they all are soon to fall.” Feeling slight discomfort from having stood still in the same place for a while now, Jo was growing a tired. It was a long day, she hadn’t slept much the night before, and she had eaten very little earlier. She needed to get to the punch. “So what is your choice? Change or death?”  
  
“Wait—those are my only two choices?” Gary questioned, sounding slightly insulted. “I don’t get imprisonment or banishment like the others?”  
  
“Well, you’re not like the others.”  
  
Gary huffed. “‘Cause I got people who would follow me if I fought back, right? You need me to keep them in line. If I become some upstanding citizen according to your new world order, they will too?”  
  
“That’s the idea.” Dwight took a step closer to her and whispered in her ear; supplying her with a tidbit of information that would put the nail in the coffin of Gary’s slight indecision. “I mean, what would your mother think if she were still alive? You joined the rank of soldier to get her medicine and proper medical care, but her condition was too far advanced for Dr. Carson to do much more for her except ease the pain. What would she think if you were given this opportunity to change and threw it away? What if this opportunity had been present when she was still alive? Imagine how other people like you might feel if they didn’t have to work for points or become some soldier who facilitated the oppression of other survivors when there was another way. You can all work together as a democracy instead of a dictatorship. I’m not an idiot. I know you’ll still need leadership, but have everyone vote in a counsel; a group of people to bring about the change so that not one person has more power than the next.”  
  
Gary cast his eyes down and shoved his hands into his pants pockets. “Yeah, okay. I’ll admit…honestly, that does sound better.”  
  
“So, do you agree to change?”  
  
“Yeah,” Gary nodded. “I do.”  
  
“Good to hear. Now take a seat.” Jo turned and nodded thanks to Dwight for that bit of help and then glanced over at the two widows who seemed more at ease now, too. Aside from Jared, getting these so-called top dogs to heel was going surprisingly well. “Send in the last one!” she called out at the door.  
  
“Alright, so, what’s with all the mystery over this—” The redhead that entered into the room stopped in her tracks, still holding onto the doorknob. She stared directly at Jo and narrowed her gaze. “Who the fuck are you, lady?” She turned and looked at Dwight next. “Who the fuck let _you_ out?” Back at Jo, she scowled. “Where’s Negan?”  
  
Jo sighed, trying to remind herself this was the last of the so-called top dogs she was going to speak with before the meeting on the factory floor. “I’m Jo, Dwight was let out on my orders and Negan’s dead. Now, let’s get down to brass tacks, shall we?”  
  
“Excuse me? ‘I’m Jo.’ You’re not in charge here and if Negan were dead, how come no one has found out about it?”  
  
“You’re finding out about it now. It’s currently a need-to-know basis at the moment.”  
  
The ginger woman scoffed and rolled her eyes. Joseph appeared behind her in the doorway but was stopped from entering when she slammed the door shut in his face, but it was unlikely she knew he was about to come inside with her back to him. Taking half a step forward, she looked upon the four seated either in the chairs or on the leather couch, and then she lowered her gaze to the floor behind the chairs and saw Jared lying there dead. Her fists clenched at her sides and then she looked back at Jo before taking another step forward, causing Dwight to aim his gun at her, but she seemed unfazed.  
  
“Take another step, Paula. I dare you.”  
  
“So you killed Negan?” Paula questioned; sounding quite skeptical. She looked from side to side and chuckled. “Where’d you do it? Did you shove him down some stairs? Did you break dipshit over here out of his cell and have him sneak up behind Negan and then pull the trigger? Oh, or maybe that stomach of yours is a decoy and you hid a knife underneath your shirt and stabbed him.”  
  
Too tired for this shit, Jo threw a look at Dwight. “Watch her,” she muttered before sauntering behind Dwight and walking round to the other side of the bed. While still managing to hold Lucille with right hand, she crouched down and pulled the duvet off Negan and then grabbed one of his ankles. “Yolanda, be a dear and give me a hand.”  
  
A moment later, Yolanda was at her side and grimaced down at the sight of Negan’s dead body. “Damn girl, you really did bite his neck out didn’t you,” she whispered; half impressed, half grossed out.  
  
“I worked with what I had,” Jo whispered back as Yolanda bent at the knees and grabbed onto Negan’s other ankle. As they worked together to drag Negan’s dead body back around the bed to where Jo had been standing, they let his legs drop and both stood back to allow Paula, as well as the others, full view of their former leader’s corpse in all its glory. Jo turned and glared right back at Paula, using Lucille as she pointed at the body. “I bit his neck out with my bare teeth and when he was so stunned, gurgling and choking on his own blood, I took Lucille here,” she disclosed, raising the bat open like a trophy she’d one at some sporting event, “and struck him twice upon the head. And it only took two hits to make sure he was dead and never coming back. And _then_ , I did the same thing to Simon when he came in to check that everything was okay.” Jo moved closer to Paula, making a play to assert herself as the dominant one in this room and in this situation. “After all that, I had Tanya called Arat here and did the same to Arat.”  
  
Paula’s scowl turned to that of disbelief and concern, but then switched to anger. “You cunt.”  
  
“I’m giving you a choice, Paula. You can either give up the way you’ve been living here and how you’ve helped take from other communities and help oppress and murder them…”  
  
“ _Or_?”  
  
“ _Or_ you can die.”  
  
Paula literally laughed in Jo’s face. “What a crock,” she muttered. Turning and looking at the seated four, she shook her head at them. “You gave up the fight because this knocked up bitch told you to?”  
  
“There doesn’t have to be a fight anymore, Paula. Negan’s dead,” Dwight remarked. “He was the one leading us. He was the one who convinced us doing everything we did was the way to go. But it’s _not_ the way to go. There’s a better way, a way where everyone can have the same opportunities to survive in this world.”  
  
“We just gotta work together.”  
  
Paula smirked and shook her head. “There will never be a world where everyone has the same opportunities. This world, the world before…they were both fucked and we are all fucked up. Anything I had that ever meant anything to me is gone. Anyone I ever loved is gone. All I had was this place and what I could do. I wasn’t some weak peon who did whatever the charming man with a bat told me to. I joined him because he helped me become who I am.”  
  
Jo licked her upper lip and considered her next choice of words. With a smile, she asked, “And who are you now?”  
  
Paul smiled back, but her smile was laced with malevolence. “Why, I’m Negan, of course.”  
  
Jo looked to Dwight, who looked at her with an expression that suggested he was wondering if he should shoot Paula or not. Jo, however, shook her head at him. “Well, if you’re Negan,” Jo began, leaning Lucille over her shoulder. “Then I guess you can die like him, too.”  
  
Raising the bat back up, Jo swung at Paula, but Paula threw her arms up to block the hit; but still got hurt in the process anyway. Enraged, the redhead threw herself at Jo. At the same moment Jo attempted to step out of the way, Dwight fired a shot at Paula but she was only struck in the abdomen. The shot was enough to stop Paula in her tracks, though, as she looked down at her fresh, gushing wound and touched it carefully; as if making sure it was real.  
  
“Goddamnit,” Paula groaned. Dropping to her knees, she tried throwing a look over her shoulder at Dwight. “You fucking asshole.”  
  
Gathering her wits about her, Jo readied Lucille again. “So, I guess you’ve made your decision,” she remarked, staring down at the ginger before her. “There is no place in the new world for anymore Negans.”  
  
As Paula glared up at her, Jo brought the bat down.

 

* * *

  
  
Everyone walked in silence on the way to the factory floor. They all knew what was expected of them and the role they had to play during this meeting, and they went forward having agreed this was all for the better. Having agreed to turn their backs on how things had been run, they now flanked Jo like her very own Secret Service. While she took comfort in this allegiance, she refused to rest on her laurels. She would not become comfortable in this place because it wasn’t her home. She was viewing this all as if she were some corporate executive tasked by the company she worked for to rebrand and update one of the company’s older branches. She was only passing through.  
  
While the main entrance to the factory floor was on the ground floor, Jo needed a perch of sorts so she can see everyone and they could see her. It was Joseph who told her where Negan used to speak to everyone from; on the catwalk just above the factory floor and there was an entrance from the second floor they could easily access.  
  
As a show of good faith, Jo let the surviving top dogs retrieve their weapons and carry them. Yolanda had grabbed Alicia and Amber from the Boudoir and told them to follow the others and Tanya ran into them all on her way back up to Negan’s room.  
  
Dwight led the way, with Joseph directly behind him and then Jo directly behind him while the four top dogs walked along on either side of her and all five widows trailed behind her. In her right hand, Jo still held Lucille, and she was still wearing the leather jacket. In her left hand, she carried a tote bag by its short, fabric handle; the contents of it a mystery for the time being.  
  
Once they’d reached the appropriate door, Dwight stopped and turned around to face Jo. “You should head out last,” he suggested with a slight smirk. “Make an entrance. It’s what Negan did and he’s what they're used to and what they’ll react best to.”  
  
“I’m not here to be another Negan.”  
  
“Says the lady wearing his jacket and holding his bat.” Dwight rolled his eyes and snickered. “Those people on that factory floor need to be won over. You gotta show them who’s boss, even if it’s just a temporary thing.”  
  
With a nod, Jo understood and agreed. “Alright.” Looking between Wade and Gavin, she gestured for them to head out first. “You two, and then you three,” she spoke, looking secondly between Laura, Gary and Joseph.  
  
As Dwight opened the metal door, the quintet walked out onto the catwalk. The sounds of the boots echoing throughout the large room, which was already bustling with sound from many voices, footsteps and clanking from who knows what. The footsteps of the quintet began to slow and that’s when the widows were ushered out next. Where they were all going to in the factory floor, Jo hadn’t any idea. That hadn’t been discussed, but she could assume they would stick close to the catwalk where they all had a safe distance from the floor in case things went south.  
  
Dwight turned to Jo then. “I’ll give you an introduction.”  
  
“As long as it’s nothing akin to some sports announcer,” she smirked.  
  
Smirking back, Dwight sauntered out of the door and along the catwalk while Jo hanged back; waiting. She listened as his footsteps also came to a stop and how he cleared his throat to garner attention.  
  
“Alright, everybody. Eyes forward,” he demanded. “Your full attention and compliance is required for this meeting. You know the drill.”  
  
Jo stole a glimpse out the door and saw Dwight beckon subtly to her as he walked over to the top of the stairs that led down from the catwalk. Inhaling a deep breath, Jo pulled her shoulders back and stood up straight as she took her first step forward and each step she made was slow and purposely heavy. For the sake of grabbing everyone’s attention and giving them an entrance they were used to, as Dwight had advised, Jo tried to inspire awe, but was sure she just looked nothing more than a tired, pregnant chick in a leather jacket. Keeping a very still expression, falling back on the tried and true resting bitch face, she sauntered along toward the center of the catwalk with Lucille resting upon her right shoulder.  
  
Glimpsing down on what was somewhere close to a hundred or more people kneeling upon the factory floor with their heads bowed, Jo realized this was how they likely greeted Negan when he entered a room; like he had been a king, this had been his castle and they were his subjects bowing to show respect. Their demeanors didn’t seem like they felt respect for Negan. They looked almost as if they were cowering; as if they feared looking or moving the wrong way could set him off and get themselves killed. A few faces dared to glance upward at her and were understandably confused.  
  
Lowering Lucille, she tapped it twice along the metal railing. “You can stand up,” she bellowed; grabbing the attention of the majority who still looked down toward the floor. “I’m not your master. I’m here to tell you that your way of life here is going to change.”  
  
“Who are you?” someone called out.  
  
Jo sighed.  
  
She was getting really tired of hearing that today, but it was to be expected.  
  
“My name is Jo Grimes and I’m a survivor like the rest of you, and like you I have done what I can to survive in this world. The only difference is that I have never forced anyone to work for me. I have never taken anything from good people without earning it. I have killed countless undead and I have killed the living, but I have never murdered _innocent_ lives for the sake of asserting power. I have done things I regret, I have experienced horrible things that still haunt my nightmares and I have lost too many people I love. Sickness, self-sacrifice, being attacked by the undead: those are the deaths that, while horrible, have come to be the kinds of deaths that are expected these days. Being murdered by horrible human beings who feel no remorse? That’s never okay. It’s not okay to oppress people and make them work for points when others get whatever they want by agreeing to help further that oppression. When the people I know and care about need anything—food, water, clothes or medicine—and if I have it, I give it to them, no strings attached. Shouldn’t we all live equally? Shouldn’t we help each other instead of holding each other back?”  
  
There were plenty nods and murmurs of agreement among the crowd, yet there were also those that seem somewhat disgruntled and still confused by what Jo was doing there, speaking to them.  
  
“Where’s Negan?” another voice questioned; something else Jo was tired of hearing.  
  
“There is no more Negan,” she answered. “The era of Negan and his ways are over. From now on, there is no more point system. From now on there is no more pillaging other communities and taking half their belongings. If you want to survive, you have to work for it and you have to work together. You have to come together with each community and _share_ ; be it goods, supplies or skills.”  
  
“Where is Negan?” a third voice repeated; more adamant than the second.  
  
With a sigh of light frustration, Jo leaned Lucille down against the lower railing and then began to open up he tote. Reaching in, she grimaced as she grabbed on to what she’d been carrying around in said tote and pulled out Negan’s head; raising it high. She wasn’t surprised by the sounds of gasps she heard nor was she surprised by the mixture of horror and relief she saw upon everyone’s faces.  
  
“Negan is dead,” Jo answered as blood dripped from the severed neck. “I can understand how some of you might find this upsetting. And I know it may make me seem like a hypocrite, considering some of things I just said. Murder is not okay, and I did kill him. It wasn’t in self-defense, either. It was a necessary evil I chose to do to free _everyone_ from the oppression and whatever levels of servitude he implemented.” Stuffing the head back into the bag, she set it down at her feet and braced her hands along the railing. “I have only just recently, within the last month or so, become aware of the name Negan, and only yesterday did I find out the extent of what he had been capable of and the terror he had spread throughout multiple communities. One day. It took me _one_ day to decide this wasn’t right. _One_ day to decide he had to stop and that if no one else was going to step up to the task then I sure as hell would. I came here, alone and unarmed, at eight months pregnant, knowing the risks; knowing I could be killed, my unborn child could be killed and that I would never see my husband and my daughters ever again. It was a selfish decision I made, and one I made that I didn’t even tell my husband about. He went to meet with one of the other communities, to open a trading partnership, because he is a good man who thinks of the betterment of life for _everyone_. _You_ deserve better leadership, and not necessarily just one person standing over you, barking orders as you just barely get by. You deserve to live, not just merely exist. So, things will change.”  
  
“How?” A man down below, with long dark hair and an unruly beard stepped forward among the crowd.  
  
With a gun strapped to his hip, he had the opportunity to use it on her if he really wanted to. Whether or not he’d succeed in taking the shot would remain to be seen, because it also remained to be seen whether or not Dwight or the other fivesome would bother or be quick enough to prevent it or retaliate. But none of that is what Jo wanted.  
  
“How do we change?” he continued. “We don’t have the kind of tools or proper areas for growing our own food. We’ve relied on the other communities to give us enough to feed everyone here.”  
  
“That’s exactly the point,” Jo replied. “You’ve depended on others to _give_ you food, supplies, and anything else that was taken from them at literal gunpoint and on threat of death. Maybe not you, personally, but Negan and whoever he sent out for those supply runs did. Every week, the same thing. These communities could be spending their time growing or finding food for themselves, but whatever they manage to scrape together, they have to give away half of it? How about work with them? Go to them and utilize some of their land to grow food for here alongside them. Or how about earn the food you take by working for them. Set up a bartering system. They have things you need and maybe _you_ have things _they_ need. So, make a trade. Maybe a few people from each community comes together and all go on one large supply run a month and scavenges for everything and anything that can be found and used. It would be better with a safety in numbers anyway, and with how well armed your arsenal here is, it would definitely help. At the end of each supply run, everything is separated equally or by necessity of who needs more of a certain thing than the others. I’m not going to go through details about how you should go about this change. This is something you have to figure out for yourselves, but if you work with the other communities, you can see how they make it work and learn from them. Life can be better for everyone and we can make it a better world for our children to grow up in and for future generations to inherit.”  
  
Jo took a step back. Her mouth was dry, her feet and lower back were sore from standing for so long and she was getting really hungry. Plus, she was tired, and she was sure it was showing.  
  
Tired as she was, though, she wasn’t about to show weakness anytime soon in case dissention sprung forth.  
  
Gripping the railing a bit tighter, she cast a glance at Dwight. “You know, the only reason Dwight was imprisoned here for the last couple of months was for wanting to _leave_. That was his crime, and he was locked away, in the dark, not knowing one day from the next; just waiting for his number to be up.” Jo removed one of the hands from the railing and placed it flat upon her chest. “I’ve been in that position. I tried getting away from a terrible, controlling man who led a community I was part of in Georgia for a short time. I tried getting away. I won’t go into the details of that situation, but I ended up locked away in a windowless cell in some basement for six months. I never wanted to be in that situation again and I don’t want that for anyone else. I want everyone to have the same chances in life to live freely, without the fear of someone else forcing them into positions they are uncomfortable with. The only thing we should be afraid of is the dead, not each other. Don’t you _want_ that kind of life?”  
  
There were nods among the crowd, which she took as a positive sign.  
  
“You can have that life. You just have to commit to changing how things are done here. You have to turn your back on this current situation you’ve been in and look to a brighter future. All of you, each person in every community, near or far, can come together and rebuild society the way it should be,” Jo continued to speak, feeling quite passionate about what she was saying. Perhaps in another life she could’ve been a politician. “Maybe I’m reaching, but we have the means to create a utopia, the undead aside.”  
  
She wasn’t sure what else to say. She had gone into this expecting shouts of anger and protest, of Saviors rallying together to fight back and attack her.  
  
But nothing like that was happening.  
  
Despite having always tried being optimistic, she was so used to preparing for the worst that when things went well, like this moment, she was at a loss.  
  
As the crowd began to clump together in smaller groups to talk among themselves for the moment, Dwight slowly broke away from the others on the stairs and sidled up beside Jo.  
  
“We’re gonna put this place right, thanks to you,” he muttered, talking to her but staring out at the crowd. “You took on a crazy fucking task and came out the other side unscathed. I mean, you got close to Negan after knowing him for, like, five minutes, and you killed him like it was nothing. Not to mention you did it pregnant as fuck.” Turning to look at her now, he eyed her and smirked. “I don’t know if I’m impressed, turned on or both.”  
  
Jo chuckled. “Well, you’re welcome, I guess.”  
  
Dwight nodded. “Yeah. This shit ain’t gonna be easy to smooth out overnight, obviously, but you put the wheels in motion for us. Thank you is an understatement.”  
  
“Honestly, my motivation was to kill Negan so the threat of his existence and everything he’d done to the other communities wouldn’t reach mine. It was a preemptive strike.”  
  
“Huh.” Dwight furrowed his brow, looked forward again. “I had you pegged for someone from Alexandria.”  
  
“Oh? Why’s that?”  
  
“They always seemed the most motivated to get out from underneath Negan’s thumb.”  
  
“What about Jesus and the Hilltop? Didn’t they ever seem motivated enough to you?”  
  
“Jesus, yeah, definitely, but when I first came to him, he hadn’t yet been able to rally any of his people together.” Glancing back at Jo, he shrugged. “I guess there’s been more rallying going on since I’ve been out of play.”  
  
“If you thought Alexandria had more motivation to fight back, how come you didn’t go there with your plans to defect from this place? How come you sought out Jesus?”  
  
“It was closer and I didn’t have a lot of time to spare when I was away from this place. I had to make the most of my time and it was easier to do by going to Hilltop, and I just lucked out that Jesus was an eager beaver.”  
  
Jo smiled. She met Dwight’s gaze and held it for only a moment before returning her focus back upon all the people below on the factory floor. “Until this place can get its bearings and chooses a council to govern it, it’s gonna need strong leadership to guide it through to the next phase.” Her green eyes scanned the crowd, and then over to the fivesome on the stairs and the widows standing there, waiting for whatever came next. It seemed like everyone was waiting on Jo to give the word. “I think it should be you, and hopefully they elect you to be on the council after that.”  
  
“If they don’t?”  
  
“Then you have two choices.”  
  
“Uh-oh,” Dwight muttered teasingly.  
  
Jo rolled her eyes. “Nothing like that,” she remarked, getting his meaning. “If they don’t want you to be on the council, you can just continue on here as a regular, everyday Joe; earning your keep and making a new life for yourself.”  
  
“Or?”  
  
“Or…or you can make a new life for yourself somewhere else and not worry about someone coming after you to bring you back against your will.”  
  
“Where else would you suggest?”  
  
Jo turned sideways to look more upon Dwight. “Well, I’m sure the Hilltop would have you. Especially with everything you’ve done to put all of this in motion.”  
  
“But I didn’t—”  
  
“You took a risk to seek out the Hilltop and you gave Jesus enough information about this place. If you hadn’t done that, Jesus would’ve never found my community; he would’ve never brought us back to the Hilltop and told us everything about Negan and what the other communities have been dealing with. If you hadn’t made that choice months ago, I wouldn’t have been inspired to come here and do what I did, as horribly draining as it’s been, both physically and emotionally.” Jo looked down and brought a hand to her forehead. “I’ve been lucky enough in this new world that any man who has tried to hurt me, or violate me in anyway, I’ve been able to kill. But those times were much, much, much different situations than this. This…this is on a whole other level. I had a plan in mind for what I wanted to do, but a lot of it has also been me flying by the seat of my pants. So, thank _you_.”  
  
“Well, what now?” he asked, bypassing the thanks; possibly because he felt awkward receiving it.  
  
They both look down at the crowd of anxiously awaiting faces.  
  
“Now?” Jo repeated. “Now we begin.”

 

* * *

  
  
The truck came ambling down the road at a decent clip; passing an abandoned, half off the road and a disemboweled walker off to the side of it. Rick leaned forward, gripping the dashboard, as if doing that would somehow get him there sooner or provide him with a better view of the Sanctuary before it was fully in sight. Before they reached the end of the road, though, Jesus pulled off to the side and drove slowly within the tree coverage, which the van and the car following them mimicked. Wasting no time, they all began piling out of their respective vehicles, armed with their weapons of choice as they gathered together as a clump on the road.  
  
“Alright, we separate into groups of three, as even as we can make it. We spread out and find cover. I’m going right up to the front door. My plan is to reach out and simply make contact at first; see if I can talk to Negan. If Jo’s here and she’s…and if she’s done anything, and if she’s still alive but locked up, I’ll see if I can talk to Negan about letting her go. I’ll…I dunno. I’ll figure it out as I go along,” Rick spoke, looking between several of the faces staring back at him before, buckling slightly under the fear raging through him. “We can’t go in there, guns-a-blazing. We don’t have the manpower or enough weaponry and ammo between us. We gotta do this smart. We gotta do this—”  
  
“Jo,” Finn muttered.  
  
“Yeah,” Rick nodded; his hands planted upon his hips. “We gotta do this for her, so that she can make it out of there alive, if she isn’t…she’s gotta make it out of—”  
  
“No, idiot,” Finn continued, pointing over Rick’s shoulder. “It’s Jo.”  
  
Turning around with little to no hesitation, Rick looked up the road and saw two figures staggering slowly toward Rick and the others.  
  
Jo and Aaron.  
  
Every ounce of fear and worry that had been weighing heavily down upon Rick’s shoulders was immediately lifted. Breathing a sigh of utter relief, Rick began walking forward; slowly raising his arms and outstretching them. While he looked upon her with tears stinging his eyes, Jo was smiling back at him as she wobbled over.  
  
“What are you doing here?” she asked, as Aaron made a beeline for Jesus.  
  
“I should be asking _you_ that,” Rick replied, pulling her into his arms and reveling in being able to hold her; that he hadn’t lost her.  
  
Jo responded by snaking her arms around his waist as far as her interloping stomach would allow her to. She rested her head down upon his shoulder and smile with contentment to be there in his arms, where she always wanted to be. “I had to do this. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she muttered softly; her exhaustion catching up with her even more now.  
  
Pulling back and holding her at arm’s length, Rick scowled. “You have no idea how fucking stupid this was or how fucking scared you had me. I thought I’d come here and you’d be dead.”  
  
“Well, I’m not, and I’m sorry I scared you.”  
  
“I was pissed.” He cocked his head to the side slightly and gritted his teeth. “I still am.”  
  
“Sorry,” she repeated, but she less like she actually was sorry and more like a child who was hiding a fantastical secret. The way she bit her lip and was barely making eye contact with him were the dead giveaways. “Would you still be pissed if I told you this trip was successful?”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“I mean…I killed Negan.” Off his surprised look, she smiled a tired smile. “It was all surprisingly easy, too. For the first time in our lives, in this new world, a plan went completely well, from beginning to end.”  
  
“H-how? How’d you do it?”  
  
“I played the Trojan horse card. Walked up, played the pregnant damsel in distress, pretended to faint, and then they brought me inside, because even an asshole isn’t gonna abandon a pregnant woman like that,” she began to explain. “I was brought to their doctor, taken somewhere to shower and change into clean clothes and even given a little something to eat and drink. I made friends, too, with Negan’s wives. Then, I met with Negan, alone in his bedroom where we talked.”  
  
“You just sat down and talked with him? What, like, old friends?” The anger Rick was still feeling was slowly slipping away and he was becoming more intrigued by his wife’s prowess.  
  
Jo nodded. “Pretty much. He was curious to know about me and what had brought me here. I edited my life story; changed some important parts and fabricated others. All to suit my cause. Then I got emotional, I started to cry. Like most men, he hated seeing a woman cry and I asked if I could be so bold as to ask for a hug because it had been so long since I had hugged another human being and felt safe. I was pleasantly surprised that he agreed to it, and that was his fatal mistake.”  
  
Rick waited for her to say more, but she didn’t right away. His impatience got the better of him, though. “Well, how did you do it?”  
  
“I fell back on a tried and true favorite,” she answered sarcastically. “Let’s just say McGruff the Crime Dog would be proud because I took a _bite_ out crime.”  
  
Letting that information move around in his head, Rick stared back at her as it him with what she actually meant. “Like what I did to that Claimer?”  
  
“And like I did to the Wolf at that gas station,” she confirmed.  
  
“Huh.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“So, just like that?”  
  
“Well, then, I bashed his head in a couple times to make sure he wouldn’t come back, and then I killed his right hand man and then three other of his top lieutenants. I also had that guy Dwight freed. He’s been alive all this time, imprisoned in there. To say he swore loyalty to me right away would be an understatement,” Jo explained. “Then I convinced a few other soldiers to change their ways, so to speak, and then I held a meeting with everyone inside. I explained that things were gonna change and that they had to work _with_ the other communities instead of taking from them or killing them.”  
  
“How’d ya manage that?” Daryl asked, having been walking up and listening in.  
  
“Well, showing them Negan’s head kind of helped,” she replied, throwing a look at the archer. “But I think it was just that I talked _to_ them and not _at_ them. And I think they just liked what I said. And I think they’re gonna be fine now. I mean, it’s not going to be this immediate overnight change for them all, but it’s gonna happen, and I think sooner rather than later.” She smiled then. “I might’ve also won them over by tossing Lucille into the furnace and burning it. I think, for them, it was their Berlin Wall and I knocked it down, and suddenly it became very real to them that they were free of Negan for good.”  
  
Shaking his head in amazement, Rick brought his hands up to either side of Jo’s face and pulled her in for a kiss. Jo reciprocated without hesitation; covering her hands over his.  
  
“My sister, the badass,” Finn called out proudly.  
  
Apparently the others had been walking up and been close enough in earshot of everything she’d just said, but Jo had been so engrossed in talking to Rick that she hadn’t noticed anyone else.  
  
Though, that wasn’t exactly anything new for either of them.  
  
When they were together, to an extent, the world around them ceased to matter.  
  
“So what happens now?” one of the Hilltoppers who Jo hadn’t met yet asked.  
  
“Well, we can go back and I can introduce you to some people,” Jo suggested, looking among the group. “Some key players in this change of regime, I guess you could say. I kinda instilled Dwight as their temporary leader until they can get their shit together and elect a council of their peers to govern them. But I think meeting outsiders, truly getting to know people from other communities could definitely speed up the process a little bit.”  
  
Jesus stepped forward and slapped a hand down onto Rick’s shoulder and grinned at Jo. “I’m glad you woke Aaron and me up last night,” he remarked. “I was skeptical and I worried about how Rick would react. I mean, I assumed he would murder me and I think he contemplated it a few times after I told him where you’d gone. But I’m glad I played my part in getting you here. I’m glad you managed this when no one else could’ve even dared to dream it.”  
  
Jo shrugged, trying to let the compliment roll off her. “You’re not even focusing on the best part yet,” she said, eyeing each person and smiling even brighter.  
  
“Which is?” Rick egged.  
  
“Well, we might have some skirmishes ahead of us with the outposts,” she replied. “But now there won’t be a war. _Now_ we get to live.”


	64. Alexandria

_"We all have big changes in our lives that are more or less a second chance."_ — Harrison Ford

* * *

 

Despite everything that Jo had physically and mentally put herself through, the exciting prospect of what would happen next for every community that was tangled with each other, as well as the happiness she felt with seeing Rick again, it was perhaps _because_ of all that, paired with the lack of sleep from the night before and having eaten very little, that Jo had quite easily fallen asleep on the journey back to the Hilltop that ended up being a two hour drive. The lack of conversation inside the front cab of the truck and the steady rumble of the motor as they drove along, on virtually the same exact route it had taken Jo and Aaron to get to the Sanctuary, her eyes grew heavier with each bit of scenery they passed and her head dropped to Rick's shoulder. Obviously, he didn't mind. Rick cast a glance out the corner of her eye down at the top of her blonde dome before turning his head slightly and shared a smirk with Jesus, who was once again behind the steering wheel.

By the time they had gotten back on the road, the sun had already begun to set and the skies were painted red and pink. Some stars were already attempting to sparkle up ahead and a quarter moon had since made its presence known as well. By the time they actually reached the Hilltop, night had officially fallen and they were greeted by an onslaught of residents from not just the Hilltop but from the Kingdom and Alexandria, as well as Morgan, José and Tara from back home at Mount Vernon; the latter having arrived back to the Hilltop with Michonne, Merle and Tyreese with almost their entire arsenal.

Jo woke up by then, Rick climbing out first since she had been sandwiched between him and Jesus in the front cab. Climbing out, she was greeted by Tara first; who hugged her and expressed her complete relief to see she was okay after she had heard what she had gone off alone to do. She had also explained, in private, that the girls—Sophia and Mika—had not been given any details about what was going down as not to make them worry, which both Jo and Rick were equally grateful for.

Torches around the community and one large bonfire had been lit as the residents from Hilltop and the representatives from the Kingdom and Alexandria stood around waiting to hear about what was going to happen.

No one had been given the details yet that there would be no war, and that's exactly what they were expecting to hear. That's what they were mentally and physically preparing for. Instead, Rick took Jo by the hand, with Jesus and Aaron in tow, and the four of them stood at the top of the stairs leading up to the front of Barrington House. Everyone gathered looked up expectantly, waiting on what the next move would be with bated breath. The looks of anxiousness upon their faces gave way to their worries and fears about fighting; which they probably weren't sure they were one hundred percent ready for, but were ready to fight regardless.

"This is gonna sound anticlimactic, given what you were told to gather ya'll here, but we're happy to tell you there won't be a war," Rick announced, and the murmur of surprise, relief and confusion was almost instantaneous. "As you may already know, or have been told, my wife took it upon herself to go to the Sanctuary with a single mission: to kill Negan."

The murmurs picked back up again. Rick scanned the faces of those of his own people and the Hilltoppers he had begun to view with familiarity over the last two days, but also focused on the other faces belonging to the Kingdom and Alexandria. He wasn't surprised to see Richard from the Kingdom among the crowd, but he was to see King Ezekiel himself, and what was more was that he'd brought his tiger, Shiva. That latter presence had plenty people keeping a safe distance; out of the very normal and rational fear of being mauled and eaten alive by the animal. Fortunately, King Ezekiel was some kind of tiger whisperer, because he had that big cat lying docilely upon the ground like a common house pet. No one else seemed familiar.

"What happened? Are we not fighting at all now?" someone from the back asked.

"Did she do it?" another asked. "Did she kill him?"

Rick looked to his right and smiled upon Jo. "She sure as hell did," he repeated. Looking around her to Aaron, he gave a nod. "Obviously, we don't want you to just take our word for it. Proof is in the pudding, after all."

Aaron hurried over to the truck and pulled the tote that Jo had been carrying earlier that day as she addressed the people on the factory floor in the Sanctuary. Others followed his movements, wondering what Aaron could possibly be bringing up to the front steps to be shown before he handed the tote to Rick.

Turning to his wife, his muttered, "This is all you. You should do the honors."

Jo glanced back up at him and emitted a small sigh and smirked slightly. As he opened up the tote for her, Jo reached her left hand in. "This isn't for the faint of heart, so if you're easily nauseous you might want to turn away now," she spoke loudly enough so her voice could carry across the crowd. Giving anyone who might get sick a moment to look away, Jo lifted her arm and was suddenly holding up Negan's severed head by his hair for all to see who were looking. "Negan is dead and the threat of the Saviors is over. Without him and without his top soldiers taking up the cause in his place, they're just as free as all of us now. It's not going to happen overnight, but they are willing to work with all of us toward the same goal; to be equal and create a better world. They're going to be changing their ways and without Negan as their ringleader, they don't have the same sway over the other communities anymore."

The mixture of communities cheered and whooped. There were tears of joy, sighs of relief and laughter filled with hope and amused disbelief. Neighbor hugged neighbor, smiles were shared and even a few kisses were, too.

"What about the outposts?" Richard asked, taking a step forward. "Have they bent the knee like the Sanctuary has?"

Rick looked from Richard to Jo. He was going to allow her to speak about it, but he had been invited in to the Sanctuary with the rest of the group that had come from the Hilltop. He had been given every detail of what had transpired and met with several Saviors; namely Dwight. The look Jo gave him back was permission to take a turn and speak about it all.

"We've come to the decision that the Saviors have agreed to. That a few of them will join with a few ambassadors from each community and, from there, go outpost to outpost in order to spread the word and, if need be, enforce this change. We're not expecting any battles ahead, but it would be foolish not to be prepared for some."

Jesus nodded, as he decided to add his own two cents to the conversation. "The Saviors that have been living at these outposts have been doing so for a while now. They've been obedient to Negan, carried out his orders and maintained a certain kind of aggressive lifestyle. They won't be easily convinced to turn their backs on that lifestyle right away, but the hope is that if they see their own people mixed in with ours, that there won't have to be any bloodshed."

"Even if there was a fight, the fight would be between all of our communities against the outposts," Jo added. "Those numbers will be in our favor now. The outposts won't be able to match us in people and combined weaponry."

"And each outpost is too spread out from each other to be able to communicate and come together in time to join forces against our combined communities," Rick mentioned further. He smiled rather smugly at this good fortune as he watched Jo shove Negan's head back into the tote. Looking back up at the crowd, he boasted, "We've won the war without having to even fight it. I'd say that's pretty damn amazing and something worth celebrating, don't you think, Jesus?"

Jesus nodded again, this time with great enthusiasm. "I certainly do," he agreed. "Now, I'm not saying we get wasted and let our guards down, but there just so happens to be boxes of scotch in the root cellar that used to belong to Gregory. Why don't we bring them up and have us a well-deserved celebration?"

Several whoops seemed to decide a celebration was definitely in order.

"Alright then; tomorrow we get to work, but tonight we party!"

Rick smirked and watched the majority of the crowd began to break up, while others stayed put, talking among themselves or moved to approach Rick, Jo, Jesus and Aaron on the front steps.

"Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we _don't_ die," King Ezekiel chuckled, holding tightly onto Shiva's chain leash. He grinned broadly and looked among the faces before him before settling his attention upon Rick. "When we were told of your wife's valor, we were all inspired and in agreement to finally take up arms in this fight against our oppressors. If one woman, carrying new life inside of her, is willing to risk all for the hope of a better world, then we no longer had an excuse to sit on our hands in cowardice." Turning his gaze next upon Jo, King Ezekiel bowed to her. "The Kingdom is indebted to you, milady."

Having not met King Ezekiel until now, Jo had not been prepared for his mannerisms and obviously not the tiger. However, seeing how tamed the animal was under his master's watchful eye, she wasn't afraid. She also pleasantly amused by King Ezekiel. As over the top as he was, with how he spoke and the entire charade of being a king with his court was, Jo found him to be a breath of fresh air. His personality was a bright light in a dark world and Jo already saw him as a friend.

In response to his words for her, Jo tipped her head at him and smiled. "I'm just glad it all worked out so well. Almost too well, actually," she admitted. "I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never did."

"Good fortune smiles upon you."

With those as his parting words, for the time being anyway, King Ezekiel and his entourage stepped away from the front steps and went to join in on the revelry about to take place; but first to probably find a safe place to keep Shiva for the night so that no one accidently crossed paths with the tiger accidently found themselves on the menu. Jesus patted Rick on the back and then disappeared down the steps toward the bonfire with Aaron at his side.

Moving the tote from his right hand to his left, Rick took his right hand and slipped it into Jo's left; giving it a squeeze as he turned to her and whispered, "It's the roller coaster. We're up right now." Nodding toward the first handful of people to appear from around the side of the house, carrying boxes that no doubt contained the scotch Jesus had mentioned, Rick smiled. "Let's make the most of it we can."

Jo smiled back at him, watching the way their people had begun to happily mingle with members from the other communities. "I can't drink, but I know something better that we can do to celebrate."

Rick instantly perked up, and it was obvious what he was thinking. "Yeah? And what's that?"

Licking her bottom lip, Jo leaned in toward him and whispered, "Sleep."

When it registered what she had just said, Rick shook his head and laughed a bit. "Oh, alright," he muttered. "Guess I'll have to take a raincheck on the _real_ celebration I was hoping for. I mean, you kinda owe me one, after that scare you gave me. I mean, even though you more or less singlehandedly save the day, I still have every right to be furious with you."

"Are you? Still furious, I mean."

Rick paused, as if he was thinking long and hard on it, but then he shrugged. "Nah, I'm over it."

"I'm glad."

The two of them stared contentedly at each other for a few moments; enjoying being in each other's company again and the happy feelings they were basking in.

"There's just one thing we gotta do first," Rick commented.

"Yeah? And what's that?"

Holding up the tote, he nodded to it. "We gotta decide what to do with the head," he answered. "I'm torn between two options: sticking it on a pike and carrying it with us to each outpost we subdue or just throw it on that bonfire." With an exaggerated sigh, he looked at Jo. "What say you, milady?" he asked, mimicking King Ezekiel.

"I say," Jo began, "that if we carried it around on a pike we'd be no better than the Saviors were under his rule." She gestured to the tote, but was referring to the head inside of it. "We're not trying to spread fear like they did. We're spreading hope and change. So, I say we burn it. Fire is purifying, after all. And then, if we're feeling particularly petty, we can all take turns shitting on the ashes."

Rick laughed out heartily and nodded. "I knew I married you for more than your good looks."

Leaning in, Rick kissed her and smiled while doing it. Jo, too, smile amidst the kiss and held his face in place with both her hands like when they greeted each other on the road away from the Sanctuary. Without saying anything else to each other, they walked hand in hand down the steps and joined everyone around the bonfire.

Bottles of scotch as well as bottles of other forms of liquor were being cracked open and passed around or poured into individual cups for all wishing to take part. It wasn't just the adults, or the ambassadors from the other communities, that were standing around the bonfire. It was parents with their children. It was families. And now, everyone together, they had all become a new family. They weren't just multiple communities anymore. Coming together like this and branching out with one another made them one community. It made them one very big, dysfunctional family.

"A toast!" Merle bellowed, holding up a bottle of scotch he was hoarding for himself. As everyone that had a bottle or a cup raised their bottles and cups, the eldest Dixon brother looked briefly into the large, flickering flames and then grinned. "Here's to those who wish us well. All the rest can go to hell!"

As he knocked back a hearty swig of scotch, everyone else whooped and cheered and clinked bottles cups with each other before taking their own swigs.

"Before anyone wanders off, we got one thing that needs to be done," Rick announced, and all eyes were on him. Holding the tote open, he nodded to Jo to do the honors.

With a smirk, Jo grabbed Negan's head by the hair again and lifted it up out of the tote. After a slight pause to make sure everyone was paying attention, Jo tossed it into the flames and the act was met with further whooping and cheering.

Rick smiled down at Jo and then tossed the tote into the fire as well as they both turned their attention to the bonfire and the sound of initial sizzling created by the severed head.

"It's gonna start to create a smell soon, as dead flesh typically does, and I don't really feel like being too near it," Jo muttered quietly as the burning wood popped and crackled along with the sizzling head. "May I suggest we take our leave now for the night?"

Taking Jo's hand in his again and giving it firm, loving squeeze, Rick nodded. "Sounds good to me."

Not feeling the need to say any goodnights to anyone or give any reason for slinking off together, the couple turned around and headed back up to Barrington House with the simple and pure goal of calling it a night.

 

* * *

 

"Do you still see Carl when you close your eyes?"

Rick blinked and turned his head to look upon Jo who lay beside him still, not long after first light. They had already been awake for about thirty minutes or so; having greeted the day with some good ol' fashioned dancing in the sheets. Now they were resting after their romp and trying to buy themselves some time before they got up.

Considering her question, Rick rolled onto his side. Pressing his elbow into his pillow, he propped his head up in his hand and nodded. "Not as much as I used to."

"I don't see Hope as much anymore either and I feel so guilty about it," Jo admitted, holding the bed sheet tight across her fuller chest as she stared up at the ceiling. "I can barely remember the specific shade of blue that her eyes were or if she had any notable freckles or beauty marks upon her skin."

Reaching his free arm across the top of Jo's stomach, Rick breathed evenly as he studied the conflicted and sad look upon her face. "Look at me." When she hesitated, he repeated himself. "Jo, look at me."

After a moment, she acquiesced. Turning her head, she looked up at his face and smiled sadly.

"Look at my eyes," Rick continued. When her eyes met his, he leaned his face a little closer so she could get a better look. "Hope's eyes were slightly darker than mine. They had more of a grey tint to 'em. They sparkled when she smiled, and she smiled a lot. She had a beautiful smile. She had _your_ smile."

A pout appeared upon Jo's lips as she looked away from Rick and back up at the ceiling as her mind drifted at the picture he'd helped paint for her in her mind so she could remember. "Yeah, she did," Jo mumbled in agreement. "She had that beauty mark above her lip, her left side."

"Yeah," Rick nodded.

"And…and she had one dark freckle above her left eyebrow, too." Jo frowned then. "She had his chin. The very slight cleft in it."

"Don't think about that part."

Turning back to face Rick again, Jo shook her head. "No, it really doesn't bother me anymore," she insisted. "I dunno what exactly happened but, after yesterday, after everything I did to Negan and that handful of his lackeys, something changed for me. The Governor— _Philip Blake_ —he doesn't bother me anymore. When I think of what he looked like, the first image that keeps popping into my head his how he looked, laying on the ground with that wound I put into his chest before I cut off his head. Maybe…maybe it was tossing Negan's head onto the fire last night. Maybe it was the similarities between the two and everything I was able to do to Negan was sort of a way of doing what I didn't get to do to _Philip_."

"Philip, huh?"

"The Governor was a persona. It was a title given to him and the people clung to it because they needed leadership in the early, dark days and he was their beacon of light. _Philip_ was the man behind the curtain. The face behind the mask," Jo remarked, glancing in the direction of the window. "He was just a man. A horrible, horrible man, but still just a man and all men can bleed."

"Well, that's ominous," Rick smirked, rolling back onto the mattress.

"I'm not trying to be. I'm just trying to say that monsters are hard to defeat, but men aren't. I've likened him to a monster long enough. He's not the Great and Powerful Oz. I pulled back that curtain and saw him for who he really was. Negan was just like that and he didn't frighten me, so if Negan couldn't frighten me, then Philip can't anymore, either."

"I'm glad to hear that."

"So, I don't mind remembering his face as long as it helps me remember Hope's. I mean, I can't always lean on you to remind me what my own child looked like on those days I forget. I need to do it myself." Jo sighed. "It would be so much more easier if we'd ever had a picture taken of her somehow. Didn't Glenn have that camera that printed out mini Polaroids? Why didn't we think to borrow it?"

Rick pushed himself up into a sitting position and then ran a hair through his sleep-tousled curls. "I think he ran out of film and used most of it on Maggie. Actually, I don't think he had much film to begin with."

"I'm holding out that we find our own Polaroid camera with film someday. I'd like to have pictures of us, pictures of the girls, and of this nugget when she's born," Jo remarked, giving her stomach a generous rub with both hands. Turning her head a bit, she watched as Rick pushed himself up to stand beside the bed. Despite the mild seriousness of the conversation that had just taken place, she was able to smile warmly as she followed him with her gaze as he reached his hands up toward the ceiling to properly stretch and then began to make his way around to her side of the bed where they'd discarded their clothes the night before so they could sleep comfortably. "Wanna help me up while you're here? I'm stuck like a beached whale."

Rick smirked and stepped up over. Grabbing onto her hands, he gave slow tug and pulled her up to sit and so that she could toss her legs around the edge of the bed. Without having to be asked, he picked up her clothes as well and laid them beside her before going about redressing in his own. Jo didn't bother to get dressed right away. She opted to just sit there a while longer, wearing only her bra; the only thing she had kept on while she slept and during sex with him that morning. Jo simply found joy in watching him stand there, naked as they day he came crying and still with that sleepy look to his face while his curls flopped around on his forehead when he hunched forward to pull his black jeans on.

"You're so beautiful," she muttered.

Rick made a face, expressing he didn't necessarily share her sentiments about his appearance. He didn't respond verbally either. Once he managed to get his jeans all the way up over his hips, and then zip and button the front, he shot her a wink and a small smile. Stalking forward, he placed his hands onto her shoulders and then snaked them up her neck to hold her face before planting a soft kiss to her lips.

"Get dressed," he finally spoke again.

"My shirt has blood all over it from yesterday. It was one of Negan's I had changed into after biting him," she informed. "But then I ruined this one not long after. It was probably pointless to change at all."

"I can go see if anyone here has a spare shirt that'll fit you."

Jo nodded. "Okay."

Pulling on his socks and then his boots, Rick grabbed for his shirt and began to pull it on as he walked out of the bedroom. While he was gone, Jo pushed herself up to her feet and waddled over to the window where she pulled the sheer curtain aside and looked down at the tops of the FEMA trailers that the Hilltop had been utilizing as a doctor's office and other homes since the beginning. She could barely make out movement of people off to the side and in the distance it was nothing but treetops. The view from the bedroom didn't offer much else to see from there.

Waddling back over to the bed, Jo began the arduous task of putting her underwear back on as she used the edge of the bed to keep her balance. After that was said and done, she exhaled a deep breath and just stared at her pants; not looking forward to repeating the process to get those on, as well as her socks and boots, either.

So, Jo sat back down and waited for Rick to return.

After few minutes of staring at the door and daydreaming, a knock came to the door.

"It's just me. I'm coming in," Rick announced, as he already had the door partially open. Once he'd slopped back inside, he stepped up to her with a rather beautiful white blouse that had some sort of see-through lace design around the neckline. "One of the ladies offered it. She has a four month old son and said she wore it here while she was pregnant and that it should be worn by someone who needs it instead of sitting in a box with the rest of her maternity clothes that she isn't using anymore."

Jo took the shirt and smiled. "That was sweet of her, whoever she is."

Rick shrugged. "I didn't actually catch a name," he admitted, watching as Jo lifted the blouse up over her head and pulled it on. "Today was the day we were planning on heading to Alexandria and meet with those people there to discuss joining the trade network they got going with this place and the Kingdom. I was thinking we'd ask those people from Alexandria that showed up here yesterday and see if they wouldn't mind leading us back with them."

Jo nodded, smoothing the loose, lightweight material down over her stomach. "Sounds like a plan. But after that I think we are due to head back home to Mount Vernon, don't you think?"

"I do," Rick agreed. "We could probably send half our people back home so they can soothe any worries the others have; let them know everything worked out and that we're fine."

"Okay. When do you want to leave?"

"Soon, if you're up for it."

"I am."

"Good."

Jo looked up at Rick, who was standing there with his hands on his hips, watching as she just sat there. "Can you help me get my pants, socks and boots on?" she asked with a coquettish smile.

"If I'm being honest, I prefer you without any of that on," he teased.

Jo chuckled and rolled her eyes. "Well, now, that's not exactly ideal for walking around in public, is it?"

"No, sad to say, it isn't."

With a smile of his own, Rick helped her back up to her feet. Taking her pants in hand, he bent slightly at the knees and urged her to use his shoulders for balance as he help pull her pants on for her. Slowly he shimmied them up to her hips and then let her close the front with the zipper and button while he bent down to pull on her socks and then her boots for her.

Both let out a heavy breath and smirked at each other as Jo took a step to the side and reached for her new utility belt; the same one she had taken off of Simon after she killed him. The gun she'd carried in the holster was still there and so was the machete. After patting her backside, she could feel the pocket knife was still in one of her back pockets. Rick began to do the same, finally adding his belt and his own utility belt to the mix to complete his outfit.

"I feel a bit guilty leaving the bed unmade," Jo commented, looking back at the disheveled sheets and top comforter.

Rick shrugged. "They're probably gonna change the sheets anyway. We've slept in that bed the last two nights and for all they know we got chiggers. Probably best for them to play it safe and change the sheets and wash them anyway."

"Eww," Jo chuckled.

Rick patted the handle of his Colt and the smiled at Jo. "You ready?"

"I am."

Together, they left the bedroom behind and left the door open as well. Taking their time down the stairs for Jo's benefit, they headed straight for the front door after reaching the bottom of the stairs. Opening the front door let in a bit of sunlight, but not much because of the balcony overhead. Somehow, the inside of the house had felt much cooler, almost as if there was air conditioning, and stepping out into the day was like being hit in the face with a wall of warmth. The earth was already heating up for the day and it was looking to be a beautiful one. There were barely any clouds in the sky, and what clouds were there were small puffs, sparsely scattered.

Walking down the front steps to the house, they were almost immediately greeted by most of their people; led by Daryl and Finn.

"You sleep okay?" Finn asked his sister.

Jo nodded. "I did."

"So, what's the what for today? What do you want us to do?" Daryl questioned, eyeing Rick.

"I was just telling Jo—I think half of us can head back home to Mount Vernon. The rest of us, I was thinking, could go to Alexandria."

Daryl nodded. "Well, I'll go wherever you go and I'm assuming it's Alexandria."

"And _I'll_ go wherever _you_ go," Finn mirrored, looking at Jo. "And I can assume you'll be going wherever Rick is going."

"You've assumed right," Jo remarked with a smile, raising her hand over her eyes to shield them from the morning sunlight.

Michonne, who was also standing there with Tyreese, looked between their small gathered group. "I'll come with you to Alexandria," she offered, and then turned to Tyreese. "You should head home. Be with Karen."

"That was my plan," the larger man remarked with a smile. "We're at the end of her pregnancy and she's been really restless this last week. It's only a matter of time now."

The others smiled back at him; happy for his good fortune.

It was always wonderful when things were looking up for once.

Slowly, their group began to break apart, with Tyreese rounding up Tara, Lewis and José to join him in heading back to Mount Vernon. Aside from Daryl, Finn and Michonne, Merle had also decided to make the trek to Alexandria. It was clear that the older Dixon wasn't always a fan of going anywhere without his little brother. Knowing they wouldn't be coming directly back to the Hilltop after Alexandria, at least not for a few days, probably, both groups that were either going home or going to Alexandria packed up anything they had come with. They also went about packing anything that was given to them from Hilltop; now mostly in thanks for the tremendous feat Jo had accomplished the day before and not just because they'd agreed to trade between their communities. As the foursome heading home departed in a car loaned to them with Jesus' permission, it left the van for the others to still utilize.

Rick approached Jesus not long after as the Hilltop fully began to come alive for the day. "Where's Ezekiel, Richard and the others from the Kingdom?"

"Oh, they left as the sun came up. They wanted to get home and assure their community that all was well," Jesus answered. "Normally the Kingdom residents probably wouldn't bat an eye if King Ezekiel left, as he was always present for tributes to the Saviors, which took place outside the Kingdom. But he left with Shiva. Something like that was bound to raise questions."

Rick nodded. "Yeah, I guess that's understandable. And what about Alexandria? Did their people leave already?"

"No, they're still here." Jesus gestured to a clump of four people standing close to the gates. "I already took the liberty of telling them you're hoping pay a visit to Alexandria. Today was supposed to be that day, wasn't it? So, they agreed to hang back a little longer before they went back."

Slapping Jesus appreciatively upon the shoulder, he smiled. "Thank you."

As Rick walked off to greet the foursome from Alexandria, Jo stayed back with Jesus; folding her arms across her chest. She seemed a little lost in thought when Jesus turned and looked at her.

"So, how are you doing? I mean, how are you _really_ doing?"

The small, contemplative smile that had been toying at the corners of her lips pulled upward and revealed a bigger, happier smile. "I'm good. Better than I thought I would be."

Jesus smiled back. "I'm glad to hear that."

"Sorry about yesterday; putting you in that position with Rick." Shifting her gaze from Rick's retreating form to Jesus, she gestured to her jaw. "I'm assuming that bruise on the side of your jaw is his handiwork?"

Chuckling with his mouth closed, Jesus nodded. "Yeah, but I don't blame him for it. When I realized Aaron had gone off with you, too, I was able to understand things from Rick's perspective quite better. That very real possibility that I'd never see Aaron again had me quite shook, and I've only been with him a couple months. I can imagine how much worse it was for Rick, considering you've been together longer; you're his wife and the mother of his children."

"Well, things worked out so we don't have to think about those fears from yesterday," Jo muttered. "It's a new day."

"Yeah," he agreed. "It's a new _era_."

While the two of them continued to talk among themselves, Rick had sidled up to the foursome from Alexandria and greeted them initially with a nod of his head as he stood there with his hands upon his hips.

"I wanted to thank you for coming here yesterday with little hesitation; for being ready to fight alongside us even though it would've been a severely uphill battle," he remarked, looking upon each face, one at a time.

They were three men and a woman. Two of the men looked to be in their late twenties or early thirties, and also looked a bit alike. The other man was much older, probably in his late forties, and also taller. The woman, with short dark brown hair, looked to be about the same age as the younger men.

"It was nothing. We wanted to come," one of the younger two men insisted. "It was the right thing to do. Our constable would've been here, but our mother isn't keen on him heading outside our walls because she insists his leadership is needed at home and not anywhere else. Plus, he has young family; two kids. We try not to make a habit of parents with dependent children heading off into dangerous missions, I guess you can say."

"Yeah, my wife would probably wish I'd do the same thing more often, then this wouldn't have happened to me," Rick remarked, holding up his left hand to reveal his bandaged nub that was once his pinky finger.

"Wow, shit. What happened?" the woman asked.

"Saviors."

"Well, at least it was only your finger and not your head, right?" the other younger man muttered with a chuckle.

Rick nodded, having thanked his stars every day since it happened that that's _all_ that had happened. "Listen, I wanted to ask you—yesterday, before everything, we visited the Kingdom, met King Ezekiel and agreed to join this trade network you're all part of. We've been at Mount Vernon for the last six, six and a half months, and we've been pretty cut off from the rest of the world; living in a bubble, as it were. But that bubble's popped now and we can't live like that anymore, and there's gonna be things we'll probably need that we can't always do for ourselves, and there's probably things we _do_ have that you don't and need. Today we originally intended to visit you next, meet with your leader, and come to some sort of arrangement like with the Kingdom and here with the Hilltop. And, soon, with the Sanctuary, fingers crossed."

The first younger man that had spoken to Rick nodded. "Yeah, definitely. In fact, if you want, you can follow us back to Alexandria. Actually, it would probably be safer if there were more of us traveling together. There's still the issue of the outposts and those Saviors who haven't gotten the memo yet."

"That'd be great."

Holding his hand out, the first younger man smiled. "I'm sorry. Where are my manners? We haven't even been properly introduced. I'm Aiden Monroe and this is my brother, Spencer." He gestured between himself and then the other younger man beside him. Then, to the taller, older man and the woman, "And that's Tobin and Francine."

Rick nodded at each of them, as well as shaking their hands individually. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Rick Grimes."

Aiden paused and chuckled slightly as he stared back at Rick. "You said Rick?"

"I did."

The wheels in Aiden's head seemed to be moving as he glanced briefly at his brother and then back at Rick. "Well, Rick, I think we're gonna have no problem at all working something out with your community. And I think you're gonna like Alexandria. I mean, we have electricity, air conditioning and hot showers, for starters."

Rick remembered Jesus mentioning that two days ago, when they'd first arrived to the Hilltop. "I gotta admit, I don't think I'd know what to do with myself if I lived in a place like that anymore. My people—my _family_ —we've been so used to doing without those luxuries for so long."

"You said you're at Mount Vernon?" Tobin inquired.

Rick nodded. "I did."

"As in George Washington's home and not just the area?"

"The house and all its property," Rick confirmed. "It wasn't easy, but we made it ours. We made it _home_."

"That's amazing," Aiden remarked. "I think it was—what—last summer? We went on a supply run in that area and thought about trying Mount Vernon for shits and giggles. We made it there. We got inside the property but as soon as we saw all those rotters just hanging around, we turned tail and got the ever-living fuck out of there. How…how did you manage claiming it? How could you have possibly made it a home?"

Rick beamed proudly. "I've got an amazing family, willing to do what needs to be done. We do whatever for each other."

Spencer smirked, slapping Rick on the side of his arm. "Our mother is gonna love you."

 

* * *

 

The ride to Alexandria was pleasant. Even though the van had a working air conditioning unit, Rick drove with his window rolled down and his arm dangling outside to enjoy the warm, fresh breeze; how it felt on his skin and especially the way it had begun to whip through Jo's blonde tresses. Rick occasionally glanced in her direction, from where she sat beside him in the passenger seat, when not paying attention to the car filled with Alexandrians in front of them, leading the way on the road. She seemed lost in thought, but didn't seem to be in any sort of negative space. She merely looked thoughtful or contemplative to him. Behind them in the van was the rest of their group and all were immersed in the same lighthearted silence.

It was nice.

So nice that Rick opened up the center console and pulled out a CD. With one hand he popped open the jewel case and slipped the CD into the player before flashing Jo a goofy smile when she'd realized what they were all soon listening to.

"Ricky Martin?" Jo questioned, narrowing her gaze at him as the intro music to 'Livin' la Vida Loca' began to swirl around the inside of the van and waft gently outside along with the breeze.

"I've decided to own it," Rick replied.

"It's kind of fitting," Michonne remarked from the row behind them. "'Livin' la Vida Loca' translates to 'living the crazy life', and ours is just that."

Jo half shrugged and half nodded. Michonne wasn't wrong, after all. "Plus, it _is_ a pretty fun song," she offered up. "I always enjoyed dancing to it when I was younger."

Rick removed his eyes from the road once more to smile at her again. "Maybe we'll dance to it together sometime."

"Maybe after the baby is born," Jo suggested with a wink. "I'm officially giving in to the fact that I need to just relax now. The last couple days helped me realize that."

"I'm glad you've seen the light."

Jo rolled her eyes at Rick and turned her attention to the scenery passing them by while Rick returned his attention to the car in front of them. No one seemed bothered by Ricky Martin playing or, at least, no one was complaining about it. The music continued on and so did the silence once again.

After a while, both vehicles turned onto a narrow, residential road, lined with homes on either side and several of them looked as if they'd been set on fire a long time ago. At the end of the road, several cars sat partially on the road with sharpened, wooden spikes sticking out the windows as a sort of deterrent or obstacle course to keep anyone or anything away. Beyond that was a large wall made up of panels of sheet metal with a sign beside the entrance gate welcoming outsiders into the "Alexandria Safe Zone." As the car in front of the van slowed to a stop, Rick mirrored the gesture and waited. Everyone inside the van began to look out the windows and look at their surroundings. Despite the recent good tidings and victories, they still couldn't let their guards down completely. It was wise to be ever vigilant.

In front of them, Aiden climbed out of the car's driver's seat. Leaving the door open, he gripped the top with his left hand and rested his right forearm upon the edge of the roof as he shouted out for someone to open up the gate. Everyone inside the van immediately looked forward with curiosity.

And then, slowly, the gate began to roll open, revealing a man of a rather portly build, who was dressed comfortably in khaki shorts and a short-sleeved tattersall-patterned shirt. What was more was that his hairstyle of choice was that of a dark brown mullet.

When the entrance was clear enough, Aiden hopped back into the car and started it back up. Shoving an arm out of the window, he signaled for the van to continue to follow them inside the walls.

Gingerly, Rick slowly drove the van inside of this new community and came to a stop once again, parked behind the car as the gate was rolled closed behind them by the man with the mullet. Both vehicles were parked alongside the sheet metal wall that lined that closed in that particular section of the community while the road continued on up ahead toward what appeared to be a small intersection. Peering out the van windows, the van's occupants could see a large pond with a picturesque gazebo at its side. On the other side of the large pond was a row of townhouses that reminded them of the ones they'd stayed in briefly in Arlington. Along the road to their immediate right, which ran alongside the front walls, were a white home and several rows of solar panels beside it. There were other homes they could more or less make out a bit further away from where they were and everything looked serene.

Aiden hopped out of the car again, and was soon followed in that gesture by his brother Spencer, Tobin and Francine.

Rick took it as his cue to do the same.

Looking at Jo, he gave her a slight nod and then glimpsed Daryl in the rearview mirror and gave him the same nod. Without a word, he opened up his driver's side door and climbed down. After shutting the door behind him, he stepped forward and walked between the front of the van and the back of the car until he was clear of both vehicles to stand more openly on the road. As Jo opened her door, he turned to help her out as the others began to pile out of the van via the sliding door. As they clumped together out of habit, each keeping their hands close to the weapons they had strapped to themselves, also out of habit, their collective attention fell upon the Alexandrians they'd followed in the car and the one with the mullet standing at the gate with a rather blank look upon his face.

"Welcome to Alexandria," Aiden formerly announced as he gestured with one arm at the community as a whole. "Before we give you the grand tour, I'm sure my mother would like to speak with you about a multitude of things."

"Starting with how Negan's dead and the Saviors won't be fucking with us anymore," Spencer added with a smirk.

Aiden nodded in agreement. "Yeah, that'll probably be the subject to lead with."

"I'll tell her we're back," Francine offered; walking off without waiting for anyone to say anything different.

"This place is real nice," Finn remarked, stepping forward slightly. "Looking around, you can almost forget what the world is like outside those walls."

"Up until last fall, we let ourselves forget how serious it could be. We lost a few friends on a supply run and our constable really laid into us about it. Short while after that a shit ton of roamers got free of this quarry not far from here and found their way here. The weight they put on some of the walls caused a few panels to buckle."

"How did you keep this place from falling completely?"

"Our constable and a few others were able to block the gaps in the wall with a few trucks we had inside the community and shot at those that had gotten inside. It took about two weeks but we eventually all came together to find ways to kill as many as we could and then sneak out to lead the rest away," Tobin responded, hands on his hips. "We lost a few people when the roamers first got in. Mostly it was unsuspecting residents who were near the walls when they came down and were underprepared to handle the dead. Once everything had been secured again and the threat led away, our constable mandated everyone be trained with firearms and knives so we could be better prepared. Of course, we never thought the next threat would be the living instead of the dead."

"The Saviors," Jo deduced.

Tobin nodded at her. "Yeah, but now, thanks to you, that threat is over, too."

"Hopefully it's a long while before another rears its ugly head," Aiden added. "Better yet: not at all."

"We gonna go to your mama or is she comin' to us to talk?" Merle questioned from the back of their group.

"Well, when we get new residents, she prefers to interview them alone, one on one, in our living room and she tapes it—for posterity, I think. But, considering you're just visiting from another community and not here to stay, she might just meet with all of you together and I doubt she'd tape it."

Rick nodded at this, stepping forward with his hands on his hips just like Tobin. "Why don't you take us to her? We've been away from the rest of our people long enough. We'd like to get home to them by nightfall. Francine already went ahead to give your mother a heads up about us."

Gesturing to the road to their right, along the front wall, Aiden smiled. "Sure thing," he muttered, stepping forward to lead the way.

"Aiden," called the man with the mullet. "Who are our guests?"

"New friends," Aiden replied with a brief glance toward the gate. "It's nothing for you to worry your pretty little head over, Eugene."

"Understood."

With a roll of his eyes, Aiden smiled between Rick and Jo and then turned back around to lead the group forward up the road. As they followed, residents began to pop up here and there, standing out in the streets or on their porches or in their windows; news of the new arrivals having spread like wildfire throughout the community that quickly. Wandering past the solar panels, they turned the corner up the road where the townhouses faced; not paying much attention to the people staring from a safe and subtle distance.

Rick and Jo, especially, didn't seem to care.

While he kept his right hand hovering over the handle of his Colt, his left hand held tightly onto Jo's as they walked the paved road. As soon as they stepped up onto the red brick sidewalk in front of the townhouses, the front door to the house at the very end of the row of houses opened up and someone stepped out.

It was a man whose gait was heavy and purposeful as he plodded down the stairs. His face was hard to make out from the distance but his head of thick and floppy brown curls and closely trimmed beard were rather hard not to notice. He seemed to notice the approach of several people coming up the road on his right, so he stopped, turned and narrowed his gaze.

The closer Rick, Jo and the others got, the more curious the man with the dark curls got.

Rather quickly that curiosity seemed to give way to sense of relief and good tidings as he began to hurry forward.

"Holy fucking shit! Holy _fucking shit!_ " the man shouted as he came running forward.

Immediately, Rick, Jo and the others glanced upward at the approaching figure and stopped in their tracks.

"Rick! Oh my god, Rick!"

Rick stared, blinked and just stood there in confusion for a moment before shock took over. "Shane?"

Without warning, the man practically barreled into Rick and threw his arms tightly around Rick; hugging him like his life depended on it. A sob of relief and happiness escaped the man's lips and when he pulled back so Rick could look him in the face, Rick found himself staring into the face of his best friend who he had believed to be dead for the last half year.

"Shane?" Rick questioned again, immediately trying to come to terms with this change of events. He reached his hands up and gripped onto Shane's arms, as if physically touching him would prove this wasn't all some dream he was having. "Oh God, Shane. You're alive?"

"Yeah," Shane nodded, his face plastered with the largest, happiest grin. "And so are you!" Glancing Rick up and down, he turned his attention to the others, but primarily to Jo. "Holy fuck, Jo…you're pregnant? How come every time I see you you're ready to pop?"

Jo just stood there; her knees shaking as badly as her hands were as Shane reached forward and hugged her next. She didn't know how to react. She was in such a daze and finding this unexpected reunion a bit much to take in all at once as so many questions began to pop into her mind, as she was sure the same was happening in Rick's mind.

"I…yeah…" was all she could manage to say at the moment.

Aiden, who had been standing there silently with his brother and Tobin, merely flashed a knowing smile. "I told you that you'd like Alexandria," he said to Rick with a wink of his eye. "When you said your name was Rick Grimes, I could barely keep this to myself."

Rick turned briefly toward the younger man. "You knew we knew Shane?"

Aiden nodded. "I didn't want to say anything back at Hilltop. I thought this surprise would be better, and I was right."

Rick looked back at Shane and began to cry as he reached out and pulled his long lost friend back into his arms for another hug. "You've been here this entire time? H-how?"

Then, the most important question came to the surface as Jo grabbed onto Shane's shoulder; forcing both men to separate so she could look Shane in the eye. "Hope," she muttered. "We saw your signs. It said you had her. Is she—?"

"Is she here?" Shane questioned. "Yeah. She's at home with Andrea."

Jo and Rick's worlds came undone then, but in the best possible way. They were stunned into silence and Jo was so over the moon with emotion, her knees buckled and she began to drop to the ground, but Finn caught her in time to prevent any injury. It was like in the movies when everything slowed down and you can't seem to move. They completely overlooked the information that Andrea was also alive and well, and could only focus on Hope.

Hope was alive and well.

"My baby," Jo muttered with tears stinging her eyes before they rolled down her face. Glancing up into Shane's face, she grabbed onto his hands and squeezed tightly. "Take me to my baby. Take us to her now."

While Jo began to push away from Shane, Rick just stood there, still so stunned. He felt like all of this was a dream and as Shane began to lead them up the road in the direction they'd already been headed, Rick felt like he was in a movie, where everything would suddenly move in slow motion. He barely registered that Jo was already walking ahead of everyone else, just assuming which way she should go, because she was on a mission now. The slap on his back finally brought the world back to Rick; turning to see that it was Daryl and that Daryl was actually giving him a rather bright smile, which wasn't all that common for the man.

At the end of the row of townhouses, the front door opened and an older woman in her sixties stepped out and looked curiously at the group of people that were clearly not about to stop walking. Aiden broke apart from the group and took the front steps two at a time to speak to the woman, who was quite likely Deanna, his mother. Rounding that corner at the end of that road, they all turned left around a walled in courtyard for the end townhouse. More residents seemed to either step out onto their porches or appear in their windows with the curtains pushed aside, to steal curious glimpses of these new people wandering their streets.

However, the noisy neighbors once again went unnoticed to the group, specifically to Rick and Jo, as they walked on. They continued past the road that fell between the townhouses where the garages were and a small white home where a tall man with blonde hair came out of to do as his fellow residents were doing, and see who these newcomers were for himself, as he seemed to be wiping his hand on some sort of towel. The large pond came up next on the left and by that time Shane had already resumed leading the group. They were approaching an intersection when Rick turned and looked at Shane.

"How long have you been here? What happened to you after the prison?"

Shane dipped his head. Even though he was squinting from the morning sunlight, he was still able to express sadness in his eyes. "I went after that guy in the tank. Shot him, and then shot a couple others. Then all those walkers were coming out of the woods. You were fighting with the Governor and I just tried getting to Jo and to Lori, even though she was gone. I didn't see Jo anywhere by then," he explained with a gesture to Jo. "I found Lori. I wanted to do something, to bury her, but it was too chaotic. There wasn't anything I could do for her so I had to go back and help those that were still alive, but everyone had already begun to scatter. I made my way back up to the prison. You were still fighting the Governor and looked like you were winning at that point so I figured you had a handle on things. I got back to the courtyard, got into C Block and found Andrea with Hope. She'd gone back for her and the diaper bag we had packed in the event of something like that happening and if we ever had to abandon the prison. We got out of C Block and found Luke as well."

"Luke?" Rick questioned, stopping in front of a blue house on the corner, and the others followed suit. The name sounded familiar.

"The kid Lori had taken a shining to and cared for. He was hiding behind the bus, had pissed his pants 'cause he was so scared. I grabbed him up and we ran. There was no time to hang around. Too many walkers were coming into the courtyard. I don't even know who was still alive in the courtyard. We just wanted to keep the kids safe. I'm sorry we got separated from you for so long or that we didn't try to wait for you."

Jo shook her head. "You saved our daughter. We saw your sign about a week after the prison and we held onto that hope until we reached DC, and then we lost that hope and accepted the both of you were dead."

"How come?" Shane asked.

"This asshole running a gang in DC said he saw a man matching your description at a fresh grave in Arlington Cemetery, small enough for a baby. He said the guy looked broken and was crying and then shot himself in the head," Daryl spoke up from the back of the group. "We found the grave, and we found a corpse that could've easily been you. Hard to tell, though, 'cause it'd been eaten pretty badly. Couldn't see a face anymore."

"So you just stopped looking?"

"We needed to find someplace safe to set up in. We'd been on the road a month by that point and been through way too much shit; we kept losing people. We needed a home," Rick added.

"And you found one?"

"We did."

"Where've you been?"

"Mount Vernon."

Shane looked at Rick. "Seriously? You sayin' we've been this close to one another all these months and we didn't know it?"

"Did you have any hope that _we_ were alive?" Jo asked.

"Honestly? No, I didn't," Shane admitted. "After we got here, I couldn't settle in. I kept going with Aiden and his crew on supply runs, trying to keep my eyes out for some sign y'all might've made your way to this area, but I ain't never seen anything. After two months, I had to put my focus here. This place needed proper guidance. They were too naïve about the world outside. Shit went down here and I had to keep Hope and Luke safe. They were my priority. Herds of walkers surrounded this place and even got in, and then those asshole Saviors. By the way, we're gonna need to talk about them. We know Aiden took a group to go help fight them. Some woman went off to fight Negan and the Saviors on her own and start a war. I wanted to go, too…"

"There's nothing to worry about anymore," Rick assured as they all began to continued forward up the road again.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm the woman who went after Negan alone," Jo offered up.

Shane threw her a surprised look and rubbed the back of his head. "Seriously? What happened?"

"We'll discuss that later. Hope first."

Shane nodded. "Right. Okay."

On the side of the road that the blue house on the corner was located, there were three houses total; the blue, a tan house and then a grey house. In front of thee tan house in the middle, Shane brought the group to a stop and then climbed up to the first step. From there he turned and faced them all, even Spencer and Tobin who had come with them. However, Shane was only looking between the couple and beckoned them forward.

"C'mon in," he said.

Turning back forward, Shane continued to ascend the front steps and then waited at the door as Rick and Jo looked at each other for a moment. Rick placed a hand on the small of Jo's back and gave her a reassuring nod before they both began the gingerly ascent of their own up the steps. At the door, they joined Shane, leaving the others to wait behind so that they could have this private time alone to reunite with their daughter.

Shane opened the door and stepped inside without any hesitation, whereas Rick and Jo did. They were so anxious and excited but also worried. It had been seven months since they saw Hope.

How would she even react to them? Would she remember them?

They entered into the living room first and were quite taken back by how normal everything looked. It was lived in and comfortable, and with all the modern appliances that clearly worked, because Alexandria had working electricity, it almost felt like the world before and that the apocalypse hadn't happened.

The one thing that stuck out the most to the couple was the toy box in the corner to their immediate right, overflowing the toddler-aged toys.

Hope's toys.

She wasn't the seven month old they'd been separated from anymore. She had surpassed her first birthday and was now fourteen months.

It was heartbreaking to come to terms with all the important milestones they'd missed; milestones they could easily assume she'd reached already, like talking and walking.

Shane looked from Rick and then to Jo, seeing in their faces how nervous and anxious they were, but also how happy they were also. "Don't be nervous. She don't bite," he tried to joke in order to bring some lightness to the situation. Turning toward the stairs, he gripped the base of the railing and peered in the direction of the second floor. "Hey, Andrea! Bring Hope down! We got some important guests!"

After a moment, a reply came in a rather hushed albeit audible voice. "I just put her down for a nap. She's been miserable because of those two teeth coming in."

And then, there was Andrea, standing at the top of the stairs, dressed comfortably in a pair of khaki chinos and a simple blue blouse with her blonde curls pulled back into a lazy ponytail. At first, she only realized Shane was there and that was obviously nothing new to her, but when she looked beyond Shane and noticed Rick and Jo standing on either side of him, her entire being lit up. Andrea's hands shot up to her face to muffle her squeal of excitement before she came hurrying down the staircase like she was on fire.

"Oh my god, oh my god!" Andrea exclaimed, heading to Jo first. Tears were already springing to her eyes and just as she was about to toss her arms around Jo she had to stop herself. Taking a necessary step back, she gave her long lost friend a thorough onceover and smiled so brightly. "Holy shit, you're pregnant! Oh my god!" Andrea pulled Jo in for a hug then, but was mindful of the large belly between them. "You're alive…oh thank god." When the older blonde pulled back, she braced her hands upon Jo's shoulders and then threw a smile over at Rick. "You're both alive and well…and here!"

"It took a while, but yeah…we are," Rick confirmed with a nod of his head.

"They want to see Hope," Shane remarked.

"Oh, of course. I just put her down for a nap, so she's probably not asleep yet. She fights off sleep for as long as she can. It's hard to get her down for naps lately."

Jo frowned and bit her lip. As Hope's mother, she wished this was something she would've already been privy to; her daughter's sleeping habits and quirks. But she had missed so much and it caused a new ache in her heart and fresh tears at her eyes.

"How has she been?" Jo managed to ask, wiping her tears away; determined to be strong.

"She's been amazing," Andrea replied. "When we were on the road with her, she was so well-behaved. When we found ourselves in tight situations, it was like she knew and kept quiet."

Shane nodded in agreement. "She's smart and she's tough. I mean, she's only a year old and we can already tell she's gonna be something amazing when she gets older."

"Thank you both. Thank you so fucking much for getting her out of the prison and keeping her safe all this time," Jo professed. "You have no idea how crazy it made us, worrying and fearing the worst, every day."

"We could imagine." Andrea gave Jo's arms a comforting rub and a flashed a sympathetic smile. "We talked about it a lot; hoping you made it out and would somehow find your way to us. We never stopped talking to Hope about you two either. We didn't want her to forget you, in case you didn't make it."

Rick sighed, bringing a hand to his mouth and then rubbing it over his bearded chin. "Thank you," he whispered; his voice cracking slightly.

"It was nothing, brother," Shane insisted, giving Rick a pat on the upper arm.

"No," Rick shook his head. "It was everything."

"Can we see her now?" Jo asked, not wanting to waste any more time.

Andrea smiled and nodded. Stepping aside, she gestured up the stairs. "At the top of the stairs, turn right. Her bedroom is at the end of the hall. There's a little plaque on the door that says 'Hope's Room'. Luke made it for her for Christmas."

Both Shane and Andrea made no move to head up the stairs; opting to stay down below so Rick and Jo could go upstairs alone and greet their daughter privately.

Turning to look at each other, Rick and Jo each exhaled a shaky breath. Taking Jo's hand in his, he let her lead the way up the stairs; the entire time she gripped the railing as if her life depended on it. At the top of the stairs, they came to a stop and then turned their heads to the right. Past a few doors that led to a couple of other bedrooms and likely a bathroom, there at the end of the hall was a simple white door. Upon the door was a small piece of scrap plywood that had been painted pink and had Hope's name written on it with purple crayon and little flowers drawn around the name, also in crayon.

Their hearts began to beat wildly in their chest as they began to approach the door. Before Jo reached for the knob and could bring herself to turn it, she cast Rick another look, as if asking him if any of this was real. She felt doubtful for a moment that it was. She felt that she would open the door and find the room empty and then wake up, only to find herself back in their bed at Mount Vernon.

Jo leaned her head close to the door and placed her hand atop the knob.

She just stood there and listened.

From inside there was slight rustling around, signifying Hope was indeed inside and probably fighting off sleep as Andrea had said.

When Rick placed his hand upon the small of Jo's back once more, she sighed with contentment at the gesture and the strength it gave her.

With renewed vigor, Jo turned the knob and pushed the door open.

 


	65. Together

_"Together we have travelled a long road to be where we are today."_ — Thabo Mbeki

* * *

 

As the door opened, there was a single stream of light coming from the window across the room and fell upon the hardwood floor. Dust particles danced and swirled like glitter that had been released from a party favor. It was almost poetic, especially since they were, in a sense, celebrating the fact that they were reuniting with their daughter. Aside from the light coming from the window, there was no other light source, casting the room in considerable darkness, which was necessary for helping Hope to sleep for her naptime. The room was decorated simply; there was a rocking chair in the corner that was situated between the wall where the window was and the wall where a closet door and a small dresser were.

The focal point, of course, was not on any of those things, but instead upon the crib.

There, rolling around upon her back, talking to herself in toddler gibberish, was Hope, who was suddenly peering through the slats in order to see who had come into the room.

Rick and Jo hovered in the doorway, almost afraid that if they took a step forward that everything would disappear like a mirage of a watering hole in a desert. They became entranced, staring back at her from the other side of the slats she was staring through them from. She was considerably changed, physically, from how they'd last seen her. She was bigger, obviously, but her hair was also longer and her face was less pudgy. Her eyes were still the same blue eyes they remembered and the inquisitive furrow of her brow was the same as well.

"Hope, honey…" Jo broached, taking a gingerly step forward to the crib while Rick remained where he was in the doorway. "It's me, honey. It's mommy and daddy." Jo stepped up to the end of the crib and gripped the top of the side panel as she stared down at her daughter. Hope's gaze followed her and Jo watched the way her little girl turned onto her side and then onto her stomach before pushing herself up to her knees. "Heya, Hope. Do you remember us?"

As Hope grabbed onto the slats, she began pulling herself up, which was amazing to witness considering the last time Rick or Jo had seen her she had barely begun to crawl. She stood up and turned to face both Rick and Jo while only holding onto the railing with one hand.

Rick stepped forward then. "Hi, beautiful. Do you remember mommy and me?"

Despite not being biologically Rick's, Hope tilted her head to the side just like him when she shifted her gaze from her mother to her father. Pushing her lips forward in somewhat of a pout, she brought her free hand up and pulled out the pacifier she'd been sucking on.

"No mama," she muttered when she glanced back at Jo.

Jo stood there, feeling as if she'd been slapped in the face. She had been silently praying her daughter would look at her with a big smile and outstretched arms. Instead, she was being scrutinized and deemed a stranger to her own child.

"Yes, mama," Jo insisted, patting herself on the chest. "I'm mommy." She then tapped Rick's shoulder. "This is daddy. Remember?"

Hope looked back and forth between the pair again.

And shook her head.

"No mama."

Pressing her lips together, Jo pushed back any tears and did her best not to be hurt. She tried to understand how her daughter perceived things. She'd been separated from them for literally half her very young life and in the last seven months, everything she knew had changed for her. She probably viewed Andrea as her mother now and Shane as her father.

"Pick her up," Rick urged quietly.

"What if she gets scared and starts to cry?" Jo asked, looking at him with her brow knitted together. "She doesn't remember us."

"She will in time. We'll help her remember."

Jo held his gaze for a few moments longer before returning it to Hope. With a deep sigh, Jo stepped around to the front of the crib. Reaching her hands forward, she hooked them underneath Hope's arms and lifted her up. As expected, Hope began to whine and wiggle, but Jo ignored it as she pulled her daughter into her arms and held her close.

Jo pressed her nose into Hope's hair and inhaled her scent. She closed her eyes and pressed her lips against Hope's forehead before Hope could pull back. Hope continued to wiggle, but she stopped whining.

"It's okay, honey. It's okay. Mama's got you," Jo cooed as fresh tears of joy stung her eyes. She pressed more kisses upon Hope's forehead and around her little face. "I've missed you so very much. I _love_ you so very much. God, I love you."

Rick moved closer, placing an arm around Jo's shoulders and a hand upon the back of Hope's head. Just touching their daughter brought a relieved chuckle to his lips while a sob got stuck in his throat. He was suddenly even more overwhelmed about having her alive and back in their lives than the moment they were told she wasn't dead and gone after all. He'd never have Carl back, but he had Hope back. It was like a miracle.

Fortune was definitely smiling upon them.

"Shh, shh," Jo hushed as Hope began to whine again. "It's okay. It's okay."

In a last ditch effort in that moment, Jo began to hum _Edelweiss_ , a song Jo occasionally sang to Hope to get her to sleep back at the prison, even though she had never exactly been a great singer. Hope never used to mind, though. It used to soothe her, regardless of her mother's lack of talent.

Rick took half a step back and looked upon both mother and daughter and watched the way Hope suddenly leaned back and craned her head to get a better look at her mother's face. Her brow knitted together with resumed curiosity and her little mouth began to hang open.

Hope stared up at Jo and the corners of her lips slowly turned upward into a smile, which caused Rick to smile, too.

"Keep humming," he pressed. "She's recognizing the tune."

And so Jo did.

Lifting a hand, Hope stuck two fingers into her mouth and began to suck on them. After a few more moments of staring at her mother, she turned her gaze briefly to her father and then leaned forward; resting the side of her face down against Jo's shoulder.

Jo was quickly besieged with pure happiness and reveled in this by snuggling Hope tighter against her. While she launched into humming the song all over again once it came to an end, she threw Rick a warm smile before closing her eyes to further enjoy the moment. Rick leaned forward, pressing a kiss to the side of Jo's head and then down upon Hope's head; tears rolling down his face from just how happy he was, too.

"We're together again," Rick whispered. "Our family is together again."

 

* * *

 

Rick and Jo descended the staircase, returning to the first level where they found Andrea and Shane waiting patiently in the living room. When the latter two heard the former coming down the stairs, they stood up and looked to see how things had gone. Rick and Jo had come downstairs, feeling as if they were gliding on air; they were just so happy. The bright, warm smiles said everything.

"She went down for her nap," Jo remarked, walking over to grab the back of the couch with one hand while holding her stomach with the other.

"How did it go with her?" Andrea asked, patting a spot on the couch for Jo to sit down beside her and take a load off.

"She didn't recognize us initially," Rick commented, watching as Jo sidled up beside Andrea and huffed contentedly when she sank down onto the couch cushion. "But then Jo hummed to her and Hope smiled. She remembered us then."

"I think what confused her at first might've been my stomach," Jo chuckled rubbing her stomach with both hands. "I wasn't big like this last time she saw us."

Shane grinned and leaned against the side of the fireplace, looking back at the ladies on the couch while Rick made his way around to take a seat upon the chair positioned kitty corner to the couch. Folding his arms across his chest, he looked from one face to the next and then cleared his throat. "So, you gotta tell us what happened to y'all. How did you get out of the prison and where did you end up afterward? How many others got out?"

"Well, we'll tell you our story if you tell us yours," Rick quipped.

Shane nodded. "You got yourself a deal."

Rick leaned forward, resting his hands upon his knees as he shot a glance at Jo. Looking down toward the floor, he recalled the day the prison fell. "Jo saved me that day. The Governor had me on the ground, beaten to a pulp, and was choking me. I was ready to give up and just let him kill me, and then suddenly I saw Jo's sword sticking through his chest and Jo was standing behind him. He fell over, bleeding out and Jo helped me up to my feet and I could barely walk."

"He'd been shot in the thigh, so it was a struggle for him. I wasn't thinking much on his injuries at the moment, though," Jo remarked.

"No, she wasn't," Rick confirmed with a small laugh.

Jo caught Rick's smile and shrugged. "I was focused on killing The Governor, and I did."

"Did you just leave him to bleed out?" Andrea inquired. "Or put him down so he wouldn't come back?"

"I cut off his head," Jo replied simply, looking at her hands. "I did to him what he did to Lori. I thought that was fair."

"I certainly would've done the same if I could've," Shane interjected. "I'm glad it was you, though. If anyone deserved to put an end to him, it was you."

Jo frowned and nodded. "After that I helped Rick and we made our way back up to the prison and we found Hope's car seat but it was covered in blood and that was the first pang of fear we felt that she was dead. But then we heard Maggie calling to us. One of the explosions from the tank threw her backward and she was impaled by rebar. She managed to tell us that a "she" had Hope and that _gave_ us hope to go on."

"What happened to Maggie?" Andrea asked.

"She died," Rick answered; not bothering to go into detail about how she was removed from the rebar, bled out and how they went about carrying her body and burying her away from the prison.

"She said she saw a woman with Hope?" Andrea frowned sadly, picking at her fingernails. "She must've meant me. She saw me and I never even saw her. I feel horrible that I overlooked her."

"Don't feel bad about that. There was nothing you could've done for her anyway," Rick insisted, reaching forward and giving Andrea a brief pat on her knee. "You had a more important task, and that was getting Hope out of that prison, safely."

"And Luke," Shane added. "We were lucky to get him out. The other kids…like Molly…"

He trailed off and all could understand where that thought process was supposed to end.

"Where _is_ Luke right now?" Jo wondered, looking between Shane and Andrea.

"School."

Jo raised an eyebrow. "School?"

Shane nodded. "Yeah, it's held in a garage. Younger kids go in the morning and the older kids go during the afternoon. So he should be home soon."

Rick looked at Jo and could already see the wheels in her head turning. Having been a teacher in the world and with her experience teaching children at Woodbury, the prison and just recently getting back into it at Mount Vernon for Sophia, Mika and Ryan; Rick could tell the idea of there being more of a proper school at this community where Hope was with Shane and Andrea was incredibly enticing.

"So, you got out of the prison…" Shane pressed onward, bringing them all back on subject.

Rick nodded. "We took refuge in a house later that night. Jo patched me up as best as she could and we tried sleeping, but it was a rough night, considering all that had happened. I was unconscious pretty much the entire next day and Jo went scavenging to get food and other supplies for us. It wasn't very easy those couple of days that followed, but we were lucky to at least still have each other."

"And then Daryl and Sophia found us. He got her out of the prison and kept her safe," Jo added, leaning back a bit more against the couch; getting comfortable. "We were hoping they might have Hope but, obviously, they didn't."

"We ran into some, uh, bad people once we got back on the road. We'd come across these signs along the train tracks, advertising this sanctuary at a place called Terminus. All tracks led there, and we thought maybe it's someplace y'all would've come across and headed toward also. But…" Rick sighed, hunching forward and rubbing a hand down his face. "That place wasn't a sanctuary at all. It was the exact opposite. The people running it, they were—"

"Cannibals," Jo finished for him.

"I was just gonna say monsters."

Jo shrugged. "No point in sugarcoating it."

Rick sighed again. "No, I suppose not."

"Holy shit," Andrea murmured. "Actual cannibals?"

Rick and Jo both nodded.

"We saw one of those signs, but we'd already found other people we ended up with that brought us this way and they didn't believe Terminus was any sort of sanctuary," Shane commented, glancing at Andrea. "I'm glad we listened to them.

After a brief lull among the four of them, Rick and Jo shared another look with each other; both of them saddened by what they both were thinking the same thing about.

Their next loss.

"We were reunited with several of our people that day, but we lost Carol while trying to escape," Jo spoke first. "Walkers were coming for Sophia so Carol distracted them and drew them toward her instead. They began to attack her."

"So, I shot Carol," Rick added; still pained by having done it, even though it had been necessary. "She asked me to, so she didn't have to suffer and wouldn't come back."

Shane nodded, completely understanding. "It had to be done. You did her a kindness."

"Exactly," Andrea agreed.

"We got away from Terminus," Rick continued. "Slept in the woods, and then in the upstairs of a consignment shop. Once we got back on the road, we found your first sign, spray-painted onto an old, faded billboard."

Shane chuckled. "That was the first one I left. And I think I know that consignment shop you mentioned. It was red, wasn't it? We stopped at a gas station near there, looking for some supplies, and I grabbed that spray paint. I planned on leaving some sort of message for you somewhere and when I saw that billboard, I couldn't pass up that opportunity."

"So what happened after you saw the sign?" Andrea asked, peering at Jo to her right.

"We decided that we'd need vehicles with plenty of fuel if we were gonna make it to DC, so we made our way to a car dealership a little ways outside Atlanta," Jo replied. "We cleared it of walkers first and then found enough vehicles for all of us, but given the hour we found a place to stay that night and got back on the road the next day. Except, the next day, we got detoured, so to speak."

"We were in a bit of a car accident," Rick clarified. "Jo got hurt; her shoulder got dislocated and a bump on the head. Sophia got whiplash. But they were okay. We were taken to this hotel that a bunch of survivors were living in."

"The guys that hit us were from that place," Jo added. "They had a doctor that took care of my shoulder. And my brother was there. With our mother."

"Your mother? The one that abandoned you both as kids?" Andrea wondered.

"The one and the same," Jo nodded with a rueful smile. "It was a very awkward family reunion but my mother and I managed to get past our issues and leave them there, in the past, and go forward. But we didn't get the time together we were hoping for." With a deep sigh, Jo bypassed the whole scuffle with Raffy. "The entire hotel got swarmed by this massive herd of walkers. Hundreds if not thousands of them. With so many of them, they began to push in and broke into the hotel's first floor. A lot of people died trying to flee. Then my mother decided the sacrifice herself to contain the walkers inside the hotel by blowing it up."

"No fucking shit," Shane muttered.

Jo nodded. "I barely made it out. I had to jump out of a second floor window and I sprained my ankle in the process, but I found cover in time inside a dumpster."

"And I thought she'd died," Rick admitted. "No one saw her get out, but that didn't stop me from trying to find her either way." He smiled over at Jo when he felt her looking up at him; recalling how terrified and distraught he'd been, but then how relieved he was when she was found alive and virtually well in that damn dumpster. "After we found her, I carried her to where the rest of us had taken safety at this church a few blocks away. We tended to wounds, gathered new supplies and found a school bus to transport all of us north, but the bus broke down not long after we got into South Carolina. Fortunately, we found more vehicles and continued to make our way; spending a few nights here or there in abandoned houses. Then a real bad rainstorm blew through and one of our vehicles got wrecked by a huge branch. We didn't have enough room in the others for everyone, so we started to walk until we could find more transportation."

"Did you?" Andrea pressed.

Rick looked at Jo again, and nodded. "Just after we got into Virginia. We came to this town and decided to stay for a few days in this newer-developed neighborhood. We needed some proper rest."

"It was really nice there until we my brother got knocked out by these psychos and then Tara and I got taken by them," Jo pointed out, trying to make light of a dark moment.

"Wait— _what_ happened?" Andrea placed a hand over Jo's and seemed incredibly concerned.

Jo licked her lips and shifted slightly on the couch. "We'd split up into a few small groups to scavenge the nearby houses. These guys calling themselves Wolves followed us. They bound and gagged our friend Tara and me and led us to this abandoned gas station," she explained. "I won't go into it, but things got…messy. All that matters is that those Wolves didn't make it out alive."

"The moral of the story is not to cross my wife," Rick quipped.

Andrea turned her attention from Jo to Rick, and then back to Jo; raising a curious eyebrow. "Wife?" She smiled. "I remember, months ago, Shane mentioned to me how Rick had proposed back at the prison, just before the attack."

Jo nodded, sharing a warm look with Rick that was paired with the warm memory they also shared. "We got married on the side of the road, the morning before we got to Terminus. It was only Daryl and Sophia there and our rings are from the house we'd stayed in after we got away from the prison."

"We renewed our vows in a nicer ceremony with the rest of our group eventually."

"I'd been the best man at your first wedding. I'd been looking forward to being it at your second," Shane remarked with a sad smile. "I'm just glad Jo made an honest man out of you."

The foursome laughed slightly, with smiles upon each of their faces.

"So," Andrea continued, "When did you make it to the DC area? And when did you find out you were pregnant?"

"Well, I took a pregnancy test in the woods on the side of the road in North Carolina," Jo replied, answering the second question first. "Once we were back on the road with vehicles, after that short stay in that underdeveloped cul-de-sac and the ordeal with those Wolves, we continued north again toward DC. We saw another message you left on a road sign, closer to the city."

"We holed up in a townhouse outside the city, in Arlington, and then split up into three groups; some of us looking for medical supplies, some for food and water, and the rest of us for signs of where you and Hope would be," Rick spoke, catching Shane's eye. "We got cut off by a herd outside Ford's Theatre and took refuge there for a night and while we tried escaping, lost a young girl that had been friends with Sophia. We'd lost our car, too, and then realized it had been stolen by these Mad Max types. We were making our way back to Arlington by foot when we found Daryl's group at the Lincoln Memorial. We wound up embroiled with those Mad Max types who were holding one of our own hostage, as a sort of insurance policy. We gave over our weapons, our supplies and our vehicles in exchange for our guy. He was Finn's best friend, one of us; we couldn't just leave him."

"Who's Finn?" Shane asked.

"My brother," Jo answered.

"Oh."

"Milo was Finn's friend, and Milo had killed one of the Marauders—the Mad Max types. But he'd done it because he thought he was protecting Tara. The Marauders didn't see it that way," Rick carried on. "After we gave over everything they wanted, they let us keep our weapons, and then take Milo with us, but as we walked away, they shot and killed Milo out of spite. They claimed that blood must have blood."

"Before that, though," Jo interjected, "Sarge, the leader, asked why we were in the city to begin with, and when we explained we were looking for our daughter and our friend—you and Hope—he insisted he saw a man matching your description."

Shane nodded. "Yeah, that's what Rick just said earlier. That asshole claimed I was the guy he saw shooting himself over some small grave. And you found that guy's body, and that small grave, and assumed that asshole really was telling the truth."

"We didn't have much else to go on," Jo shrugged. "We didn't want to believe it to be true, but we were so broken by that point. We were tired. Part of us never really gave up believing, but we had everyone else needing us to go on; depending on us."

"And staying in Arlington with those Marauders just across the river wasn't safe, so we packed up everything we could and piled into a few vehicles, including an RV we found and brought back to life by simply filling up the gas tank with fuel we siphoned," Rick recounted. "Once on the road, Finn's girlfriend Jen suggested Mount Vernon as a suitable place to make a home because it was built for this kind of world where we couldn't rely on modern luxuries anymore. And she was right. We did make it home, but not until after a few days of clearing it of the hundreds of walkers that swarmed the entire estate."

"Damn," Shane muttered; impressed.

"It wasn't quite a walk in a park, but the ease in which we managed to get it done was probably the first bit of relief we'd truly felt in a while. We put every walker down and then we moved up to the house while working on barricading all roads leading to the estate with cars, trucks, vans and buses; anything that would deter the living and the dead from coming our way. And it worked."

Jo nodded in agreement. "In the beginning there, we scavenged nearby cul-de-sacs as well as the countless vehicles abandoned at Mount Vernon, for food and other supplies. Including some of the fruits and vegetables till managing to grow in the gardens and the wild animals Daryl caught, we had enough to get us through winter."

"Is that where you renewed your vows?" Andrea wondered with a slightly teasing smirk. "Did you manage to squeak in a honeymoon?"

Rick and Jo looked at each other and grinned, recalling the wonderful ceremony that most of their friends had been in on and made special for them.

"Yeah. It was," Rick confirmed. "But, no—we didn't get a honeymoon."

"We had a proper wedding night, though," Jo reminded; watching the way Rick smiled at that specific memory. "Before Christmas, Rick discovered a small group of people that had been squatting at some nearby McMansion and invited them to live with the rest of us at Mount Vernon. They've been great people and quickly became part of the family; very willing to help out and contribute where they can, or learn how to, anyway. Christmas Day, Finn's girlfriend got really ill. She hadn't been well since the hotel explosion. She'd had her fingers bitten off by a walker and the only way to save her life was to cut off her hand. It just never properly healed and that night she finally succumbed to what our medic deemed to be tetanus. Then, after the New Year, one of our new group members—Mike—lost his oldest son and his wife less than a day apart from one another. It was a sad time and the cold and all that snow just made it dreary and sadder."

"As soon as things began to look up again, we had our first run-in with The Saviors." Pushing against his knees, Rick stood; causing both women on the couch to draw their gazes upward. Once he was sure at least Shane and Andrea were giving him their full attention, he held up his left hand and wiggled his fingers which revealed the fact of his little finger being nothing more than a little stump. "We crossed paths with them on a road near Mount Vernon while we were coming back from a quick supply trip. They took our guns and wanted to take everything in our truck. They would've killed us right then and there but they didn't know Daryl and Michonne were in the woods on either side of the road, and Daryl and Michonne opened fire on them when they realized what was gonna happen. Then all hell broke loose. The leader of the pack came at me, we fought, and my finger got shot off. I didn't even realize that had happened right away. I knew I was in pain."

"And we were just happy it was only his finger and nothing more serious."

"Well, I'd say getting a finger shot off is pretty serious."

Jo rolled her eyes and smirked. "Stop fishing for pity," she teased.

Shane laughed. "You two are definitely married. She's already busting your balls."

Jo smiled when she caught the way Rick sighed heavily. It had only been a little over two months since that event had happened and Rick had healed really well since. Enough time had passed where they could overlook how scary that moment in their lives had been that teasing could also be overlooked. Hell, even Rick had made light of it recently in the privacy of their bedroom at Mount Vernon while they were getting ready for bed. He'd wagged the stump in her face without the bandage on in an attempt to gross her out; never mind the fact that they lived in the kind of world where the dead walked and that Jo wouldn't be in the least bothered by his wound.

"Yeah, well, either way; we survived that run in and they didn't," Rick remarked, getting back on topic. "Then Jesus found us, we questioned him and a few days ago he brought us to the Hilltop and explained everything about how The Saviors ran things with the other communities."

Shane stood up straighter, leaning away from the fireplace, and placed his hands upon his hips. The expression on his face suggested he was either curious or confused about something. "Okay, so how exactly did Jo killing Negan come about?"

Andrea immediately sat a bit stiffer and threw looks back and forth between Rick and Jo. "Wait—what? Negan's dead?" Settling her gaze upon Jo, she gripped Jo's forearm quite firmly. "Did you seriously kill Negan?" Off Jo's simple nod, Andrea let out an astonished laugh. "Oh my god. This is—wait, what about the rest of the Saviors? Are they going to retaliate?" The older blonde was looking around at the other three before once more settling her gaze on Jo. "More importantly, how did you kill Negan?"

"I, uh…" Jo looked at Rick; wondering how she should explain it to their friends. Sugarcoat it or give them the gory details? "I went to the Sanctuary alone, pretended to be a widow, all alone in the world; a damsel in distress. I fed them a sob story and got a one on one meeting with Negan in his room. At the end of our conversation, I made myself cry, and we all know men hate seeing a woman cry."

Shane smirked. "She ain't wrong."

"No, I ain't," Jo agreed with a knowing smile. "Negan was no exception. Once the tears began to fall, he was already done for. I convinced him to hug me; giving him the excuse that it had been a long time since I had been near another living person, let alone hugged, and then I asked him if I could be so bold as to ask for a hug, as thanks for how kind he was and for everything he was offering me."

"What did he offer?" Andrea asked.

"To let me stay at the Sanctuary, to teach the children, and to live comfortably there compared to the majority of the people. But when he made the decision to hug me; that was him signing his own death certificate." Jo sighed, looking own at her hands. "I ripped the flesh from his neck with my own teeth and watched as he began to bleed out and choke to death on his blood. When he fell to the ground, dying, I struck him with his own barbed-wire baseball bat. Twice. And then I killed those most loyal to him."

Jo fell silent and waited for all of that to sink in before she bothered to tell them about how she set in motion the change the Sanctuary would be seeing through or until either Shane or Andrea spoke up an asked question. It was odd, because on one hand, she didn't regret the brutality of what she'd done, but she did feel a bit worried about how their friends would perceive it. Just like Rick had felt the night after he ripped out the throat of the head Claimer, Jo didn't want to be viewed as a monster.

"You only hit him with Lucille twice?" Andrea wondered as Jo looked up at her and nodded. "Damn, I would've beaten his head to a pulp like he did to Eric." She looked over at Shane; the two of them sharing that terrible memory they experienced just a few months before. "I've never seen someone be so brutal and then laugh about it while making jokes. If you're asking me, you let him off easy."

Jo smirked and shrugged. "Well, I didn't exactly end there."

"Oh?"

Rick placed his hands on his hips and nodded when he noticed Shane raising an eyebrow. "You know that saying, 'I'd lose my head if it wasn't attached'?" Of Shane's nod, he continued. "Well, it ain't attached anymore."

Shane brought a hand up to his mouth; running it down past his chin to reveal an amused grin. "So, uh…" He laughed. "Where's the rest of him?"

"I left his body behind at the Sanctuary for the people there to do whatever they wanted with; bury it, burn it, throw it to the walkers tied to their outer fences to chow down on," Jo replied; glad Shane and Andrea didn't give two shits about Negan's end or how he met it. "As for his head…we had a bonfire to celebrate last night, so use your imagination."

Stepping over to stand in front of Jo, Shane offered both his hands to her. For a moment, she hesitated; wondering why. When she placed her hands in his, he helped her up to her feet and then pulled her in for a hug.

"I'm so glad we found you with Sophia in that house last year," he voiced.

 

* * *

 

As the day progressed in Alexandria, several things happened.

Rick and Jo had met with Deanna Monroe and explained to her about their past with Shane and Andrea back in Georgia before the prison fell and the cliff notes version of the figurative road they took to get where they were now, all while she videotaped them; just as her son had said she would. The only thing was that Deanna had wanted to interview them individually, but Rick and Jo insisted they were a team and they could be interviewed as such.

Both of her sons had already explained the fate that Negan had met at Jo's hands and that the Saviors would no longer be oppressing Alexandria or any other community. Although, it wouldn't be exactly overnight considering the outposts that would have to be shown the light, so to speak. Rick and Jo gave her slightly more specific details about how it all went down at the Sanctuary without going into the gory details and worrying Deanna about wanting her community to be involved with Mount Vernon.

After Rick and Jo had finished with their tale for Shane and Andrea and before they shared it with the former congresswoman who originally hailed from Ohio, Rick and Jo were treated to Shane and Andrea's tale, which Daryl, Merle, Finn and Michonne had arrived to hear as well.

As it would happen, the same day the prison fell, Shane and Andrea escaped with Hope and Luke and made it out to a road after barely an hour of traipsing through some woods and dodging a few walkers. Once there, they waited barely two hours, hoping anyone from the prison would make it out and find them there. The only people that found them was an unknown trio in a military-style truck; a burly redheaded man with a handlebar mustache named Sergeant Abraham Ford, a petite but tough Latina named Rosita Espinosa and another man named Eugene Porter, the same Eugene with the mullet that had let Rick, Jo and the others into Alexandria. Seeing two people on the side of the road with children, the trio had willingly offered a place with them in their truck and join their "mission" which was going to DC because Eugene was supposedly a scientist who had worked on some sort of human genome project and basically had the cure to the disease that had ended the world.

Without food and without the means to properly care for the kids in their current situation, Shane and Andrea were conflicted about the decision they had to make but they had to make it regardless.

Swearing to find a way to alert Rick and Jo about where they were headed, if Rick and Jo somehow survived the prison falling, Shane agreed before Andrea did, but she was quick to see it was their best option. So, they climbed up into the back of the truck and made their way north. Just a short while after that, they passed over some train tracks and noticed one of the signs for Terminus, which was when Andrea pointed it out and suggested they go there and check it out in case any of their people might head toward it. Abraham had been the one who claimed that if something looked too good to be true, it probably was. That night, they'd taken shelter in an abandoned law office in a nearby town and then Shane and Abraham had scoured a few of the nearby businesses for food and other supplies.

The next day they were back on the road, which was when they'd passed through that same abandoned town with the red consignment shop where they stopped once again to check for diapers at the gas station there, and where Shane had found the can of black spray paint. Down the road a couple of miles is when they'd come upon the old, faded billboard where Shane left the first message for Rick and Jo.

The entire trip north had gone somewhat smoothly with barely any issues, except for the guilt Shane and Andrea felt for not waiting longer to see if anyone else escaped the prison or even going back. But there wasn't really much time for thinking about what they'd left behind when they had the kids to care for, and then there was the issue of finding out Eugene had lied about being a scientist and having a cure. Considering that had been the main thing that had been keeping Abraham going, it went without saying he had taken it badly and took his anger out on Eugene by punching him once in the face which was enough to knock Eugene unconscious for upwards of an hour. After that, they didn't know what to do; if they should keep going forward north, or double back toward the prison.

Andrea was the one that pointed out that they had already left messages for Rick about going to DC; more than the one on that billboard. If Rick and Jo made it out and seen at least one message, they would head north to DC, too. She also pointed out that if Eugene had the idea of going to DC, it was possible others from all over might've had the same idea. Perhaps there were actual scientists holed up in the capital and maybe there was some sort of veritable sanctuary set-up. After all, if any place would, it would be DC.

So, they continued north.

The specific route they had taken was not the same Rick and Jo's group had taken, but if you were to look at a map, eventually both paths would've crossed had they all been traveling the same direction at the same time.

Shane's group made it to Virginia within a week when the new vehicle they'd been traveling in had run out of gas. Having broken down in a rather rural area with no signs of other vehicles or shelter to take cover in for the night, they had no choice but continue on foot. By nightfall they found a solitary, abandoned car without fuel. With no other options for shelter, and with a light rainstorm rolling in, all of them piled into the car; Shane and Andrea in the backseat with the kids, while Rosita was sandwiched between Abraham and Eugene.

Once both the storm and morning had broken, the group resumed their trek on foot on the road for the better part of a day when they were suddenly approached by Aaron, who introduced himself with his hands raised while being greeted by Shane, Abraham and Rosita aiming their guns at him.

Long story short, they were invited to follow Aaron and his partner Eric back to Alexandria, where they each met with Deanna and were each interviewed on camera, the same as Rick and Jo were. Not long after settling into the new community, jobs were given out. Having been in law enforcement in the old world, Shane was made constable. Abraham joined the construction crew but soon proved he knew more of how to run a crew better than Tobin, who had been the then-current head of the crew. Eugene offered services with maintaining the solar panels. Andrea, once a civil rights lawyer, fit right in working alongside Deanna in an assistant capacity when she wasn't taking care of Judith and Luke. As for Rosita, she began train alongside the community's doctor, Pete Anderson, to learn proper first aid.

While Shane's group seemed to ease into life in Alexandria, there had been some issues; namely the discovery that Pete was physically abusing his wife, Jessie. After Andrea had accidentally witnessed Pete punch Jessie when she'd come by with Judith, Andrea had gone straight to Shane who gathered a few men to assist Pete away from his house to stay at the infirmary until proper punishment could be decided. With Andrea's help, Jessie was able to find her inner strength and kick Pete out for good. Pete didn't take to that too well, and tried retaliating physically against not only Jessie but also Andrea. Shane easily put a stop to that by beating Pete to a pulp and then locking him in the basement of one of the townhouses which was being used as a temporary cell.

Eventually, Pete died.

Jessie had been given a gun for protection by Andrea, unknown to Shane or Deanna, who governed Alexandria in different capacities. One day, when he'd determined everyone seemed to feel he wasn't much of a threat anymore, Pete had used that freedom he was given to walk around without anyone giving his motives a second thought. He went straight home to Jessie, who immediately told him to get out. Not budging, they argued and then a physical fight ensued. Jessie ran into the bedroom they had previously shared and Pete followed. After he struck her, she reached for the gun Andrea gave her and that she kept inside her dresser drawer. As Pete advanced on her, taunting her and claiming she could never pull the trigger, Jessie did just that.

The community was shocked by the suddenness of the death, but not too surprised that it happened.

The only other major events to happen in the community after that were the herd of walkers that brought a few of the walls down, which led to a handful of deaths, and then the arrival of Negan and his Saviors.

For months, it had been very abysmal for Alexandria and its residents. Supplies constantly ran low because of everything they'd been forced to give over to the Saviors.

Now, though, with the arrival of Rick, Jo and the others, along with the news of Negan's demise and the oppression Alexandria and the other communities had been subjected to, life would now change and go back to the easier times they had known before.

Once Rick and Jo had told their story, Shane and Andrea had told theirs, and then after Rick and Jo had met with Deanna, a town hall meeting was held in the church that had been added to the community when the expansion was being completed a few months back. Virtually every resident came out and was present for the meeting, where Deanna stood at the very front with her husband Reg and also with Shane. They began to explain everything that had been told to them about the end of Negan and the Saviors' reign over all the communities. Rick was then introduced; there to represent the Mount Vernon community and, so in a sense, to speak on behalf of the other communities about how they would all come together—every community—even the Sanctuary. First they would come together to dismantle the outposts.

When residents from Alexandria began asking questions about how he knew Negan was dead, or how they could be sure the Saviors were really finished, he introduced Jo but she let him explain her part in it all without going into the details would've made the lighthearted blanch; which looked to be the majority of the community. Aside from witnessing Aaron's former boyfriend being bludgeoned; Rick could safely assume that the people of the community had been living rather sheltered lives. Not that he was surprised, but it was a bit annoying at the amount of resistance he was met with when the floor was opened up to the residents to voice their opinions on the matter. The people seemed divided on the matter; half didn't believe the Saviors were done for good and would just simply live and let live just because Negan was dead, while the other half cheered and exclaimed how coming together was exactly what they all needed to do to move forward to change how things had been done.

Rick left it at that.

He wasn't Alexandria's leader.

It wasn't up to him to get them all in line like good little ducks. Hell, he didn't even need the pessimistic half to believe things were gonna change. Things were gonna change with or without them and they would see that change in good time.

As the meeting ended, most people — specifically the naysayers — left the church, but those that were more curious about hearing more about how the Saviors had been brought down and some that even wanted details as to how Negan had died had walked up to properly greet Rick, Jo and the others from Mount Vernon. Jo had since introduced her brother to Shane and Andrea and was looking forward to introducing him to Hope, who had still been down for her nap when everyone had begun to gather for the meeting.

While Rick stayed behind in the church with Deanna and Shane, Jo began to leave with Andrea and Finn flanking her. Just outside the doors, she spotted Francine who was talking to one of her fellow Alexandrians and Jo suddenly remembered something.

"Hey—Francine, right?"

Francine turned and nodded. "Yeah."

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah, shoot."

Jo placed her hands on her hips and squinted; blaming that on the sun. "Did you ever have an uncle named John who used to be in the military…that was an explosives expert?"

A fond smile appeared upon Francine's lips as she nodded again. "Yeah," she confirmed. "My Uncle John. He was my mom's younger brother. I haven't seen him in years, but I did hear from him as the world was starting to fall apart; before the cell towers went down, obviously. Why? Did you know him?"

"I met him," Jo replied. "Briefly, in Atlanta, last fall. He told me he had a niece named Francine who lived in the DC area and that if I made it here, and on the off chance I found his niece, to tell her he loved her. So, if you truly are one in the same, he wanted you to know that one of last things on his mind was how much he loved you."

Francine's smile became rueful.

Like most people, she had probably just assumed most of her family was gone and made her peace with it. Hearing proof of it was bittersweet though.

"You were there at the end—when it happened for him?"

Jo nodded; recalling that day when the horde had been led to the Commune by Lena, and when Jo, Harry and John confronted her, Lena fired her gun and fatally shot John. "I was."

Francine sighed. "It's weird. I kinda want to know how it happened, but then I _don't_ wanna know either."

Reaching out, Jo placed a hand on Francine's wrist and gave it a squeeze. "Sometimes it's better not knowing."

"Yeah, probably." Then after a moment, Francine asked, "Well, how about this: just tell me whether he came back or not."

Jo smiled reassuringly. "No, he didn't."

He did.

But this way Francine didn't have to picture her uncle as a walker; the walker who Jo's mother Harry hesitated to kill and bit her neck, which facilitated her own death. It was better to allow Francine believe that, yes, her uncle had died but that he simply died and was allowed to stay that way where he wouldn't come back as one of the monsters that have plagued the world or caused harm after death.

"I'm glad. He was a great guy," Francine remarked. "The only other thing I can hope is that it was quick for him."

"It was."

"Thank you. Thank you for getting his message to me."

"You're welcome," Jo replied.

After that, they parted ways and Jo continued onward with Andrea and Finn as they headed back toward Shane and Andrea's house. When they reached the main intersection in the community, they spotted the blonde woman Jo had learned was Jessie Anderson, heading into the blue house on the corner with her two sons, Ron and Sam, but not before greeting Jo, Andrea and Finn from her porch with a wave and a pleasant smile.

Immediately next door, to the left of Jessie's house, was Shane and Andrea's which Jo had come to learn was also occupied by Abraham and Rosita, who were a couple living out of the extra bedroom downstairs while Shane, Andrea and the kids occupied the three upper bedrooms.

That was the other thing Rick and Jo had learned.

Being forced into co-parenting two children that were not theirs and due to their mutual grief and stress, it came to be that Shane and Andrea had begun a relationship with each other over the winter after an evening of quietly enjoying a bottle of wine after the stresses of the day, after reflecting on the fact that it was the holiday season and that they were tired of being sad.

They had decided to give themselves more to live for and, as it would happen, it was also for each other.

Returning back to the house, Jo was greeted by Rosita, who had showed up to keep watch of Hope while she still napped and the others headed to the meeting. She smiled and then took her leave to head for her shift at the infirmary where she was continuing her medical training with the community's remaining doctor, Denise Cloyd.

Turning to her brother, Jo smiled. "Ready to meet your niece?"

"Considering I never thought I'd get to—hell yes," Finn replied with a chuckle.

Without further ado, Jo led the way upstairs while Andrea went into the kitchen to get dinner started.

 

* * *

 

Several hours later, Jo was sitting on the porch, nursing a cup of lemonade. The sky was already dark and so were the roads in Alexandria, but she could see lights on in plenty of the homes. The air was still warm from the day and it was so peaceful. Jo felt rather content where she was at the moment and didn't feel like getting up, and it had nothing to do with the fact that getting up out of the Adirondack chair she was sitting in would be a chore.

She had a lot on her mind at the moment and was thankful the only noise that was offending her ears was the muted din of chatter from inside the house.

When the front door clicked open, Jo looked to her right and found Rick stepped outside; holding a sleeping Hope against his chest. Slowly he crossed in front of Jo and then took a seat beside her in the other Adirondack chair, but careful as not to wake their daughter.

"This has been one hell of a day, huh?" he questioned in a low voice.

Jo was simply watching Rick and Hope; admiring how beautiful the scene beside her was and how full her heart felt. "Yeah," she muttered; setting her drink down on the small table between both chairs. "It's been a hell of a week."

Rick smirked. "You can say that again. I mean, if you would've told me this is the direction this week would've gone, I wouldn't have believed you."

Jo smiled and turned her head a bit more; resting it against the back of the chair while draping her hands upon her stomach. "This is what I longed for. This is what I wanted for so damn long. I find it hard to believe it's actually happened. We have Hope back. We have our friends back. We're in a great place again."

"I agree," Rick nodded. "With Negan gone and the Saviors out of business, so to speak, thanks to you, all of us — every community — is that much safer now. No one needs to live in fear as badly as before. And I say that because no matter what, in this world, I'm sure the next threat will be just around the corner eventually."

"There he is, my pessimist," Jo teased.

"Ha ha."

"I wasn't talking about safety when I said we're in a great place. I didn't mean it figuratively," she clarified. "I meant it literally." Lifting a hand, she gestured out toward the street in front of them and then pointed in the direction of the pond and row of townhouses. "I meant this place — Alexandria. This is the kind of place we've always been wanting. This place is amazing. I mean, yeah, it has some issues, but it's nothing we can't fix."

Rick stared back at Jo with his brow furrowed slightly. "What are you getting at?" he wondered; knowing her enough to know there was something specific on her mind.

"This is Hope's home. This is the place she's come to know and is comfortable in. This is where Shane and Andrea are. We came all the way from Georgia to DC specifically to find them and be together again with them." Jo sighed, turning away from Rick and looking forward at the garage of the house across the street. "Don't get me wrong: I love Mount Vernon. It's been a great home for us. We made it work for us, no doubt, but it didn't come easy. Living there will never be as easy as this place. I mean, for one, they have electricity, Rick. They have hot water running from their faucets and _air conditioning_. They have so many of the comforts from the old world that we've gone without for the last two years and dammit—I want that again. We _deserve_ that again."

"So what are you saying?" Rick reiterated.

"I'm saying that…that when you go back to Mount Vernon in the morning, I'm staying here. I'm saying that you need to gather Sophia and Mika and bring them back here, and anyone else that wants this kind of life again."

"What about Mount Vernon? It's our home," he expressed; his voice rising to just above a whisper. "You said it yourself that it didn't come easy and that it's been a great home for us."

"I know. It _has_ been. But Alexandria can be a _better_ home for us now."

"And where would we live? This house is cramped as it is. Do we ask Abraham and Rosita to find someplace else to go so we'll have a bedroom? And what about Sophia and Mika? Where will they sleep? The couch?"

Jo smirked knowingly; clearly more in the know about something than he was. Gesturing to her right, she pointed to the grey house next door. "That house is empty. There's a master bedroom downstairs with a master bathroom. Upstairs has three more bedrooms—four if you count this tiny thing that's probably more of an office or craft room. Plus there's two bathrooms upstairs, too. One is a small en-suite."

"I don't even know what that is."

"En-suite? It means it's connected to the bedroom, not the hallway. It's private for that bedroom only," she explained. "So, I guess, in a sense, there's two master suites. And I think we should live there. It would be our own house—as a _family_."

"What about everyone else back at Mount Vernon, though?"

"Anyone who wants to stay there can. Anyone who wants to come here; there's enough room. I already talked to Andrea about it. Finn wants to stay here, too, if we do. I figure he can take the upstairs with the small en-suite bathroom. We can take the main one downstairs. Sophia and Mika can still share and then Hope can take the other bedroom. That small, possible fourth upstairs bedroom can become the nursery for this little one," Jo remarked, rubbing her stomach to make her point clear.

"You sound like you've seen the place."

"I have," Jo admitted. "I went over earlier with Andrea, Finn and Hope. Hope was running around the kitchen and living room, chattering away, and that's when it felt real. That's when I realized it could—no— _should_ be our home. After they expanded the walls here, they gained two more houses, which sit empty. There are apartments in the townhouses; they aren't all single family homes. And some of the other houses are vacant because of the lives that were lost when the herd of walkers knocked the walls down and made their way into Alexandria. Some of the houses even have spare bedrooms not being used. Jessie Anderson, next door, for example. She has a third bedroom upstairs that no one uses. It would just be for someone to sleep. Perhaps Tara could live there. And, with us bringing Hope next door with us to the grey house, which would open up a bedroom here. Someone else could take Hope's current room. Maybe Nicole could take it, or a couple like Michonne and Morgan."

Rick smirked at that last bit. "I'm still amused by the fact that Morgan's finally getting some."

Jo chuckled. "The infirmary has an extra bedroom upstairs. I know the current doctor lives there, but maybe Nicole could share that space with her."

"No, she's shacking up with Lewis now. And Lewis would probably want his mother with him," he commented, thinking on it. "They'd want something together and probably with a decent kitchen, because Barb loves cooking. I got to see the Infirmary's kitchen and its primary function is to serve the infirmary, not cook meals."

With a smile, Jo reached for her glass of lemonade and took a sip before setting it back down. "See? You're coming around to the idea."

"Well, air conditioning and hot showers on the regular _are_ rather tempting."

"So? What d'ya say?" she asked, looking imploringly at him. "Can this be home?"

Rick brushed his lips softly against the top of Hope's blonde head; inhaling her sweet scent and finding such peace in it. To think he could have this all the time again, here, in Alexandria was beyond tempting. Turning to look back at Jo, he shrugged. "I think I'd have to see this master bathroom for myself."

Jo grinned back at him.

Reaching her hand across the small table, but careful as not to knock over her glass of lemonade, she waited for Rick to mimic her gesture. Once he took her hand in his, she squeezed.

"Home sweet home?"

"Home sweet home," he nodded.


	66. Future

_"Nobody gets to live life backward. Look ahead, that is where your future lies."_ — Ann Landers

* * *

  
Rain came late in the night, and it came in hard and strong, all while the house slept.  
  
Well, most of the house, anyway.  
  
Jo and Rick both were quite restless as it was and found themselves awake and staring up at the ceiling in Shane and Andrea’s room when the storm began rolling in. The thunder was rumbling low at the beginning and the flashes of lightning were fewer and farther in between, so Rick and Jo could tell the storm was still a few miles away and not about to hit them just yet. They just lay there, still staring up at the ceiling, but also occasionally at the window, while listening for signs of Hope stirring awake. Neither said that’s what they were both doing. It just went without saying because they used to do it back at the prison whenever a storm passed over at night. It was like clockwork; as soon as thunder rumbled loud enough and lightning flashed bright enough at the same moment, Hope would wake up with a fright and begin to wail.  
  
Back then, it was tiring and they wished she would just manage to go back to sleep without them having to get up. But there were too many other people in C Block trying to sleep on those nights and no doors to the cells that would muffle Hope’s wails. Now, however, Rick and Jo were secretly hoping their daughter would cry so they could comfort her. After all, they’d missed the last seven months of comforting her so there was a lot of time to make up for.  
  
“You know what’s strange about this?” Rick asked quietly.  
  
“About what?”  
  
He turned to her and smiled, while also somewhat wincing at the same time. “We’re lying in the same bed that Shane and Andrea fuck in.”  
  
When the words registered in Jo’s mind, she immediately let out a quick, hearty laugh but was just as quick to cover her mouth so the noise didn’t travel. Not that it really mattered with the increasing sound the thunder was creating as the storm got closer.  
  
Jo rolled onto her side and, sensing the gesture as it was happening, Rick turned fully and did the same so that they were both facing each other. With a slight crane of his neck, he leaned forward and gave her a kiss on her nose.  
  
“Do you think they’ve changed the sheets lately?” he asked, which caused Jo to laugh again.  
  
“Are you suggesting we have sex in the same bed they have sex in?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “We’ve had sex in more questionable places.”  
  
Jo made a face and pushed against Rick’s chest to keep him at bay when he tried to lean in again to kiss her. “When was the last time you bathed, mister?”  
  
Rick smirked and rolled his eyes. “Oh, come on. We’ve also had sex when we’ve both gone almost a week without bathing to some extent.”  
  
“And those were very dark times when having sex in those conditions were our only way of feeling anything other than sadness or despair.”  
  
“You’re blue-balling me here, babe.”  
  
“I am not,” she insisted, gently; placing a hand upon Rick’s arm. “Can we just focus on Hope and our transition into moving here to Alexandria? I promise to put out once we’ve moved in next door.”  
  
“Cross your heart?”  
  
“Hope to die, stick a needle in my eye,” Jo added with a smile.  
  
Rick sighed dramatically, rolling onto his back and folding his hands up under his head. “I guess I can hold out until then.”  
  
Jo chuckled. Rolling onto her back as well, she reached out with her hand closest to him and patted his stomach. “You don’t have a choice in the matter, my love.”  
  
A few minutes later is when the rain began hit the windowpanes quite hard and one loud crack of thunder seemed to shake the bones of the house. The storm had obviously rolled much closer to the community in a shorter expanse of time than either Rick or Jo could’ve expected; so much so that they actually jumped at the sound and the abrasive flash of light outside the windows.  
  
Then, as expected, the startled wailing began from the next room over.  
  
Rick and Jo turned to look at one another and smiled.  
  
With little to no hesitation, Rick threw back the duvet and climbed out of bed so quickly that he managed to walk around to Jo’s side to help her up before she had even managed to sit up. Once they were both upright and mobile, the pair of them slipped out of the bedroom and out into the hall. Knowing Luke was asleep in the other room on that floor and Andrea and Shane were making do on the couch and living room floor downstairs, Rick and Jo wanted to hush Hope rather quickly. Abraham and Rosita they weren’t too worried about, what with being downstairs and closed off in an actual bedroom; especially since Hope’s bedroom wasn’t situated above theirs. The sound wouldn’t travel the same for the other couple and wake them; or if it did, it would take longer to do if they were heavy sleepers.  
  
Turning the knob and pushing the door open, Rick and Jo slipped easily into Hope’s bedroom and shut the door quickly behind them. Inside they found Hope sitting upright in her crib with her hands on her knees, crying. The occasional flashes of lightning offered enough light to show she was slightly red in the face from just how hard she was crying.  
  
“It’s okay, Hope. Mommy and daddy are here,” Jo cooed, reaching forward into the crib.  
  
Without hesitating and without having any doubts about them, Hope held her arms up; wanting to be picked up, held and comforted from big, bad rainstorm.

 

* * *

  
While life in Mount Vernon, living in their bubble, had been quite idyllic in its own right, with the lack of threats from the outside world coming at them, in the end, Mount Vernon or any of the other communities had nothing on Alexandria. Even though it had experienced its fair share of horrors, the world within its walls and the people that lived in its homes and walked its roads seemed to carry on as if the world was still as it once was. Everything about the old world still existed, for the most party anyway. Obviously, there was no live television, radio, internet or phones, but there were DVDs of television shows, ham radio, video games and walkie-talkies. But it wasn’t just the modern day conveniences. It was the vibe and just how normal everyone seemed to act; not like they were people living in a walled community that was currently safe from the horrible dangers of the new world, but like there were no new world threats. How anyone could still live so ignorantly after experiencing firsthand how monstrous the world had become was truly something to behold.  
  
For the life of her, Jo couldn’t understand it, but she was enjoying while she was walking through the streets of Alexandria, pushing Hope in her stroller, with Andrea walking in step beside them. The sky was still overcast and rain seemed imminent again, but not for at least a few more hours, which is why Jo wanted to make the most of this time out and about, bonding with her daughter while properly getting to see the community she and Rick had made the choice to join. Andrea filled her in about any individuals they passed by on the street or saw sitting on their porches, including “all the juicy gossip” — Andrea’s exact words, said with a roll of her eyes.  
  
Apparently, the herd of walkers and then the Saviors aside, life was so dull in Alexandria that gossip was the main source of communal entertainment.  
  
Jo supposed she could understand that, not that it was something that she cared about involving herself with. She had other plans on how to spend her time here in Alexandria once they were finally settled in. For starters, Alexandria had a school but their only teacher was simply a woman who once ran a daycare out of her house prior to the apocalypse. Jo had her sights set on taking over that position. But then there was the whole thing of how she and Rick had kinda sorta led their people together in an unspoken partnership. While Rick may have taken the reins for the most part, it was no secret that he deferred to her on most matters. Whenever there was any sort of important decision that needed to be made, they talked it over together before taking said decision to the others. Living somewhere new where they would no longer be in charge was going to be strange, but somehow Jo felt like it would only be a matter of time before someone would come to them with their issues. Jo could safely assume it would likely be one of their own in the beginning.   
  
She wasn’t sure if she was sad or relieved to be taking a step back from that leadership role.  
  
For now, Jo was content to simply focus on Hope and their transition into life in Alexandria.  
  
After a quick cup of coffee and some toast for breakfast that morning, Rick had kissed Jo and Hope goodbye and gathered up most of the people they’d come to Alexandria with the day before in order to head back to Mount Vernon and talk to the rest of their people.  
  
Finn stayed behind; wanting to stay close to his sister and newfound niece. If everyone decided to make the journey to Alexandria that same day, there was nothing Finn had back at Mount Vernon of any material value. The only thing of any importance to him was buried in a shallow grave and that wasn’t anything he could bring with him to here to Alexandria. Really, the only thing he could think about that he might want or need would be his clothes, but even then he could always get new clothes. In fact, Alexandria had plenty of clothes available in the pantry that had originally been set aside for the Saviors for their next tribute, but now the Saviors had been demoted to average survivors, just like everyone else and there would be no more taking of supplies from other communities. Alexandria could keep what they found for themselves or trade it for anything else they might need from the other communities.  
  
It was a new day. The options were endless.  
  
While Finn stayed behind and was “shown around town” by Spencer, much like Andrea was doing for Jo, Shane had left with Rick and the others. Deanna hadn’t been privy to that, and had only found out about her constable’s temporary departure after he had already been gone about an hour. She went straight to find Andrea who had assured the former congresswoman that Shane was merely building bridges and that Alexandria could afford to let him leave their walls from time to time.  
  
It wasn’t until Deanna was out of earshot and headed home that Andrea revealed that the older female was more in the way of a figurehead in the community rather than its actual leader. Deanna was to Alexandria what Queen Elizabeth would have been to England before the world fell; her power and stature was symbolic. Everyone in the community knew it, even Deanna, but the façade continued for the simple sake of peace. Had Shane seized full power like he’d wanted to after realizing how the community lived like ostriches with their heads in the sand, their group would’ve been exiled from Alexandria since their group was way too small to fight back against the numbers in the already established community; regardless of how good or bad each resident was at defending themselves and fighting back. It was just easier to work with Deanna than against her. In the end, it was much more worth it to take the time to show her how the world truly worked and how to properly adapt Alexandria too it.  
  
Still though, no matter how far the community had come under Shane’s guidance as constable, there were still those who opted to continue living with their heads in the sand, even after everything they’d experienced or lost when the herd and then the Saviors came to town.  
  
This was the kind of gossip Jo was happy to hear.  
  
She wanted to know the ins and outs of what was to be her new community.  
  
She wanted to know what things she was going to help change.

 

* * *

  
A short time after the noon hour, the van driven by Rick approached the road leading to Mount Vernon. It took several minutes to move the other vehicles that were strategically placed as a barrier to deter outsiders from making their way to the estate. Once the van was through that initial barrier, they had to move the bus parked on the outside of the main gate as well as the RV parked on the inside. As soon as both vehicles had been moved and the van driven inside, both the bus and the RV were returned to their previous positions. All that was left to do next was make the long drive up the dirt road, up to the house, which took no time at all.  
  
Once the van had made its way to the top of the circle in front of the house, it came to a stop and the front door almost immediately opened. Shane, in the passenger seat, just remained there, looking around at what he could see. Morgan appeared at the front door first and wore a smile when he looked and saw who was beside Rick.  
  
“Well, this is not what I expected,” Morgan remarked, stepping down the front steps and approaching Shane’s side. With his hands on his hips, he looked through the front of the vehicle to Rick as the side door rolled opened. Glimpsing only Merle, Daryl, Michonne and Tara piling out, Morgan focused on the pair in the front who was moving to climb out of the van, too. “Where’s Jo and Finn? Nothing happened to them, did it?”  
  
Rick snickered. Once he had removed himself from the driver’s seat, he shook his head and looked across the hood at Morgan. “I think it’s safe to say that if anything bad had happened to Jo, I would be coming back here covered in blood and it wouldn’t be my own, and not necessarily hers either.”  
  
“Shane!” A squeal from just inside the front door drew their attentions over toward Sophia who ran down the front steps and over to his side of the van like a bat out of hell to greet him with a big hug. “Omigod! You’re alive!”  
  
Shane made an ‘oof’ noise upon the suddenness in which she threw her arms around his chest and embraced him; but easily reciprocated the gesture. “Hey squirt. Long time, no see, huh?” Placing a hand upon her head, he held her back at about a foot’s distance to get a better look at her and smirked. “Shit, you shot up, didn’t you? You’re gonna be taller than me in a couple more years, I bet.”  
  
After a brief smile, she shrugged. “Maybe.” Then, “So, if you’re alive, does that mean Hope—”  
  
Before Sophia could finish her question, Rick interrupted. “Let’s get inside and we can talk about everything there, ‘kay? A lot of important things needs to be discussed.”  
  
Understanding his word was law, no one else that had come to greet those that had returned said a thing. They simply nodded their heads and waited for the returned to gather whatever they’d brought home with them and then made their way to the front door. Shane walked slowest, taking in the sight of the interior of the entrance hall; specifically at the fold-out table along the wall full of ready-to-use weapons which were a few hand guns, two shotguns and then mostly different varieties of blades. Also, there were a couple boxes of ammo that accommodated the different gun types.  
  
Rounding said table, Rick pointed toward the door furthest from them on their left and looked upon his oldest friend. “If you need to use the bathroom, we have one there, but it’s nothing fancy like what you’re used to.” Rick raised an impish eyebrow and smirked. “It’s just a portable toilet with a bucket that gets dumped outside into a hole. But we do have a tub we found. Dug a hole into the flooring so the water drains out and down into the cellar when anyone uses the tub. For the most part, though, we all still just usually sponge-bathe during the week.” He stopped and pointed toward the green dining room across from where they stood. “Through there is a pantry where we store any non-perishable food items, and then our infirmary. It used to be Washington’s study. We have medication, cots for patient beds and even a working ultrasound machine that runs on a gas-powered generator. Upstairs are most everyone’s bedrooms. The sleeping arrangements seem to always be changing though.”  
  
“Where do you and Jo sleep?”  
  
“In George and Martha’s room. Though, we’ve been finally updating the bed situation with modern furniture instead of the 18th century reproductions. Sure as shit has made a big difference on my back, let me tell you.” Without saying anything else, Rick gestured for Shane to go ahead and walk through the blue parlor first as they continued straight through to the ballroom.  
  
“This place reminds me a bit of Hilltop. I’ve only been there once, when Aaron decided he couldn’t bring himself to live in Alexandria anymore after Eric died. I drove him. Figured it was the least I could do and I didn’t want him going alone,” Shane remarked as his eyes settled upon the fireplace and then upon the sight of Mika and Ryan sitting in the center of the room, building some sort of intricate out of Legos.   
  
“Shane!” Mika beamed; as excited as Sophia had been.  
  
Mika wasn’t the only one. Karen, who had been sitting down in a chair, closer to the bathroom because it made a shorter trip for her more frequent bathroom breaks, stood up and smiled with surprise. Of course, much like Jo, standing up wasn’t a quick or easy process with her ballooned stomach.  
  
“Whoa!” Shane exclaimed with a laugh as he acknowledged Mika but made a beeline for Karen. “You’re pregnant, too? What kind of water ya’ll been drinking?”  
  
Karen chuckled and greeted him with a hug; or, at least, as much of one that she could manage because her stomach interfered considerably. “How did this happen? You didn’t die in DC?” she questioned, shooting a confused look over at Rick.  
  
Rick sighed and, instead of answering Karen outright, turned and looked around at everyone that had followed him and Shane into the ballroom that hadn’t already been there already. “Well, to begin, for those who don’t know him, this is my friend Shane Walsh; the very same one you would’ve heard plenty about from several of us by now that had escaped out of the prison we’d all been living at in Georgia and made his way with here with Jo’s and my daughter Hope. Long story short, Hope is alive. And so is Andrea and Luke. The four of them teamed up with a few other survivors they met on the road and successfully made their way here.”  
  
“So, all that shit with Arlington Cemetery—what that guy Sarge said…” Tyreese stepped forward while offering Shane a small smile and nod of acknowledgment. He’d hug the guy later.   
  
Rick shrugged. “Sarge wasn’t wrong about the small grave and the man he’d seen. We witnessed it for ourselves. We saw the grave and we found that body of a man who’d been eaten beside it. It’s likely what Sarge claimed he saw really was the god’s honest truth. It just wasn’t Shane he saw and, obviously, it wasn’t Hope buried in that grave. Despite what we went through with Sarge and those Marauders, Sarge wasn’t bullshitting us. It was just coincidence; what he’d seen and what we were looking for.”  
  
“So, Hope is alive?” Sophia questioned, making sure the answer she’d been seeking outside was true.  
  
Rick nodded. “She’s walking, she’s talking and she’s more beautiful than we remembered.” He looked upon the faces of those that had known Hope back at the prison and had made the journey from there to where they were now. “We were right to come to DC. It took longer than we wanted it to, but the end to that journey is finally in sight, but it’s not quite over just yet.” Off a few curious faces, Rick cleared his throat of some phlegm. “A lot has changed since we left with Jesus for the Hilltop a few days ago. Everything we’ve all gotten used to—every community, not just us—is changed. And it’s all for the better. I’m sure Tyreese filled you all in on what happened with the Saviors, on what Jo facilitated for all of us like that beautiful badass my wife is. The risk she took paid off and because of it, Negan is dead and the threat that the Saviors once posed has been mostly neutralized.”  
  
“Mostly?” Mike asked; moving to stand behind his son with his arms folded across his chest.  
  
“The Saviors are based out of an old plant, but they have several outposts occupied by more Saviors. Only their headquarters, so to speak, is what’s been neutralized. But, taking those outposts won’t be too difficult because we’ll have the help of not only the other communities, but the Sanctuary, too.”  
  
“What’s the Sanctuary?” Morgan inquired.  
  
“The Saviors’ base. A group of Saviors from the Sanctuary will come together with those of us from each of the communities, and we’ll go from outpost to outpost and show them their way of doing things under Negan’s regime is over. The hope is to do it with little to no bloodshed. No one wants a war.”  
  
“Do you think it would really come to a war?” Nicole shifted around, a bit nervous, as Lewis came up beside her and placed an arm around her waist; solidifying that they were a couple, if it wasn’t already common knowledge among those residing at Mount Vernon.  
  
“We won’t let it,” Lewis assured gently; giving Rick a nod of his head to let him know that he would help out in any way he could for whatever lay ahead.  
  
Bowing his head, Rick began to play with his wedding ring. “There’s more that’s changing. Shane,” he spoke, casting an eye toward his long lost friend, “he’s been living at Alexandria almost this entire time, with Hope, and Andrea, and even one of the other kids from the prison, Luke. Alexandria has room there for all of us. It’s like a town. One of the homes has been converted into an infirmary, there’s a school in a garage, a pantry, and an armory we can restock with the weapons we got here. The houses are just like before; there’s electricity, hot showers, air conditioning. They’re self-sustaining, and before the Saviors made their lives a living hell, the people of Alexandria were able to live virtually normal lives. So, everyone here has a choice to make, one that Jo and I have already made.”  
  
“What’s that?” Barb inquired from where she had been sitting quietly, off to the side.  
  
Rick gave her his full attention but addressed everyone equally. “Do you stay here, or do you go to Alexandria? It’s not necessarily an easy decision. We fought for this place and made it work for us in this world. Every day we fight for this place. We fight to survive, to just get by. I mean, it hasn’t been too difficult but it hasn’t always been a walk in the park either.” With a sigh, Rick looked around at all the faces looking back at him; trying to figure out what decisions each would make. “Jo and I are making the move to Alexandria. Hope’s there and we want her and the new baby to grow up in a place as close to the old world as possible.” He then focused his gaze upon his surrogate daughters. “Sophia, Mika—you’ll each have your own rooms. We’ll have a home of our own.”  
  
“For curiosity’s sake, what if we don’t want to go to Alexandria?” Mike asked, resting his hand upon his son’s shoulder.  
  
“You can stay here and keep this place going, or I’m sure the other communities—the Hilltop or the Kingdom—will take you in, too. There are a lot of good people still out there, just trying to survive like the rest of us. Jo likes to tease me that I’m the pessimist in our relationship, and I’ve come to realize it’s time for me to take a page out of her book and look on the bright side; that this world doesn’t have to be horrible and not every stranger is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. All of these communities coming together now like they are—we get to remake the world; we get to change it for the better.”  
  
Tyreese looked at Karen, who nodded at him. “We’re gonna come to Alexandria,” he announced. “Our son is due any day and we want him to grow up in a place like that, too.” Turning to look at Nicole, he seemed a bit sheepish. “We can’t thank you enough for how well you’ve been taking care of Karen throughout her pregnancy, and we don’t mean no offense, but if they got an entire house dedicated to being an infirmary—”  
  
Nicole smirked and held up a hand. “It’s okay. I would want to go there, too, if I were you.”  
  
“The Hilltop has an OB-GYN,” Rick informed, glancing at Tyreese and Karen. “His name is Harlan Carson. We can stop there on our way to Alexandria if you want and see if he’ll come back with us until your son is born, and then to deliver him, and then see that mother and child are doing well.”  
  
“Doesn’t Alexandria have a doctor?” Morgan queried.  
  
“They had two once; your average general practitioner type and a psychiatrist who had originally went to med school to become a surgeon.”  
  
“The former got himself killed,” Shane remarked. “He was a literal wife beater who couldn’t take no for an answer and his wife eventually decided enough was enough; putting one in his chest and one in his head. He was a great doctor but a piece of shit human being. He thought being a doctor was what kept him from getting what was coming to him. But Denise, our other doctor, the psychiatrist one—she’s good, too, and a friend trained with both to learn extensive first aid and even some trauma surgery. We’re doing pretty damn okay in Alexandria where medical attention is concerned.”  
  
“It all comes down to where everyone would prefer to be now,” Rick continued. “There’s no rush, either. If you’re not ready to leave Mount Vernon, but decide in a few days or weeks or even months that you wanna join us there, a place will be made for you.”  
  
“I’m coming to Alexandria,” Tara stepped forward. “I was sold at hot showers and air conditioning.”  
  
A few smiles and a few chuckles were shared.  
  
“As tempting as hot showers and air conditioning can be, I think Ryan and I will stay here for a while,” Mike decided. “My wife and son are buried here and I’m not ready to leave them just yet. But in time, perhaps.”  
  
Rick and Mike shared a look and Rick nodded in understanding. If Hershel’s farm hadn’t become overrun with that herd of walkers, he wouldn’t have wanted to leave because that’s where Carl was buried. He’d never be able to visit his son’s grave and Lori never even got one. In a sense, he was a bit envious of Mike.  
  
“I’m comfortable right here,” Barb announced. “I don’t need hot showers or air conditioning. I can very easily live with what we have rigged up here. Plus, you can’t buy that view.” She pointed out the window that looked out across the East Lawn and to the Potomac beyond it.  
  
“If my mother’s staying, so am I,” Lewis spoke. He looked to Nicole. “Will you stay with me?”  
  
Nicole smiled. “Of course I will. This place still needs a medic.”  
  
Lewis then looked to his friend, José. “What about you?”  
  
José looked down and sighed slightly. “We’ve been through a lot of shit, and you’re my brother now, but I want to go to Alexandria. I could have a chance to maybe meet a girl and settle down there. I don’t have that option here. I want a future and in that future there’s kids.”  
  
There was a moment of sadness that seemed to pass over Lewis’ face, but a moment was all it was. Extending a hand, he placed it upon José’s shoulder and gave an understanding nod of his head. “It’s okay, I get it. You don’t need to explain yourself. After all, if this really is a time of peace all these apparent communities are heading into now, taking the time to visit each other whenever we want shouldn’t be too hard. Not living under the same roof anymore doesn’t mean we won’t see each other.”  
  
With a nod in return, José smiled. “True.” Casting an eye over to Rick, he began to shift his weight around with a bit of lightness to his posture. “Gotta say, I’m very eager to enjoy some of that air conditioning, maybe sit on a porch with a nice, cold glass of lemonade with  _actual_  ice that hasn’t come from a frozen river.”  
  
Rick chuckled. “As long as there’s electricity and water at Alexandria, there will be plenty of ice.”  
  
“When do we leave?” Tara asked.  
  
“I was hoping to get back tonight, so I can get back to Jo and Hope, and not have Jo worry, but I think staying one last night here for those of us moving wouldn’t be so terrible.”  
  
Barbara perked up. “I’ll get started on a cooking up a good sendoff dinner for everyone.” Without even waiting, the older woman had already turned on her heel and made a beeline for the front door to outside building that was the kitchen.  
  
Michonne smirked. “I’ll give her a hand,” she announced, watching the older woman disappear out of the ballroom. “It’ll be my last time cooking in that kitchen.”  
  
Watching as Michonne left the ballroom as well, he began looking around at everyone else. “I think in the meantime, those of us leaving should start packing up whatever we want to take with us.”   
  
He watched as the others began to slowly look around at each other as well, as if checking to see who was going to be the first one to break away from the conclave. Rick didn’t wait any longer and, in doing so, became the first to step away. As for Shane, who was, for the most part, at Mount Vernon as Rick’s guest, he chose to stick by his friend’s side. Both men made their way out of the ballroom through the blue parlor and into the entrance, with Rick leading the way through the dining room and to the small hallway on the other side; all the while, Shane kept looking around at their surroundings and taking in every detail.  
  
“What’s with the paper hearts on the wall?” Shane asked, gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb at the dining room.  
  
Rick paused and looked back toward what Shane was referring to; something he’d gotten so used to seeing over the last couple months that it didn’t even register to him anymore. It had become part of the scenery, so to speak. “Oh, that’s just some holiday decorations the kids put up at Valentine’s and we just haven’t bothered to take down.”  
  
“Ah.”  
  
Continuing forward, they stepped into Nicole’s infirmary, which Shane seemed quite impressed by. Rick pointed to the chair at the desk to the immediate right. “That’s where I sat when Nicole fixed this,” he remarked with a smirk while holding up his left hand. “I think a few drops of my blood and Finn’s blood might’ve stained the floor if you look close enough.”  
  
“I think not seeing blood stains here and there  _anywhere_  these days would be stranger.”  
  
Rick snickered. “Yeah, it would be.”  
  
Without another word, he led them both out of the infirmary and to the back hall and up the back stairs. At the top, he gestured down the narrow hall to their right at the bedroom with its door wide open. “Nicole sleeps there since it’s closer to the infirmary. Lewis also sleeps there too since they got together.”  
  
“Where’s those stairs go to?” Shane inquired, nodding at the small staircase leading up to the third floor.  
  
“Three other bedrooms, extra storage, and access to the cupola,” Rick replied. “But that door at the top of those stairs specifically? Just an extra room we use as some of that extra storage. And here,” he pointed at the closed door in front of them, “is where the magic sometimes happens.”  
  
Both men looked at each other and chuckled as Rick turned the knob and pushed the door open to reveal Rick and Jo’s bedroom, which had changed in appearance significantly since doing away with the 18th century reproduction furniture and swapped it out for a modern bed, mattress and two accent chairs. The latter had been a lovely find at a nearby home because Rick had remembered, from that brief visit he’d made with Jo to her old house in Decatur, that she had a near identical accent chair in her living room. And here he’d found two and he couldn’t pass up that opportunity.  
  
“We used to sleep in beds made to look like they came from the time of George Washington—all of us. I doubt any of that furniture was authentic. Most everything we moved either upstairs to the third floor or the buildings we haven’t been using. I mean, it’s not like any of it wasn’t big enough or comfortable enough. We made do, but after a while the lure of memory foam mattresses became all too real when we remembered all the furniture in neighboring homes that were just ready for the taking.”  
  
“Tell me about it,” Shane quipped. “Sleeping in that bed in Andrea's and my room for the first time after those mattresses at the prison and whatever we made do with on the road in between or, hell, since the very beginning of this damned apocalypse—it was a dream. I ain’t ready to give up that comfort anytime soon. The mattresses we got now are virtually new, too. After the Saviors came to town, they took most of everyone’s mattresses during that first supply pickup. A few days later we found all those mattresses on the side of the road, not far from Alexandria, completely burnt to shit…just because they could.” Slapping Rick on the back, he turned his frown upside down. “But we ain’t gotta worry about that kinda shit anymore, do we?”  
  
“Well, I hope not.” Rick walked across the room toward one of the two closets; not the one currently occupied by the crib that had been meant for the baby on the way but the closet they still used for sponge bathing and storing their clothing. On the floor, below the shelves on the outer wall, were a few empty backpacks and duffel bags, and he grabbed one up. “Wanna give me a hand?”  
  
“What do you want me to do?”  
  
“The clothes on the shelf to the right are Jo’s. Put ‘em in one of those bags. Then I need to take apart the crib.”  
  
“Why? We got a crib.”  
  
“Not for the new baby,” Rick retorted, crouching down to open a duffel bag.  
  
Shane rubbed his head and sighed. “Hope slept in a box with a blanket on the bottom at first if I remember correctly, and then a pack-n-play for the first half of her life. Hell, she pretty much only slept in someone’s arms while we were on the road.” Off Rick’s withering look, Shane let out a small huff of breath. “All I’m sayin’ is the new baby won’t need much. The first few months she won’t be big enough that she’ll need a big ol’ crib to herself and by the time she does Hope will be able to head into a little toddler bed.”  
  
Rick reached up to grab onto the lowest shelf to help him stand back up, no thanks to his achy knees which were getting achier and achier the older he got and he hated it. The fact that his beard was very nearly almost white was an issue that bothered him that he only ever mentioned it to Jo about and she only responded by running her hands along his scruff, kissing him and insisting it made him look weathered and sexy. While he enjoyed her response, he had been looking for pity and didn’t receive it.  
  
“This crib can be turned into a toddler bed,” Rick commented, gesturing in the direction of the closet next door. “The crib Hope’s in right now can’t be. I know because Carl slept in one similar once upon a time. Hope can use this bed and the new baby can use the one Hope is in now. If I’d had a proper crib for Hope to sleep in back at the prison, you damn well better believe I would’ve had one for her instead of that box or that pack-n-play. We were limited then. I don’t want to do that again.”  
  
Shane smirked. “Alright, you’re the dad. You make the rules.”  
  
“Damn straight.” Tossing a few of his shirts into his duffel bag, Rick lowered his head and paused what he was doing for a moment. “Thank you again, for keeping Hope safe all these months and providing her with stability; for you and Andrea being her mom and dad when Jo and I couldn’t.” He looked up slightly but not at his friend. “So many days and weeks—months—ping ponging back and forth between worry and grief and regret and so many other terrible thoughts. Never mind that we came to believe Hope was really dead, but just fretting over how it must’ve happened and how much pain did she feel? Did she suffer long or was it quick? Ya know?”  
  
Reaching up, Shane placed a hand on the back of Rick’s neck and gave a gentle squeeze. “You don’t gotta have those thoughts anymore, brother. She’s alive and well, and because your  _wif_ e—that’s still weird to refer to Jo like that—is a badass who isn’t to be fucking fucked with when she sets her mind to something, Negan’s deader than a doornail and the times they are a-changing.”  
  
“That’s for sure.”  
  
“So let’s pack up your fuckin’ panties and that damn Transformer of a crib, have ourselves a meal cooked by that Kathy Bates lookalike and get a good night’s rest so we can head out at first light and go home.”  
  
“I like the sound of that,” Rick grinned. “Going home.”  
  
“Well, that’s what it is, ain’t it?” Shane chuckled and gave his friend a pat on the back before moving along to grab Jo’s clothes off the shelves. “Home is where the Hope is.”

 

* * *

  
The next morning, right as the sun was rising, the van was being loaded up as well as an extra truck full of belongings. Around back, on the East Lawn, Rick sat on the piazza, staring out at the Potomac, smoking his very last cigarette ever. It was a vice he had only touched a handful of times since arriving to Mount Vernon all those months ago and only during their most trying of times and Daryl had never made any comment one way or the other when Rick asked to bum a cigarette off of him. Now Rick was merely taking one last drag to denote the end of another chapter in his life in this apocalypse, since he didn’t think drinking a glass of wine from one of the bottles in the pantry, at half past six in the morning, seemed exactly appropriate. Especially since he needed a level head to drive back to Alexandria in the truck while Tyrese followed in the van with the others.  
  
“Almost ready to head out?”  
  
Rick hadn’t even heard the either of the back doors leading out onto the piazza open or anyone approach as he sat there, so turning and seeing Mike standing there startled him slightly, and that wasn’t an easy task to do. Rick was always so alert to his surroundings.  
  
Pulling the cigarette quickly from his lips and failing to hide it at his side, he released a haggard puff of smoke into the air and let out a slight cough. “Yeah,” he mumbled lamely; avoiding eye contact as if a student caught behind the school by his teacher.  
  
Mike chuckled. “I used to smoke before I got married,” he admitted. “My dad was a smoker, and so was his dad before him. I started when I was fourteen, but didn’t do it openly until after I’d gone off to college. Used to go through a couple of packs a week. Then my grandpa died of lung cancer, and then I met Alyssa after grad school. We dated a couple of years before I asked her to marry me and she said she would if I quit smoking. I agreed. I gave it up, but used the patch like it was going out of style. Right after we got married, my dad got sick. Lung cancer, like my grandpa. The stress of watching him go through chemo and it not doing anything but make him sicker than he already was—you’d think that would be the wake-up call for anyone who smoked to quit, but not me.” Mike shook his head, leaning against one of the piazza’s columns, with his hands in the pockets of his pajama pants as he stared out at the Potomac alongside Rick. “I watched my father wither away from a lifetime of smoking and I ended up going back to it to relieve that stress. I was sneaky with it though. I never smoked in the house or in my car. I kept gum or mints on me at all times, mouthwash in my car and at my office. I got creative with covering up the smell. Sometimes I used a little extra cologne to mask the smell. My dad died around that time and, I dunno, I guess my grief made me slip up. A few weeks later was Alyssa’s birthday and I’d had a cigarette outside the mall before going inside to pick up an extra something for her. Before I left I realized I smelled like cigarettes, so I grabbed what I thought was cologne from a counter and spritzed myself with the sample bottle and then left the store. I got in my car and drove home and greeted Alyssa with a big hug and she got so angry with me. She said she was tired of me sneaking around and her smelling woman’s perfume on me was the final straw.”  
  
Rick raised an eyebrow and looked Mike with a smirk. “She thought you were cheating?”  
  
“Yeah,” Mike nodded. “She was crying and throwing dishes. It was one of those cliché fights all couples have at least once eventually. When I finally calmed her down and explained I wasn’t cheating on her, that I’d just been hiding that I’d been smoking, she didn’t seem much happier. In fact she said it was still cheating, because I was cheating her and our unborn child out of years they could have with me. That’s how I found out I was gonna be a dad for the first time, with Taylor.” Mike sighed, continuing to stare out at the same river where he’d lost that same son a few months prior. “I quit cold turkey that night and never picked up a cigarette ever again. I never wanted my child, my  _son_  to watch me wither and die from a horrible disease I brought on myself. I didn’t want to ever put  _any_  of my children or Alyssa through that. And yet, except for Ryan, I’ve lost all of them. I’m the one who had to watch them die deaths worse than cancer, or not ever see them again in Taylor’s case. Nowadays, smoking and getting lung cancer doesn’t seem so bad anymore.”  
  
“I smoked before my son Carl was born and gave it up then, too,” Rick commented. “The first cigarette I ever had in about thirteen years was the morning we found this place, just before we got here. It was quiet out, the air was crisp and Daryl and I were trying to figure out if it was September or October. I smoked it then because we’d just found out Hope and Shane were apparently dead and we were stressed. The handful I’ve had since then were after particularly stressful times here.”  
  
“Finding my family and bringing us here wasn’t one of those times, I hope.”  
  
“No, it wasn’t. After we lost your wife and son, though, was. Also, after losing my finger, but I say I definitely earned that one.”  
  
“Does Jo know of your rare habit?”  
  
Rick shook his head. “No. She doesn’t even know I ever used to smoke before I had Carl. This was my last one ever again. A farewell of sorts I guess…to a few things.”  
  
Mike turned and faced Rick. “You gonna finish that cigarette or let it continue to burn down to your fingers?”  
  
Rick cast a look down at his left hand and lifted the cigarette up. There were a couple of puffs left he could get off of it if he wanted to but it was no longer appealing to him anymore. Looking over at Mike, he held the cigarette out to him. “I think you’ve earned the last couple of drags.”  
  
After a brief moment of consideration, Mike reached over and took what was left from Rick and brought it to his own lips. He inhaled slowly and deeply; savoring that long forgotten flavor of nicotine he hadn’t indulged in in very nearly twenty years. And, just like riding a bicycle, Mike blew a couple of smoke rings from his lips and smirked at the simple fact that he still knew how to do it. As he took that very final drag, Rick stood up beside him.  
  
“You sure y’all are gonna be just fine here with so many of us leaving for Alexandria?” Rick queried.  
  
Snuffing the cigarette out upon the column, Mike tossed the butt into the bowl beside the back door that Daryl and Merle used for their cigarettes and chew. “Yeah. We’ll be fine. All of you showed us how to survive better than we had been before you found us. Now I know how to work the land. Lewis and I will maintain the gardens, and I’m gonna have Ryan help us. Nicole’s gonna teach him advanced first aid, too. I want him to grow up and no how to survive in this world better than I do. Being so young, he’s got it easier.” Mike shrugged and chuckled. “It’s harder to teach an old dog new tricks, y’know?”  
  
Rick smiled and nodded. “I didn’t learn it all overnight either. I had a good teacher back in Georgia,” he remarked, thinking about Hershel. “Maybe you’ll get new people here. Maybe folks from Hilltop, Alexandria or the Kingdom will want a different change of pace, some different scenery.”  
  
Mike shrugged. “I don’t think I want to be here forever,” he admitted. “I think once the fall arrives, after we bring in that harvest, I want to come to Alexandria with Ryan.”  
  
Rick eyed Mike. “Really?”  
  
“Jo’s a teacher. She’ll teach the kids in Alexandria the same as she was getting into doing here recently. You said Alexandria has a schoolroom. I think it would be good for Ryan to be reintroduced into that kind of normalcy again in the fall. Plus, if there’s electricity and air conditioning, that means central heating for the winter months and that sounds a hell of a lot nicer than having to chop wood and build fires and maintaining all these fireplaces.”  
  
“Well, when that day comes for you, like I said yesterday to everyone, there will be a place waiting for you and your son.” Rick placed his hands on his hips and faced his body more directly toward Mike. “And you don’t have to come to Alexandria only when you’re ready to live there on a permanent basis. You can come to visit, too. I’m sure Mika and Ryan will miss hanging out with each other.”  
  
A thought glazed over Mike’s mind and he snickered.  
  
“What?” Rick wondered.  
  
“I was just thinking that if Ryan and Mika keep hanging out together so much in the years to come, you and I might end up finding ourselves sharing a mutual grandchild someday.”  
  
“Hey, let’s not jump that gun right now.” Rick laughed and slapped Mike playfully against the chest. “I’ve gotta focus on becoming a dad again, not when and  _if_  I live to see myself becoming a grandad.”

 

* * *

  
Jo sat in the gazebo beside the pond with Andrea at her side and Hope on her lap. Having her fellow blonde there seemed to make it easier on not just Hope, to help her transition into getting used to her actual mother again, but also seemed to put the residents of Alexandria at ease. Even though they all understood that Jo was actually Hope’s mother and were always aware that Andrea and Shane were not Hope’s biological parents, they all had only ever seen Andrea in that position as mother and Shane as Hope’s father. And, it was also good for Jo as well, to help her get used to being a mother to Hope again.  
  
The night before, while Rick and Shane were clearly staying the night at Mount Vernon (or at least that’s what Jo hoped was the case and not something direly worse like rogue Saviors that hadn’t gotten the memo yet), Jo and Andrea had devised a plan to transition Hope into living with Jo and Rick full time by having her spending every other night at Shane and Andrea’s house for the first week and then every third night; slowly weening Hope off her parental dependency on Shane and Andrea. But Jo also knew it would be helpful for Shane and Andrea, too; who had grown used to having Hope always with them, and loving her and raising her as their own. Not having her with them as she had been would be strange and perhaps even sad to get used to, but it was a good thing they would all be living next door to each other and would always be available to babysit if needed.  
  
“…I agree, I think it’s best if you wait a few months until after you have the new baby before you delve into contributing to this community as a teacher,” Andrea was saying; continuing with the conversation that were in the middle of having. “Once September rolls around, I think you’ll be good to go and even the tightwad gossipers will have gotten used to having you around. Everyone will be so used to each other by then it’ll drive you nuts.”  
  
“Like how that Mrs. Neudermeyer will apparently talk my ear off about wanting a pasta maker.”  
  
“Shelly—yes. It’s all she ever fucking talks about. Now that we don’t have to worry about giving over half of our supplies every week to the Saviors, maybe our run groups can take the time to focus on finding one of those damned machines so we can finally shut Shelly’s mouth up about it.”  
  
Jo chuckled, turning her gaze back upon Hope, who was getting antsy and wanted to stand on the wooden bench seat between her mother and godmother while jabbering at the butterfly fluttering around the water’s edge.  
  
As the conversation died off and both women found simple enjoyment in watching Hope find her own amusement, the low rumble of engines became slowly more noticeable in the distance. As the sound got nearer to the main gate, Jo instinctively picked Hope up, much to the girl’s displeasure, and rested her upon her hip, which was much easier due to her stomach which just got in the way. A toddler and an eight-month pregnant stomach just didn’t mix very well.  
  
Along with Andrea, Jo with Hope walked away from the gazebo and out onto to the road, looking directly down at the main gate.  
  
“Open up the gates!” a male voice shouted.  
  
In a flurry of motion, the gates were rolled open and a truck Jo recognized from Mount Vernon pulled into the community and was quickly followed by their passenger van, as well as two cars Jo didn’t recognize. Before the gates were even rolled safely shut there was a noticeable commotion coming from the caravan of vehicles. The van and one of the cars kept on driving around to head up the road between the back of the townhouses and the side of the infirmary where both vehicles soon came to a stop. The truck and second car pulled over just inside the gate, with Rick and Shane both hopping out of the truck from the front seats while Michonne and Morgan climbed out of the backseats of the extended cab. From the second car, out climbed Jesus and Aaron and two others Jo didn’t recognize.   
  
On further instinct, Jo walked toward Rick; calling out to him.  
  
When he heard Jo’s voice, Rick followed the direction it was coming from and met her halfway, with the others in tow while it seemed half of Alexandria was already piling out of their homes to see what the commotion was all about this time.  
  
“Rick—what happened?” Jo asked, visibly panicked by the sight of blood all over his shirt, his arms and hands, and face.  
  
Rick seemed rather calm, despite the sudden onslaught of harried voices and his bloodied appearance. “We were attacked by members of a Saviors outpost a little while ago.”  
  
“What?” Jo and Andrea both blurted out; already on edge.  
  
“We went to Hilltop straight from Mount Vernon and asked Harlan to come back here with us for a while, for Karen mainly since she was due any day now.”  
  
“ _Was_  due?” Jo questioned; her breathing quickening. “Oh god is she de—”  
  
“—in labor? Yes,” Rick cut her off, looking off toward the infirmary. “All that action and stress kicked everything into gear for her. Water broke and everything.”  
  
“Okay, so what about this attack?” Andrea demanded.  
  
“Saviors, who didn’t get the memo yet,” Jesus offered up grimly. “When Rick got out to reason with them and to explain things were different now, and for them to check in with their uppers at the Sanctuary, they pulled the same routine of demanding half our shit and claiming it belonged to Negan.”  
  
“Yeah, they didn’t seem to appreciate being told he was dead,” Shane remarked. “When we wouldn’t give up anything and insisted we didn’t want to fight, one asshole with an itchy trigger finger shot at Jesus and Aaron’s car.”  
  
“They killed Crystal. Clean shot to the head,” Aaron muttered, staring down at his hands, which were dry now, but it was obvious they had been stained recently with blood. The splatter on both his shirt and neck as well as on part of Jesus’ shirt and part of his face was an unmistakable sign that something had gone down. “I don’t even know who shot back first.”  
  
“Rick, I think,” Jesus offered up.  
  
Shane shook his head. “Nah, that was me,” he spoke, unapologetically. “When someone shoots at my people, I shoot back. It’s what I do.”  
  
“When they shot at the van, with Karen and the girls inside, that’s when I saw red and fired back,” Rick muttered; suddenly seeming a bit dazed. “I heard the screams come from inside the van. I could tell someone had been shot, but I couldn’t see who it was and I just assumed the worse. The only thing I could see was my need to kill those men with my bare hands.”  
  
Jo didn’t press it at the moment, about what he had to do, and she didn’t care. What she cared about knowing was who ended up getting shot. “Who was it? In the van…” Her heart began to speed up with the worst case scenario.  
  
Rick looked up at his wife and sighed. “José,” he answered. “He wanted to live here. He wanted a chance at a new future where he could meet a girl, get married and have a few kids.” Tears were starting to sting his eyes as he lifted one of his hands and gestured to his neck. “Bullet tore right through his throat. He choked to death on his own blood. Merle put him down before he could come back.”  
  
Jo placed a hand to her mouth. “Oh no.”  
  
“I’m gonna have to go back to Mount Vernon and let Lewis know what happened. And Barb. They were the closest thing José had to family in this world anymore. Lewis and José called each other brothers.”  
  
Looking away from Rick to Andrea, Jo silently handed her daughter off to her friend. Then, stepping closer to her husband, Jo raised her hands to Rick’s face. “Wait a day. Okay? Let’s get through the rest of this day and tonight. Let’s get you cleaned up so you don’t scare any kids because you look a sight,” she remarked, trying to lighten up the mood. “Head to our house, take a shower. I’ll have clean clothes waiting for you. Then I’ll get you something to eat and you and I will sit down together to discuss what comes next.” When Rick seemed hesitant, Jo gripped his chin firmly with her hand and forced him to look her in the eye. “Okay?”  
  
After a moment, he nodded and dipped his head. “Yeah. Okay.”  
  
Leaning in, she whispered, “It’s not on you to do everything.”  
  
A tear fell from Rick’s eye and he nodded again in response.

“Shane—will you take Rick to the house for me?” Jo asked, eyeing her husband’s oldest friend and Hope’s godfather.

“Sure thing.”  
  
“Shit,” Andrea muttered, shifting her gaze from the direction of the townhouses back to their immediate group on the road. “Here comes the Monroes.”  
  
Sure as shit, Deanna Monroe, followed by her husband and both sons were headed down the road from their home toward the gathered group while the rest of Alexandria looked on curiously from the safety of their porches or from behind their windows.  
  
“She’s gonna need to know what’s up.”  
  
Jo sighed. “Take Hope back to your house for me? Also, get Finn for me.” Leaning in and giving Hope a kiss to her head, she looked briefly over her shoulder as she watched Shane walking toward both their houses together. Off Andrea’s nod, Jo focused her attention on the community’s approaching figurehead.  
  
“What in the hell is going on here? I’m hearing people have been killed by Saviors and that a woman is in labor.” Eyeing Jo, Deanna frowned. “Clearly someone has been mistaken.”  
  
“No, someone  _is_  in labor, just not me,” Jo assured. “Our friend Karen who was due any day now anyway. The Hilltop’s doctor, an obstetrician named Harlan Carson came here to take care of her, and me when my time comes in a few weeks.”  
  
“Oh, well, that was nice of him, but what is all this commotion about people dying?”  
  
Stepping up closer to the older woman, Jo placed a hand on her shoulder and then gestured Jesus over. “Why don’t we discuss this in the privacy of your home and we let the others clean up and unpack our belongings from our vehicles, and then I can introduce you to Karen, her husband Tyreese and Dr. Carson?”  
  
Deanna nodded. “That would be best. We don’t need the residents to be unduly stressed. They’re an easily restless bunch as it is.”  
  
Jo forced a pleasant smile. “Exactly.”  
  
“Oh—Aaron. It’s so lovely to see you again.” Deanna greeted, just noticing him and quite possibly choosing to overlook the blood on him.  
  
Aaron nodded and barely attempted any semblance of a smile. “You too, Deanna.” With a look to her husband, he greeted him as well. “Reg.”  
  
“You all look like you’ve been through something awful,” Reg stated the obvious.  
  
“And we’re going to discuss it in private, dear—away from prying eyes,” Deanna insisted. “You know how these people get with gossip. It turns into a game of telephone.”  
  
“True.”  
  
Noticing Daryl and Merle sauntering up the road with Tara and the girls, Jo smiled a little in relief to see the latter were okay; at least physically, anyway. As she began to head up the road toward the townhouse, Merle stepped in front of her, Jesus and the Monroe family.  
  
“I hear y’all got a little cemetery or something here for your dead,” he stated. “You got extra room there ‘cause we got a chick and a spick to bury.”  
  
Jo subtly rolled her eyes.  
  
Deanna nodded and gestured ahead of them. “The last house at the end of this road, on the right, behind the shrubbery,” she replied. “Our cemetery is there.”  
  
“Thanks,” Daryl grunted, taking the more polite, less brusque and offensive route than his big brother.  
  
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Reg offered kindly.  
  
As the brothers Dixon turned and headed back toward the direction they’d come from, Tara and the girls sidled up beside Jo.  
  
“You girls okay?” Jo asked, looking between them both. Off their nods, she pulled them closer and kissed the tops of their heads. “You see Andrea heading up the other end of this road? Follow her. I have some things to do right now, okay?”  
  
“Okay,” Sophia replied.  
  
Mika, however, looked curiously up at Deanna. “You run this place?”  
  
Deanna smiled. “With some help.”  
  
The eleven-year-old twisted her lips in thought and gave a look around at her surroundings. “I like it here.”  
  
Watching as Tara began to lead Sophia and Mika away, Jo turned her focus back to the Monroes, who seemed amused by Mika and no longer so on edge about what they were going off to discuss. Thankfully it was the little things, because the lighter expressions on their faces seemed to put at ease those residents who beginning to retreat from their porches and from behind their windows to resume whatever they had been doing.  
  
Walking along, Jo shot Jesus a smirk.

 

* * *

  
Jesus had done most of the talking, explaining what had happened with the attack from the outpost Saviors, but how every single one of them was dead except for one survivor who surrendered and offered to go to the Sanctuary to confirm Negan was dead and take that information back to his outpost. Not in a position to doubt if the Savior was being honest about his intentions because of Karen going into labor. Jo reaffirmed that there would be that need to band together with a few members of the other communities along with members from the Sanctuary to seek out those outposts and spread the word about the changes to be made to how things have been done.  
  
Jo could tell that there were details Jesus was leaving out because they both could tell Deanna and Reg weren’t the types that would be open to those kinds of details. They were like ostriches and preferred to keep their heads in the sand in and when possible. Jo could definitely see how easy it was to realize that the Monroes really were just figureheads of the community. Any real issues regarding security and safety and anything else of major importance had been deferred to Shane once he assumed the position of constable.  
  
Following that meeting, Jesus followed Jo out and both of them stopped into the infirmary to check in on how Karen was doing. And, while she was progressing just fine and both mother and baby weren’t in any distress, labor seemed far from over, according to Dr. Harlan Carson. As for Tyreese, he just seemed anxious, but in a good way, and found the opportunity to joke about how his dark skin would easily hide the bruises Karen was gonna be giving him from squeezing his hand so tight for as long as labor took for her.  
  
As they left the infirmary, Jo took lead as she and Jesus headed first to Shane and Andrea’s house. It was still light out, so no lights were on inside the house yet to indicate everyone was gathered there. The only hint was spotting Mika with Luke on the front steps.  
  
Giving the youngest of her adoptive daughters a quick ruffle of her hair, Jo ascended the steps with Jesus in tow as they both walk straight into the house without bothering to knock. For one, Jo just wasn’t used to having to knock anymore, what with having lived so communally for over a year; at the prison, on the road and at Mount Vernon. Inside the immediate living space, several people, including Shane, were gathered on or around the couch. Beyond that, others had made themselves at home by sitting around the dining table while Michonne seemed to be assisting Andrea with cooking a meal to feed everyone that had come from Mount Vernon to live in Alexandria permanently or were from the Hilltop and were just visiting. Shane and Andrea’s on-the-road buddies Abraham, Rosita and Eugene were also present and it made Jo feel a bit more at home to see so many people of different walks of life, who had decided they were all family with each other, gathered together in one place for a meal. It was one of the things she had missed about the prison and would miss about living at Mount Vernon.  
  
Even though they would have their own homes, Jo didn’t want her extended family to live so separately. Once she and Rick were settled next door with the kids and Finn, she wanted the others to feel comfortable walking right in without knocking and to make themselves at home like everyone was doing now.  
  
The icing on the cake at the moment was seeing Sophia holding Hope in her arms again.  
  
Joining Andrea and Michonne at the kitchen island to see what was for dinner—spaghetti, by the way—was lovely, too. It was nice for Jo to see both of her friends getting to know each other and hit it off so easily. They seemed to have similar backgrounds, which helped; both having been lawyers in the old world. While Jo offered to help with anything in regard to the meal, both women preparing it quickly shot her down and insisted she sit and rest; to make the most of her last month of pregnancy. Jo obliged by pulling up a seat at the island and smiling over at Sophia who seemed to be in her element as she cuddled her young stepsister.  
  
As dinner was starting to be served, the front door opened an in walked Rick; freshly showered, wearing clean clothes except for those damn faded black jeans of his that were like a second skin, and with his beard a little more trimmed up. His hair seemed damp still, judging by how slicked back and wavy it looked instead of the normal bounce of loose curls here and there atop of his head.  
  
Swiveling in her seat upon the kitchen island stool, Jo smiled a small but warm smile at him when she noticed him and waved him over. Once he was standing at her side, she watched how he had reverted into that position of the observer; of just watching everyone else and wearing that façade of everything being fine while under the surface Jo knew he wasn’t completely fine. He smiled when appropriate and joined in on conversation he was pulled into, but he opted to keep mainly to himself. Having taken the empty stool beside Jo, he gratefully took a plate of spaghetti from Andrea and then ate in relative silence.  
  
From what Jo had gathered since arriving back from the Monroes’ townhouse to Shane and Andrea’s house was that anything belonging to Rick, Jo, Finn or the girls had already been removed from the truck and van and put in the house next door, but that the rooms hadn’t been claimed yet by anyone. Also, Morgan and the Dixon brothers were absent because they were still busy digging graves and burying Crystal from the Hilltop as well as José, so plates of food were being set aside for those three men.  
  
“Is there enough left in the pot?” Rosita inquired. “I’ll take some leftovers to the infirmary. It might be a long night for everyone there and they might forget to take the time to eat.”  
  
“I’ll whip up some extra. There’s still sauce but I’ll need to open another box of noodles to cook,” Andrea replied.  
  
Conversation around the open concept living space spanned all different topics over the course of dinner and well after, but Rick didn’t stay long to take part any further. He politely thanked Andrea and Michonne for a wonderful meal and brought his plate to the sink, which he rinsed off despite Andrea’s insistence that there was a dishwasher for that.  
  
Following Rick with her eyes, Jo watched him head down the back hall which she knew lead toward half bath, a laundry room and to the garage.  
  
Pulling herself up to her feet, Jo pushed her plate aside, which Michonne took from her, and quickly excused herself as she followed Rick at a distance. She knew he knew she was following him, but he made no obvious acknowledgment of it as he opened the door into the garage and flicked on the light via the wall switch.  
  
“Shut the door behind ya,” he muttered to her.  
  
Jo obliged, and then stepped carefully down into the thick of the garage.  
  
Rick walked several steps forward and pressed a button on a nearby side panel which caused the garage door to slide up on its own. His blue eyes watched as the door lifted from the concrete floor and rolled up and back along the garage’s ceiling with a subtle, mechanical hum. When it came to a full stop, it lurched slightly and Rick simply snickered.  
  
“Automatic garage doors,” he spoke quietly. “I didn’t even have a garage at my house with Lori and Carl. Just a driveway and a shed in the backyard for my lawnmower and whatever tools I had for taking care of the house. We didn’t have air conditioning then either. When it got too hot, we just opened the windows and turned on the fans. We thought it’d be nice to eventually get a pool in the backyard; someplace Carl could hang with his friends during the summer months. It would’ve been great during cookouts, like the 4th of July. When he was younger, we had one of those blue, hard plastic kiddie pools you can fill up with water from the garden hose in less than ten minutes. In the summer, after Carl had gone to bed, and when open windows and oscillating fans just didn’t cut it, Lori and I would go outside and just sit all cramped up in that damn kiddie pool, drinking chilled beers in our underwear and not caring as we got bit up by mosquitoes.”  
  
Jo remained quiet as Rick recounted a fond memory. The entire time he spoke, his back was to her, but she knew he’d eventually turn around and speak more directly to her about what was really on his mind.  
  
So, she waited.  
  
“I used to smoke,” he remarked, out of seemingly nowhere. “I was never a chain smoker or anything like that. It was always more of a social thing. I quit before Carl was born, though.”  
  
There was an awkward silence in the air and Jo sensed that maybe Rick was expecting some sort of verbal reaction out of Jo about his past vice. “Oh, okay,” she said, wincing at how lame it sounded leaving her lips.  
  
“I started again last fall,” Rick continued, turning to slightly face Jo. “But I only did it once in a great while. I think, since moving to Mount Vernon, I’ve smoked five or six times. I can’t remember the exact amount of times.” Lifting his gaze upward more, he looked upon Jo’s patient face with guilt across his. “I smoked my last cigarette this morning. Technically I ended up sharing it with Mike. We had a nice talk on the piazza before we left Mount Vernon.”  
  
“Rick.”  
  
He looked at her more fully. “Hmm?”  
  
There were a few things she could’ve replied with, but instead she simply shrugged and smiled supportively. “All of that is in the past now,” she remarked, taking a step forward. “Everything leading up to this moment—right here and now—is in the past. The people we were, and the people we knew and loved; they’re gone. Anything and everything we had to do to get where we are now is in the past.” Taking one of his hands in hers, she used her free hand to gesture in the direction of their new home next door. “That house just there is the start of something new. It’s our reset button.”  
  
Rick looked to his right, at the window that looked out at the garage of their house next door. “The things I did today, when we got attacked…”  
  
“Are in the past,” Jo concluded. Placing her free hand aside his face, she focused his gaze back upon her and smiled warmly again at him. “We’ve both done some shit. We’ve witnessed what each other is capable of doing when pushed to our breaking points and when we gotta do whatever is necessary to keep our friends—our  _loved ones_ —safe. It gets scary.  _We_  get scary. But we do it, because we have to and also because it gets shit done.” With a sigh, she shook her head; watching as his gaze drifted down between their bodies. “I don’t care what you did today. I care that you came home. Because that’s what this is now, isn’t it? Home.  _That_  house is our home and that home is where our past ends and where our future begins, you understand me?”  
  
With a slowly increasing smile, Rick nodded his head. “Yeah, I understand you.”  
  
“Good.” Standing on tiptoe, Jo placed her hands on his shoulders and kissed him briefly upon the lips. “And that whole thing about you smoking while we were living at Mount Vernon; I already knew about that.”  
  
“Seriously?” he asked; his shoulders slumping.  
  
“Yeah,” she nodded. “While I’ve never been a fan of smoking and would’ve appreciated you being forthright about it with me, it never really bothered me. I knew it was only a sometime thing and was just thankful you didn’t do it in front of me.”  
  
Rick shook his head and chuckled. “I don’t deserve you.”  
  
Jo shrugged and grinned back at him. “It’s definitely debatable.”  
  
With a roll of his eyes, Rick threw an arm around her shoulder and pulled her in for a hug. “Woman, I swear you’ll be the death of me,” he muttered with a sly grin before lowering his lips to hers.

 


	67. Begin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, here it is, the final chapter. It's taken a little over two years but I got here and it's so terribly bittersweet to say goodbye to this story, but this is where I needed to end it. I want to thank all of those who have bookmarked this story, reviewed, shared with me about your all-night marathon reading sessions and how much you loved Jo, as I have loved her. Of course, Jo and Rick's journey isn't quite over. Not technically, since there will be a sequel, and it will be called "We Can Hope", so keep an eye out for that in either the coming weeks or months. I'm sure on the timeline for starting it yet since there are plotlines to further flesh out.
> 
> I will be focusing next on resuming my other story "The World We Live In" as well as beginning a new story, to be (tentatively) named "Roads Not Taken" which picks up at the very beginning of the Walking Dead series. Kinda like going back to basics...
> 
> Anywho, with that being said and with not knowing what else I can say, I truly hope you enjoy this final chapter and, as always, please R&R!
> 
> xoxo —Holly  
> 

_ _

_“What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.”_ — T. S. Eliot

* * *

  
  
Three weeks.  
  
That’s how long it took before life finally settled down in Alexandria for everyone living there; that included those that had already been residents and those newly arrived from Mount Vernon. For the Mount Vernon transplants, it wasn’t just settling into their new homes, but it was also getting to know so many new people that they now interacted with on a regular basis as well as living lives more akin to those they’d been used to living in the old world and not one of them took it for granted. Rick’s group knew how easy it was to lose a place they felt was secure so it was very hard to not feel a little on edge at the beginning.  
  
Rick and Jo moved into the house at the end of the road, next door to Shane and Andrea, that very same night all of them arrived, while Karen was still in labor. Because they hadn’t unloaded and put together the crib they had brought with them from Mount Vernon and with all the excitement of so many new people around her that night, Rick and Jo had Hope stay with Andrea and Shane, as not to throw too much at her too soon. Sophia and Mika picked their bedrooms; with Sophia opting for the front bedroom upstairs that had the best view of the entire community from their house. That’s what the teenager claimed she liked it for, but Jo suspected the girl was thinking more tactically. After everything she’d survived, witnessed and been forced to do—all those things she’d learned and picked up on in order survive in this new world with all the threats out there; Sophia wanted to be able to see what was coming before it got to her so she could prepare for the worst. It was bittersweet realizing that was where Sophia’s head was at. Part of Jo was proud that she was thinking ahead and could handle herself and would grow up with a good head on her shoulders, but part of Jo was also sad that Sophia was just at that point where she wasn’t young enough to be coddled anymore and couldn’t have the childhood she deserved.  
  
Mika, on the other hand, was still just a child; no more than two years away from becoming a teenager. Whereas Sophia had taken a more active role in many situations, like when they were making their way through DC or when they were clearing Mount Vernon of all those walkers, Mika had been held back and kept out of harm’s reach. Mika had been afforded the chance to live more naively and not have to experience the same horrors. She was still a child and the new world hadn’t broken her just yet. Picking her room came down to simply liking the bed that was already in it and wondering where would be the perfect place for a dollhouse if one could be found for her somewhere down the line.  
  
Finn took the bedroom downstairs, just off the kitchen, which was technically the master suite, because the en suite bathroom was so large and it had a larger walk-in closet as well. Rick and Jo were more than content with the second larger room in the house, which was upstairs with its own en suite that happened to be considerably smaller. They figured they had the entire house to spread out and make their own, plus they wanted to sleep closer to the children, and Finn deserved his own personal space amidst it all.   
  
That night they barely slept at all.  
  
There were so many things on their minds.  
  
Getting used to sleeping in new beds, in new rooms, felt strange. At some point during the night, Mika ended up coming into Sophia’s room to sleep with her; having been so used to sharing not only a room but also a bed for so long. Finn tossed and turned as well, at one point just getting up and walking around the downstairs; opening and closing the fridge, playing with the kitchen faucets and then putting in a disc from the third season of the 1970s  _Wonder Woman_  TV series into the DVD player. Rick and Jo were lying awake, making conversation, and just listening to any sounds in the house beyond their bedroom door. They heard Mika leaving her room and they could hear Finn downstairs, but barely. At Mount Vernon they heard every creak of a floorboard or squeak of a door hinge. If someone coughed downstairs, it echoed off the walls and the sound traveled. Sometimes it was just the old mansion itself settling. But this house they were in now was virtually new. Nothing creaked or squeaked, the walls were thicker, and there was nothing to settle.  
  
Except for them.  
  
Eventually sleep did consume them all, and Rick was the first one to rise the following morning. He quietly made his way into his and Jo’s bathroom to piss and wash his hands with the door closed as not to wake her. Barefoot and shirtless, he padded out of the bedroom and down the hall to poke his head into Sophia’s room, finding both girls still fast asleep and curled up together on Sophia’s twin bed; somehow neither one looked like they would fall off. On his way downstairs, Rick paused and just looked around for a moment; taking in how oddly familiar this all felt because it reminded him of when he would rise early in the morning before Lori had to wake up and make sure Carl got ready on time for school. His routine usually meant getting up and starting coffee and then going to grab a shower before Lori, because she took longer and usually ate up most of the hot water.  
  
He enjoyed the stillness and the quiet of mornings before anyone else awoke. The peace of a brand new day was like a crisp autumn day. There was nothing else like it. And now, in this new house, with an entirely new family, it felt like this had always been his life. Of course, he knew, once he stepped outside the house, the rest of the world would come crashing back in and he’d have to face the craziness of the day before.  
  
Stepping into the kitchen, Rick immediately spotted Finn’s feet hanging over the edge of the couch in the living room; having fallen asleep with the TV still on, judging by how the  _Wonder Woman_  DVD menu was still running. Walking into the living room, Rick looked around for the remote and turned the DVD off once the remote was found on the floor below the couch; probably from falling out of Finn’s hand at some point. The sudden cease of low noise coming from the TV entered into Finn’s consciousness and he woke with a start. Lifting his head, he looked around to remember where he was and then nodded at Rick when he realized his brother-in-law was standing there. Both men greeted each other with a casual “good morning” and then made small talk while Finn continued to fully wake up and Rick went about looking through the cupboards for some coffee.  
  
After the coffee was made and the brothers-in-law were enjoying their first cup of the beverage in months, that was actually fresh and not instant, the rest of the house seemed to come alive as everyone else began to wake up.  
  
The first thing Jo wanted to know was if either Rick or Finn had heard anything about Karen and if her baby had been born. Forgoing breakfast and opting for only tea, Jo poured it into a travel mug and left the house and made a beeline for the infirmary where she found Tara sitting on the front porch with Alexandria’s doctor, Denise Cloyd. After an exchange of pleasantries, Jo got to the heart of the matter an asked about Karen and received big smiles from both women.  
  
Just after four that morning, Karen had finally given birth to her son; a bouncing baby boy that weighed in at eight pounds and nine ounces. Karen and Tyreese had chosen to name their son Isaac Richard Williams, whose middle name was in honor of Rick, and Rick was beyond honored when he found out and even more so when he and Jo were asked to be Isaac’s godparents; to take care of him as one of their own should something ever happen to them. Although Rick and Jo were adamant that Isaac wouldn’t lose his parents for many years to come, they still agreed to the request made of them without a second thought.  
  
The rest of the day was spent bringing the rest of their belongings into their new homes. Denise had offered to be roommates with Tara; the two of them clearly having hit it off with each other right away. Morgan and Michonne moved into one of the smaller homes that had been brought into the community when the walls to Alexandria had been expanded months before. Daryl and Merle moved into the extra bedrooms in the house that Eugene had been living in by himself and barely a day into that living situation and it looked like it wouldn’t work well for long merely because of how Merle was. Eugene seemed incredibly introverted who liked his personal space whereas Merle was very extroverted and didn’t know the meaning of personal space. As for Tyreese, Karen and now Isaac, once they were ready, the house across the street from both Rick and Jo’s house as well as Shane and Andrea’s, and also the Anderson home, but faced the pond, was available to them. It had sat empty since the walls had come down and the walkers made their way inside the community. The house had been previously occupied by Shelly Neudermeyer and her family. When her family was attacked and killed by walkers, and after the walkers had all been eventually done away with, Shelly couldn’t bring herself to live in the same house anymore and instead moved into one of the townhouses lived in by other women who were single and lost their families or had been turned into widows before and after the apocalypse.  
  
Jesus had gone back to Hilltop with Aaron and the rest of their people who had made the trek to Alexandria, except for Dr. Harlan Carson who was going to stay the week to make sure Karen and Isaac were doing okay, as well as offer his services to any women in need of a proper examination, since he was an OB-GYN, after all. That night, with the crib from Mount Vernon put together by Finn in what would be Hope’s bedroom in their new house, Hope stayed with them that night and it went thankfully quite well. She didn’t fuss too much when she was put to bed and slept straight through the night.  
  
The day after that, Rick made the dreaded trip back to Mount Vernon with Daryl at his side to give the bad news about José to Lewis and Barb, primarily. It was those two, after all, that saw their fallen friend more as family than the others. Since Mike and Ryan had lived with José for months with Lewis and Barb before Rick found them in that McMansion, father and son took the news to heart but seemed to except it and were just grateful no one else had died and that Karen had given birth to a healthy son. They all planned to make the visit to Alexandria fairly soon to see the place, but wanted to wait until once Jo had also given birth so they could see both babies and would only have to make the one trip for a while. Part of the reasoning was to wait out the threat of other possible attacks from outposts that hadn’t gotten the memo or  _did_  and weren’t willing to go down without a fight.  
  
At the end of the first week in Alexandria, King Ezekiel himself paid the community a visit with several of his “knights” to discuss how all the communities would be going forward together with trade and with how they would quell any rumblings of dissention within the newly Negan-free Sanctuary and its outposts. Jesus and Aaron arrived a few days after that to discuss the same thing but it was Dwight, Gavin and Laura arriving from the Sanctuary that both put most of Alexandria on edge because of the past dealings with the Saviors, but also got the ball finally moving with squashing the unrest with the outposts.  
  
Unsurprisingly, change from the old ways to the new ways at the Sanctuary hadn’t happened overnight and there had been quite a bit in-fighting amongst its residents; those who had been afforded more perks because of being a soldier of Negan’s not acclimating as well to pulling their equal weight versus those who had been so used to being at the bottom of the barrel, so to speak, and now didn’t have do more grunt work for less, especially since they now had equal rights to medicine and medical treatment from the other Dr. Carson—Harlan’s older brother. Fortunately, any attempts at uprisings against the new way of life were prevented by the majority who agreed with and preferred the new way of life.  
  
At the beginning of week two in Alexandria, the teams were agreed upon for who would be going on the so-called “peacekeeping missions.” From Alexandria it was Rick, Shane, Daryl, Michonne, Tobin and Aiden. From Hilltop it was Jesus, Aaron, Wesley and Eduardo. From the Kingdom it was King Ezekiel, Richard, Alvaro, Dianne and Jerry. Then, from the Sanctuary it was Dwight, Laura, Gavin, Gary and Mark. The vehicles they would be traveling in were outfitted with spare panels from Alexandria’s wall expansion; welded to or drilled into one side of the vehicles to act as an added barrier against any possible gunfire while they were inside the vehicles should the outposts shoot first and ask questions later or just shoot anyway. Though, with twenty people banded together from four different communities, and armed heavily, the “Peacekeepers” were definitely intimidating.  
  
Dwight took lead most times. Though, depending on the particular outpost and who those particular Saviors were more familiar with, sometimes Gavin, Laura or Gary approached first.  
  
Among all the outposts, only one actually fought back and even then they didn’t fight back well, primarily because they were outnumbered, twenty to eight. It had been an outpost originally led by Paula, the redhead Jo had slain in Negan’s suite. Word had traveled back to them that Paula had been killed and that Negan was dead and while they had been lying restlessly in wait for what to do next, they hadn’t actually prepared themselves for what they would do next. Their first reaction was to fight; to seek retribution and kill everyone they could. At the end of that skirmish, however, four of those eight Saviors wound up dead and another two only sustained minor wounds. As for the Peacekeepers, only Wesley was injured but Mark was killed after taking a gunshot to the chest and bleeding out.  
  
The four survivors from the outpost surrendered. The Peacekeepers decided that each community would take one of the survivors back to their own community; choosing instead so-called “rehabilitation” over any sort of imprisonment for how they fought back against the new world order.   
  
They wanted to change the world for the better and what better way to do that than immersion into the new way; to show these feisty Saviors how the world could and  _would_  be.  
  
The two critically wounded Saviors were taken to either the Sanctuary or the Kingdom, simply because their doctors could treat them better than either Harlan could at Hilltop or Denise could at Alexandria. Mount Vernon was left out of the mix because there was only a few of them there now. As for Alexandria, the Savior brought back with them was a young brunette woman in her late 20s or early 30s named Michelle, but preferred to be called Chelle. Although she was brought there to live as part of their community, she was initially kept locked up in a basement apartment of one of the townhouses at night. During the day she always had a chaperone and she wasn’t allowed a weapon of any sort.  
  
Then, just like that, it was week three in Alexandria for Rick’s group since they had moved in.

 

* * *

  
  
It was a Friday.  
  
In Alexandria keeping track of the passage of time had been easy because Deanna and her family had been there since the absolute beginning so they were never in the position of losing track. When the calendar for the first year of the apocalypse came to an end, they drew up calendars for the next year and now, although it was only about two years since the apocalypse began, they were on the third calendar year and it was currently Friday, the 18th of May, 2012.  
  
After three weeks of settling in for the Mount Vernon transplants, all residents getting used to the population change and the tentatively successful subduing of any and all unrest among the outposts, Deanna had called for a community meeting in the church where she announced two things.  
  
Firstly, she and Reg would be hosting a party at their house to finally welcome all the newcomers and for both old and new residents to get to know each other better, if they hadn’t already. There would be drinks, finger foods and music and it was promised to be a grand time. Secondly, there was the announcement that Deanna was asking Rick to be Alexandria’s second constable. With a growing population and the fact that both Rick and Shane had worked together for years as sheriff deputies back in King County, Georgia before the old world came to an end, and with how Rick was already a highly respected leader within his group from Mount Vernon, it only made sense to place him into this new position. Rick hadn’t been expecting this and was actually looking forward to not having to be in much of a leadership role anymore, but the leadership role always seemed to be thrust upon him no matter what he did or didn’t do. With so many eyes suddenly on him, being put on the spot like that, and with so many of those people he already knew and trusted him to maintain their safety, it was difficult to say no.  
  
So he didn’t.  
  
That afternoon, Sophia helped Jo give Hope a bath while Rick took his first unofficial patrol alongside Shane inside the community and outside its walls to check the perimeters. While he was checking in with those on guard duty, Jo was giving Hope an early dinner and then grabbing a shower. By the time Rick was making his way home, Jo was in their bedroom, wearing only her underwear with her arms folded atop her immensely bulbous stomach and scowling down at the dress laid out upon the bed before her. All the while her blonde hair clung damply down her back, between her shoulder blades.  
  
“Who pissed in your coffee?” Rick asked with a slight chuckle as he walked into their bedroom and quickly closed the door behind him when he realized how underdressed she was.  
  
“I can’t wear that dress.”  
  
“Why not? Not to sound like an asshole, but if Olivia can fit into it, so can you,” he reasoned. “Plus, it’s gotta be more comfortable than trying to wiggle into those maternity jeans you’ve been wearing that are about a size too small.”  
  
“No, it’s not any of that,” Jo replied. “I haven’t shaved my legs in forever and I can’t do it anymore.”  
  
Rick shifted his gaze down to her legs and could only barely make out any hair on them because of how fair it all was. Looking back up at her face, he smirked and then curled his finger at her. “C’mere.”  
  
Without another word, Rick led Jo into their small en suite bathroom. Closing both the seat and the lid to the toilet, he gestured for her to sit down and then grabbed for the can of shaving cream and the razor he’d been given from the pantry not long after they’d moved in and that he hadn’t actually used yet. With a small smile, Jo watched as Rick sat beside her on the ledge of the tub and lifted one of her legs up to rest across his knees. Silently, he uncapped the can and sprayed the shaving cream along the first leg and gingerly lathered it up before going about gently shaving it; front and back, just above the knee. Using an already damp washcloth from the shower she’d taken recently, Rick wiped away the residue and touched up spots he’d missed before repeating the process with the second leg.  
  
“Thank you,” Jo muttered appreciatively.  
  
“It was nothing.”  
  
“Everything you do is something,” she insisted.  
  
Rick looked up and held her gaze; giving a slight shrug. Holding onto her leg still, Rick lifted it up a bit and then he leaned down to meet it halfway before placing a kiss upon her kneecap. “Smooth as a baby’s bottom now. Happy?”  
  
“Very.” With a grin she added, “How could I ever repay you?”  
  
“Oh, I can think of a few ways.”  
  
“I’m sure you can.”  
  
“Well, since you’re clearly on the same wavelength as me, you can see it from my perspective that the baby is gonna be here in about a week, give or take, and it’ll be at least a couple months before either of us will have the energy for extracurricular activities.”  
  
Jo giggled. “Extracurricular activities?”  
  
Rick shrugged. “Thought it sounded a bit more interesting than just ‘fucking’.”  
  
“I’m fine with just fucking, and if we are then we’re doing it my way.”  
  
“Oh?”  
  
Raising an eyebrow, Rick watched the way Jo pulled herself up and then mimicked his gesture of curling her finger so that he would follow her this time. As he stood up and did just that, he watched as she walked up to their bed and picked up Olivia’s dress that she was borrowing for the party and tossed it aside onto the floor. When she climbed up onto the bed, she knelt facing the headboard and then grabbed onto it.   
  
“Minx,” he muttered with an impish grin, before climbing up onto the bed after her.  
  
Again, neither spoke.  
  
Rick simply unzipped his pants and pushed them halfway down his thighs. Reaching out, he pushed her damp hair off her back, falling forward over her shoulders, as he placed his hands upon her back; massaging it from her shoulder blades down to her hips where he used his thumbs to draw circles around the dimples above her ass. Slowly then, he hooked his fingers into her underwear and pulled it down over her hips and ass so that it came to rest mid-thigh on her as his pants did on him. With one hand on his shaft, he leaned forward slightly to reach around and rub her slowly with the pads of his index and middle fingers to get them both of their bodies more quickly into the mood.  
  
At the first sound of an initial sigh of contentment escaping Jo’s lips, Rick removed his fingers from her front and gripped her hip as he guided himself to her entrance. Moving both his hands onto her hips, he slowly pulled her back onto him as he pushed forward rather leisurely and then just holding her in that position for a moment. Then, he nearly pulled out all the way just as slowly before pushing in again, this time a hair faster and harder.  
  
“I’m not gonna break and you’re not gonna hurt the baby,” Jo mumbled, dipping her head down. “You don’t need to be so gentle.”  
  
“I’m just trying to make the most of it. If I go too quick, it’ll be over too quick.”  
  
“Well, we do have Deanna’s party to get— _ungh_ …” she cut herself off as she emitted a moan due to the way he suddenly angled himself with that next thrust.  
  
“We can be fashionably late,” Rick insisted.  
  
Tightening her grip on the headboard, Jo outstretched her arms as she pushed back against him and let out a soft mewl of pleasure when he began to thrust more deeply bust still a bit on the languid side.  
  
“Dammit, Rick,” she whined.  
  
He chuckled and leaned forward, placing a trail of kisses along her back. “Fine,” he sighed in response.  
  
Leaning up straighter, he gripped her hips a bit more tightly and finally picked up the pace; thrusting fast and deep before leaning forward once more but only to reach his hand around to her front again and roll her clit roughly between his fingers.  
  
“C’mon, baby,” he grunted, sweat beginning to bead along his hairline as their bodies rocked back and forth together. “C’mon.”  
  
A few more thrusts later mixed with that hip swivel she loved so much, Jo was starting to see stars as the beginnings of her orgasm arrived. Even though Rick orgasmed before she did, he was ever the gentleman to ride it out until she came. When she did and her body shook around him, he slipped out of her and fell back onto the mattress completely spent while she curled up on her side beside him.  
  
“I think I’m too worn out to go to that party now,” Rick muttered with a laugh.  
  
“Unh-uh, not after you shaved my legs and I can show them off without embarrassment.”  
  
Sitting up slightly, Rick slapped her thigh and ran his hand down her leg; enjoying how smooth it felt. “You mean my legs,” he teased; sitting up further so he could lean down and kiss her shin. Off Jo’s giggle, Rick sank back onto the mattress again and let out a contented sigh. “Do we really gotta go to this party?”  
  
“Yes,” she replied without hesitation.  
  
Rick sighed once more. “Ugh, fine.”  
  
Pushing herself to sit up, Jo scooted toward the edge of the bed and when she stood up she waddled into the bathroom with her underwear still halfway down her thigh. Closing the door behind her, Rick could soon here the toilet flushing followed by the sound of the sink’s faucet running. When she reemerged into the bedroom, her underwear was pulled all the way up and the only other thing she had on at the moment was a knowing smile.  
  
“What?” he wondered, sitting up again.  
  
“Nothing.”  
  
“Bullshit.”  
  
Jo shrugged. “Just thinking happy thoughts, I guess.”  
  
Rick snorted and sent her a mocking look. “Yeah, okay, Tinkerbell.”  
  
Stepping forward, Jo grabbed a pillow off the bed and went to smack Rick with it, but he caught it with both hands and used it to pull her closer so he could slap her ass.  
  
After a slight squeal, she gave him a playful shove to his shoulder. “Go take a shower already,” she commanded. “There’s a fine line between being fashionably late and just being an asshole.”  
  
With a sly smile, Rick got up and attempted to slap her ass again, but this time she was quick to react and stepped out of the way; instead using the pillow to hit him across his back as he sauntered off into the bathroom without bothering to close the door as he went to start his shower. Separated by being in two different rooms, Jo took that time to return her focus to getting ready for the party. First, she stared down at where she’d tossed Olivia’s dress, which had a slightly higher waist and a skirt that belled out enough to accommodate Jo’s stomach. She just hoped it wouldn’t be too tight on her stomach and allowed her some movement.  
  
Rubbing her stomach, she looked down at it and bit her bottom lip as a familiar feeling washed over her and brought a smile to her face. “Soon.”

 

* * *

  
  
Rick and Jo arrived to the party an hour later and weren’t actually fashionably late at all. There were plenty who arrived late to the Monroe townhouse well after them. So the adults could enjoy themselves, Sophia and another orphaned teen girl, a brunette named Enid, offered to stay at Rick and Jo’s house to keep an eye on the younger kids—Mika, Luke, and Sam Anderson—while primarily babysitting Hope and three-week-old Isaac; the latter due to it being Karen’s first attempt to finally leave the house since giving birth and to experience being a regular adult again and not just a mom. However, the entire time she was at the party, Karen kept worrying if Isaac was okay and it took, Tyreese, Jo, Rick and even Deanna to assure her that all would be okay. This kind of worry was common for new mommies but she didn’t have to ruin her night.  
  
While Jo still couldn’t partake in any drinking, it didn’t deter her from having some genuine fun, because very soon she would be cooped up indoors for a while once she gave birth again. This night was going to be her last hurrah, so to speak, and it turns out she wasn’t alone in not being the only adult not drinking because Karen was still nursing and didn’t want to get Isaac drunk via breastmilk and a few other Alexandrians were former alcoholics who had stopped drinking in the old world and somehow had the willpower to not let the new world turn them to drink again.  
  
For a most part it was a rather fantastic evening. There was awkwardness, of course; most from Mount Vernon just weren’t used to this level of social gathering anymore. There was electricity, air conditioning which helped keep the temperature down within the house with all the extra bodies creating extra body heat, cold drinks were being served with ice cubes, an array of finger foods and other potluck dishes brought by other guests were there for consumption and music played from the stereo while people chatted about seemingly normal topics, laughed and even danced a little. The other amount of awkwardness came from Abraham arriving with Savior transplant Chelle; whom Abraham was acting as chaperone of for the night so they could immerse her more into how society could be and show her life could be kinder when they all came together.  
  
It wasn’t a surprise that most people kept their distance from Chelle like she were a leper and talked about her in hushed tones behind her back while offering strained but polite smiles when she walked past. But Chelle actually seemed to be doing rather okay. As the night wore on she seemed more comfortable in her own skin and around the others; even going as far as to initiate small talk.  
  
“What happened to your finger?” Jo asked, eventually sidling up beside Chelle.  
  
The brunette looked down at her hand and then up at Jo with mild surprise; most likely she hadn’t been expecting anyone to initiate conversation with her or be so forthright instead of talking about bullshit like the weather or trying out new recipes from the rations they got from the pantry.  
  
“I stole gas from the Sanctuary to find my boyfriend.”  
  
“Did you find him?”  
  
Chelle shook her head. “No. Him and his group left our outpost a few months ago on a run, but they never came back. I went to the Sanctuary to ask for help rounding up a search party.” Chelle bowed her head and sighed. “Negan said, and I quote, ‘the Dick Brigade probably got served up as a meal for some dead fuckers and are now the  _dead_  Dick Brigade.’”  
  
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. About whatever happened to your boyfriend, that is,” Jo remarked. “Losing someone you love isn’t ever easy. You’d think nowadays we’d all be used to it by now and get over it faster, but we don’t.”  
  
Chelle shrugged as she cast a sideways glance at Jo, while nursing an iced tea since she was also not allowed to drink alcohol on top of going anywhere unsupervised or handle a weapon. “I’ve been paying close attention to everyone tonight and in the days that I’ve been here. One topic of interest keeps making its rounds; that you’re the one that killed Negan and brought the Sanctuary down to its knees. Is that true?”  
  
Jo remained silent for a moment, catching Rick’s eye briefly across the room before staring back at Chelle with little to no expression. “What if it is?”  
  
“Then…then I’d say… _holy_   _shit_. That you’re badass. You did what a lot of people only thought about doing, and that includes some Saviors I know… _knew_.” Chelle smirked slightly. “I thought about it once or twice, but it’s not like I was ever in a position to do anything about it.”  
  
Jo shrugged; neither confirming nor denying what she did.  
  
“How did you do it?” Chelle asked, going on the correct assumption that was responsible.  
  
Considering her answer, Jo smiled and opted for mystery. “Why don’t you come up with your own theories? Build up my legend.”  
  
Without another word, Jo walked away from Chelle; leaving her a bit more curious than she already was. Amused by this, Jo continued through the crowd of guests and slipped over to where Rick stood in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room.  
  
“What were you talking to Michelle about?” Rick inquired.  
  
“Oh, you know, girl things.”  
  
Rick scoffed. “Yeah right.”  
  
Jo simply shrugged and began rubbing her stomach.  
  
“How’re you feeling?” he continued, looking down at her hands.  
  
“Like I’m about to burst.”  
  
“Let me know if this gets to be too much for you. When you’re starting to feel tired, we’ll leave. You shouldn’t be on your feet for too long right now as it is, so close to the end.”  
  
“Mmhmm,” Jo nodded, biting her lips together and then ducking out of the dining room and out into the hallway. “Oh, here we go.”  
  
“Jo?”  
  
Jo turned to see that Rick had followed her and was looking at her quizzically. “Yeah?”  
  
“You okay? Do you wanna go home?”  
  
Shaking her head, Jo flashed a smile at him, but that smile suddenly faded and gave way instead to a look of surprise. “Oh shit.”  
  
Rick knitted his brow together. “What? What’s wrong?”  
  
Jo looked down and hiked up the skirt to her dress a little bit and focused on her legs; more importantly on the warm liquid running down from the inside of her thighs from the apex of her legs. Looking back up at Rick, she began to frown.  
  
Following her gaze down, Rick lifted her dress a bit more and noticed what she noticed. With his blue eyes widening, he looked her in the eye. “Now?”  
  
Jo nodded. “Yep.”  
  
Rick laughed and then sighed. “This had to happen now, before Harlan returned from Hilltop?”  
  
“It’s not like I planned it like this,” Jo replied. “Go grab Denise. I’m gonna go clean up a bit in the bathroom.”  
  
Rick hesitated. “Will you be okay if I leave you for a minute?”  
  
Shooting him a withering look, she rolled her eyes and walked off to the half bath off the hallway.  
  
_This is it_ , she thought.  _Here she comes_.

 

* * *

  
  
Thirty minutes later saw Jo in the same private room in the downstairs of the infirmary that Karen had been in three weeks prior; now wearing nothing more than a typical hospital gown. Since her water had broken, contractions had quickly increased with the intensity of pain and seemed to be arriving at a faster rate than the first time Jo was pregnant and in labor with Hope fifteen months ago. What made this time much easier were several things. For starters, there was no group of walkers outside the door trying to get inside the room to eat them, there was an actual doctor to deliver the baby in a better environment, and Rick was with her again, except this time he sat behind her with his legs propped up on either side of her while she gripped his kneecaps and he wrapped his arms just under her breasts.  
  
Calmly, Rick whispered words of encouragement in her ear well before it was even time to push even though it’s all her body craved at the moment. However, as Denise had informed, she wasn’t dilated enough yet so pushing was a no-go.  
  
Instead of walkers outside the room, there were some of their friends; either in the infirmary or literally outside on the porch. Karen and Tyreese had left the party to retrieve Isaac from Sophia’s care and informed the teen girl of what was going on with Jo. Excited and nervous about this, Sophia became antsy just waiting there at home so Enid told her she would stay with the other kids so Sophia could go to the infirmary to see how things were progressing. When she arrived a couple minutes later, Denise was still closed up in the private room with both Jo and Rick and had to get the update that nothing had happened yet from Andrea.  
  
Over the next hour, some friends left and others arrived to take their place for simple curiosity’s sake. After all this was an exciting time, not just for the parents, but for all of Alexandria, too. While Hope had been the youngest person in the community for a long while and had been the first baby ever to live inside the walls, Isaac was had been the first person  _born_  there. Now Rick and Jo’s new daughter would be born there, a mere three weeks later.  
  
In a world full of constant death and dying, so much new life was this amazing breath of fresh air.  
  
Instead of mourning the end of lives, they were actually able to celebrate the beginning of lives.  
  
Doors had closed and now others were opening because with new life came new possibilities; that this terrible, new world really didn’t have to be so bad and it could get better.  
  
Eventually, it was time to push.  
  
Those that were waiting just beyond the threshold that was the door leading into the private room knew it was time simply because that’s when Jo began to cry out in extreme pain. It began about a half hour after midnight and lasted off and on for only twenty.  
  
And then, all at once Jo’s wails of pain had ceased.  
  
Following a heavy silence that hung in the air like a dark rain cloud, a different wailing began.  
  
The sudden, infantile caterwauling broke through that rain cloud, parting it like rays of sun and those inside and outside the infirmary that were in close enough range to hear turned in the direction of the sound with bright smiles.  
  
No one’s smiles were as bright as Rick’s and Jo’s, though.  
  
Leaning tiredly back against Rick’s chest, Jo was overcome with perfect joy and love for her newborn daughter whom she held in her arms while Rick looked over her shoulder, down at their daughter; so completely filled with wonder.  
  
“She looks like Carl when he was born,” he commented; thinking fondly back on his first child and doing so for the first time without sadness laced in with the thought. “He screwed up his face the same exact way; always looked like he’d just eaten a lemon.”  
  
Jo chuckled, softly running the pad of her index finger along her daughter’s nose, lips and chin. “Must be a Grimes thing then.”  
  
“Must be.”  
  
Looking up from their daughter and over her shoulder to Rick, Jo smirked. “When she starts squinting her eyes and tilting her head from side to side there’ll be no doubting she’s yours.”  
  
Rick simply smiled happily in return; almost oblivious to the fact that Denise had left them in the room to give them a little bit of privacy. He was just too caught up in the wonder in his newborn daughter. And, although, he loved all his daughters with all his heart and would give his life for them in a heartbeat, this was his flesh and blood. She was his only child biologically related to him as well as Carl. If something happened to her, and she need a blood transfusion like he had done for Carl after he’d been shot, Rick could do that for her. Since Jo had the same blood type as Rick, there was that added bonus of never wondering which one of them could safely donate to her. There was also the simple lure of the fact that while he’d had a biological son, this was the first time he had a biological daughter; something that, all those years with Lori, he never thought he’d have.  
  
But here she was; yawning, trying to move her face toward her parents’ voice and attempt to open her eyes while still looking like she’d just sucked on a lemon.  
  
She was perfect.  
  
She was also still nameless.  
  
Soon Denise came back in with a smile and commented how more friends of Rick and Jo had seemed to be gathering outside to extend their well wishes to the “kinda sorta new parents” and sneak a peek at the new baby, but that she had advised them all to hold off until morning. Jo and baby would need rest soon after everything they’d physically just been through; giving birth and being born, respectively. Also, it just so happened that it was time for the baby’s first feeding and although it had been over a year since she’d last done it, breastfeeding was akin to riding a bike for Jo and she was able to do it with more ease this time. What helped was this child seemed to take to her tit without issue like Hope had. She really was Rick’s kid, because Rick had no issues with her breasts either.  
  
That night, Rick stayed at the Infirmary; sleeping on the twin bed out in main room which was typically used for anyone who was wounded or sick, and convalescing. He didn’t want to go home just yet; at least not until Harlan arrived from Hilltop to sign off on Jo being okay to go home and Denise assured him she didn’t mind if he hung around for however long that might be. Denise and Tara were living together in the Infirmary and it seemed a relationship was beginning to form there, so if Tara was comfortable with Rick around, then Tara was, too.  
  
Throughout the night, the baby was awake several times. Only when it was clear that she needed a feeding did anyone wake Jo. For the other moments, when she restless or cold or just wanted attention, then the latter is what was given to her by Rick, Tara or Denise.  
  
Well after daybreak was when the baby had her first bowel movement and Rick was more than ready to do the honors of changing her. Around the same time, Jo had woken up and, with assistance from Rick, because she was still sore, went to the bathroom and showered; borrowing some clothes from Tara to wear until she could get her own things from home to wear. After eating her own breakfast and then breastfeeding the baby again, there came a knock at the front door to the Infirmary.  
  
In walked both Sophia and Mika, along with Shane and Andrea who had brought Hope with them. As they were all introduced to the new baby, they were all also surprised to learn she didn’t have a name yet; although Rick and Jo alluded to having an idea in their head.  
  
After only an hour, the first group of visitors left and more were starting to show up. However, Sophia still hanging around and wanted some alone time to visit with her adoptive parents and new stepsister without anyone else around. Jo was sitting up in bed with Rick sitting at her feet; both facing Sophia who was seated comfortably in the chair that was pulled up beside the bed, where she was expertly cradling the baby in her arms.  
  
“So, what’s the name you’ve been thinking about giving her?” the teen asked, just staring down at her littlest sister.  
  
Jo smirked, taking lead off a nod from Rick. “Well, with Hope, her middle name was given in honor of Dale, for how he sacrificed his life to help save everyone in C Block the day Hope was born, which was when he died,” she began, noting how Sophia seemed to give a nod of acknowledgment as she recalled the events of that day. “So, Rick and I thought we’d sort of continue that tradition in naming our new baby in honor of not just one but two people who gave their lives for the sake of everyone else. The name is both already an actual name and not something we just made up by combining two names, but that’s kinda what it is, too.”  
  
Sophia looked up curiously at both her parents.  
  
“Laurel,” Rick announced. “Equal parts Lori and Carol.”  
  
“After my mom?” Sophia questioned with a glimmer of a tear in her eye.  
  
Rick nodded. “Yeah.”  
  
“Lori gave up her life to save mine, to save all of us,” Jo remarked; the horribly sad memory creating a slight ache in her chest. “Your mother did the same for you and, in doing so, all of us. So, Lori…Carol… _Laurel_. Also, in ancient Roman times, the laurel wreath was a symbol of success and peace, and I’d say that the issue with the Saviors has been successful and all these communities are— _hopefully_ —entering a time of peace. The name just feels too perfect.”  
  
Sophia agreed with a nod. “Laurel Grimes. I like it.” Then, she asked, “What about a middle name?”  
  
Jo shrugged. “We hadn’t really thought on that.”  
  
Studying the way Sophia furrowed her brow in thought, Rick raised an eyebrow curiously at her. “Why? You have a suggestion?”  
  
“Maybe.”  
  
Rick smirked. “Well,” he gestured to her. “Let’s hear it.”  
  
Licking her lips, Sophia looked down at Laurel and smiled a small smile. “Andrea.”  
  
“Andrea?” Rick repeated.  
  
“Yeah,” Sophia confirmed, looking back up at both adults. “I mean, if you want to keep with the theme of honoring people who did so much for you, Andrea took care of Hope with Shane. She protected her and fed her and kept her warm. She loved her and was raising her as her own and would’ve continued to do so if we’d never showed up. Andrea gave herself to being a mother to Hope. If there was ever a way to thank her for all she did, I’d say this would be it.”  
  
Rick and Jo looked at each other, considering Sophia’s suggestion.  
  
“Laurel Andrea Grimes?” Jo said out loud. With a smile, she shared a nod with her husband. “I like how it sounds. Rolls well off the tongue.”  
  
“There’s just one other thing,” Rick commented, sharing a knowing look with Jo before they both shifted their gazes back upon both the teen and their newborn. “We’re gonna ask Daryl to be Laurel’s godfather, but we’d like you to be her godmother.”  
  
Sophia was instantly surprised. “Me? But I’m not even a grown-up.”  
  
“You will be in a few short years.”  
  
“With how well you used to take care of Hope at the prison and even now how well you are with Laurel, plus you and Daryl were our only witnesses on the road when we married each other; it makes the most sense to us,” Jo clarified.  
  
Sophia practically beamed at the honor bestowed upon her. “Okay. I’ll be her godmother and the best big sister. And, if something ever happened to both of you, I would take care of her like my own but hopefully nothing like that happens for a very long time or ever.”  
  
“Sounds good to me,” Jo quipped.  
  
Looking up at Rick, Jo reached her hand out and smiled when he took it and gave it a squeeze. After he mouthed to her that he loved her and she reciprocated the sentiment, they returned their focus to their eldest and youngest daughters.  
  
Their thoughts began to swirl with all the possibilities life held for them and their children now; how they would work to help rebuild the world for them and make it somewhere they could all thrive.  
  
This would be where their story truly started.  
  
This was how their lives would begin.  
  
Everything was going to change.

 

* * *

  
  
**_Twenty-one years later…_ **

  
  
Although the sun hadn’t completely set below the horizon, the quarter moon and a few stars were already visible in the sky. Combined with a breeze that was neither warm nor cold and carried with it the scent of distant magnolias, the world held an almost ethereal quality to it.  
  
Throughout the slightly weathered streets of Alexandria, all was quiet since most had retired to the safety and comfort of their homes or guard posts for the evening, but there was one person who refused to move from the same spot where she had been sitting for a few hours now.  
  
Her hair was long and blonde and cascaded down her back; only occasionally ruffled by that slight breeze. Her posture was slouched while her calloused fingers absentmindedly played with a tiny twig. Her breathing was steady although it seemed to go back and forth between being shallow and deep. While she appeared calm and stone-faced on the outside, on the inside she was a raging sea of pain, grief and anger. Her eyes were puffy and red from crying, but tears hadn’t fallen since she’d first sat down where she was a few hours before. There didn’t seem to be any more tears left in her to shed. She was sure her tear ducts had run dry.  
  
Before her was Alexandria’s second graveyard, which had been created years before when room ran out in the first graveyard. Each grave was marked the same, with identical planks but with different names of those who had passed. Most graves were old and the ground settled with newly grown grass over them, but there were a few fresh graves which had been dug and filled with the recently deceased that very day.  
  
“Hey,” a man’s voice muttered from behind the blonde.  
  
With a sigh, she acknowledged who it was with a slight look over her shoulder. “Hey,” she repeated.  
  
“It’s getting dark.”  
  
“I’m aware.”  
  
“You should come inside now, have something to eat, grab a hot shower.”  
  
“I’m not hungry.”  
  
“You haven’t eaten since this morning, babe. You gotta have some—”  
  
“I said I’m not hungry,” she snapped.  
  
The man clenched his jaw, but nodded solemnly; understanding that she was grieving and trying to process what she had just lost.  
  
The  _people_  she had just lost.  
  
“Will you at least come inside?” he pleaded.  
  
The blonde sighed. “Okay,” she agreed after a moment.  
  
Taking a step forward, the man held out his hand to her and waited for her to accept it as she got up to her feet. Once she was standing, though, she took her hand back and wiped the back of her pants off. She shared a brief gaze with the man, frowned an expressionless frown and then glanced back down at the wooden grave markers.  
  
“I don’t mean to sound like an asshole, but they wouldn’t want you to hover at their graves like this.”  
  
“Chet—” the blonde began to argue.  
  
“I get your pain. I do. But you’re not alone in it,” the man —  _Chet_  — insisted. “Your family is suffering the same and they need you right now. They need you so all of you can get through this together.”  
  
She sighed and looked at Chet with tears somehow finding their way back to her eyes again. “I’m not sad. I’m angry. I want to cause pain.”  
  
Chet placed a hand on the small of her back. “I know. And you’ll get your chance, but you can’t be reckless about it. We can only go forward with clear heads. I mean, I know coming from me that sounds ridiculous, but it’s what we gotta do. Clearer heads prevail.”  
  
“My head  _is_ clear,” she insisted.  
  
“Yeah, I don’t think it is.”  
  
“Chet.”  
  
“ _Hope_.”  
  
The blonde glared at him with wet blue eyes.  
  
Hope Dale Grimes, in all her twenty-two year old splendor, stood there with balled fists at her sides as she looked away from Chet and once more to the graves of all her friends and family that had perished over the last two decades.  
  
Directly in front of them both were the two fresh graves she’d been sitting in front of for hours.  
  
The graves of her parents, Rick and Joanna Grimes.  
  
“Their deaths weren’t accidents,” Hope all but growled, “and I won’t let those responsible go unpunished. And those responsible better get ready for a fight ‘cause I’m bringing a war to their door.”  
  
“I know you’re angry,” Chet started to say, soothingly.  
  
“Oh, you think  _this_ is angry?” Hope chuckled, narrowing her gaze and leaning closer to him. “I haven’t even  _begun_  to get angry.”

 


End file.
